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Associate Research Professor Geoffrey Bove, DC, Ph.D., along with co-author Susan L. Chapelle, RMT, owner of Squamish Therapeutic Massage in Squamish, British Columbia, published an article last year in the Journal of Bodywork and Movement Therapies, which recently received a focus review in the Journal of the American Osteopathic Association.

The majority of surgeries lead to postoperative adhesions, and are the leading cause of pathologies such as bowel obstruction and infertility.  Moreover, up to 35% of operated people undergo reoperation for postoperative adhesions.

Bove’s and Chapelle’s paper, “Visceral mobilization can lyse and prevent peritoneal adhesions in a rat model,” presented the investigators’ experiments in which three groups of rats underwent intestinal and abdominal abrasions to induce postsurgical abdominal adhesions similar to those suffered by humans.  One group of rats received abdominal visceral manipulation on post-operative day seven; one group received no manipulation; and the third received it once daily beginning on post-operative day one.

After the rats were euthanized and abdominal incisions were made, photographs of the adhesions were given to two blinded investigators who rated the extensiveness of the adhesions in all groups.  It was concluded that visceral manipulation has a positive effect not only on lysing adhesions, but also of preventing them.

“Abdominal Visceral Manipulation Prevents and Reduces Peritoneal Adhesions,” the review of Bove’s and Chapelle’s article, can be viewed on the Journal of the American Osteopathic Association’s .

This month, Bove and Chapelle published a related paper, also in the Journal of Bodywork and Movement Therapies, titled “Visceral massage reduces postoperative ileus in a rat model.” (JBMT 2013, v 17, 83-88).