EFFECT OF SNAGS TECHNIQUES ON HEARING ABILITY AMONG THE PATIENTS WITH UPPER CERVICAL DYSFUNCTION

Background: Cervical spine is the upper most vertebral segment which is responsible for the weight transmission of head and brain, the cervical spine is divided into the upper and lower part. Any dysfunction to the cervical spine may lead to the misalignment to the vertebra commonly upper cervical joint complex. Many vital structures travels or passes through the cervical spine/ cervical vertebra / upper cervical joint complex, vertebral artery is the one of the important structure pass through it. There is a close relationship between the upper cervical (sympathetic) ganglion and C1-C2 spinal nerve, any pathological changes or dysfunction of the cervical spine including degeneration of the both disc and vertebra can cause sympathetic nerve irritation which lead to sympathetic symptoms. It may affect the hearing ability. The Aim of the study was to investigate the effects of SNAGS techniques on hearing ability among the patients with upper cervical dysfunction. Methodology: 62 subjects participated in the study. Hearing frequency was taken as an outcome measure which was recorded with u-Hearing audiometery app (Pure tone audiometery) prior to SNAGS techniques is given to the patients C1-C2 vertebra to the side it was stuck. The hearing frequency was compared with the post intervention hearing frequency. Data was analyzed using graph pad method. Descriptive statistics was used to summarize the variable. The paired t- test was done to see the effects of intervention on hearing ability /hearing frequency in our study population. Result: In this study we found the change in variables as observed with the mean of hearing frequency of the participants before the intervention was pre value of 25.98±4.25(Right Ear) , 26.71±4.35(Left Ear) and after the intervention the mean post value of 3.21±4.05(Right Ear) , 24.2±3.90(Left Ear).The result is significant at p<0.05 Conclusion: In this study, it was concluded that SNAGS techniques was significantly effective in improving the hearing ability in the patients with the cervical dysfunction.