Compared with placebo, no additional relief in pain was found for the active treatment (patellar strap and sports tape) during the functional tests, during sports, and 2 h after sports. A possible explanation for the finding that all orthoses – including the placebo condi-tion – seem to cause at least some decrease in pain is that by applying any orthosis to the knee the cutaneous struc-tures have been stimulated. This could have resulted in a change in nociceptive input what might have induced an analgesic effect (Farkas et al., 1997). As the effect of the patellar strap and sports tape on pain was somewhat stronger compared with the placebo condition (particu-larly evident in the first part of the study), the pressure exerted on the tendon might be causing the additional pain relief. It was already shown in a study investigating tennis elbow straps (Meyer et al., 2002) that the force applied by the orthosis might influence effectiveness. A change in taping method might be the reason why the placebo condition appears to be more effective in the sports-specific situation than the controlled environment. Despite thorough instructions on how to administer the elastic kinesiotape, the tape may have been more stretched when applied, what might have caused more
sensory input to the knee joint.