Acta Physiologica 186 Suppl 1, 247 (2006)

Abstracts

Joint Meeting of The German Society of Physiology and

The Federation of European Physiological Societies

March 26th-29^th, 2006, Munich, Germany

Active fascial contractility: Fascia is able to contract and relax in a smooth muscle like manner and thereby influence biomechanical behavior

R Schleip, W Klingler, F Lehmann-Horn

Angewandte Physiologie, Universität Ulm

Contraction of fascia - due to the activity of myofibroblasts - is already known to occur in wound healing and in pathological fascial contractures like Morbus Dupuytren. With immunohistological analysis we examined whether myofibroblasts are also present in normal human fasciae, such as the lumbar fascia, fascia lata, or plantar fascia. Basically we found significant amounts of myofibroblasts in all our tissues. Yet density was higher in younger patients and in areas with a strong crimp formation in the collagen fibers. For in vitro contraction tests we suspended strips of fresh rat fascia in an organ bath and tested for responsiveness to potential contractile agents. With mepyramine (the most common agonist in myofibroblast research) as well as with the hormone oxytocin we got clear contractile responses. The measured contraction forces were strong enough to result in significant influences on musculoskeletal dynamics when assuming a similar contractility in vivo (e.g. 38 N for the thoracolumbar fascia). Our findings suggest, that active fascial contractility may influence biomechanical behavior. This promises to have implications for the understanding of pathologies with an increased or decreased myofascial tonus and may offer new insights for fascia treatments such as osteopathy, Rolfing, or acupuncture.

Acta Physiologica, Official journal of the Federation of European Physiological Societies. Volume 186, Supplement 1, 2006, page 247.

ISSN 1748-1708, Online ISSN 1748-1716