Use of a device that applies external kneading-like force on the abdomen for treatment of constipation

Table 1 Bowel movements per week for every patient and for the whole group. Application of the Wilcoxon’s test for paired samples.

Pt. #	Baseline		Treatment		Increase %
	BM/week		BM/week
	Average	SD	Average	SD
1	1.3	0.58	2.9	0.29	119
2	1.3	0.58	6.6	1	394
3	1.3	0.58	3.3	0.65	150
4	2.7	0.58	6.9	1.31	159
5	1	0	2.9	0.79	192
6	1	0	3.9	1	292
7	2.0	1.00	3.8	0.83	92
8	1.3	0.58	3.7	0.65	175
9	1	0	3.4	0.79	242
10	1	0	4.1	0.9	308
11	1.3	0.58	4	1.13	200
12	1.7	0.58	3.3	0.87	95
13	1	0	3.4	0.79	242
14	1.3	0.58	4.3	1.07	225
15	1	0	4.3	1.29	325
16	2	1	4	0.95	100
17	2	1	3.8	1.47	92
18	2.7	0.58	4.3	1.36	59
19	1	0	4.6	0.67	358
20	1	0	4.2	0.39	317
21	1.3	0.58	3.6	0.67	169
22	1	0	3.8	0.62	275
23	1.3	0.58	3.5	0.67	163
24	1	0.71	4.8	1.9	383
25	1.3	1.41	4.7	1.66	250
26	1	0	2.9	0.29	192
27	1	0	2.9	0.29	192
28	1	0	2.9	0.29	192
29	1	0	3	0	200
30	1	0	2.9	0.29	192
Average	1.4	0.4	3.9	0.8	211
P<5×10-7

Table 2 Stool amount and consistency in baseline and treatment. Application of sign test.

Pt. #	Stool consistency		Stool amount
	Baseline	Treatment	Baseline	Treatment
1	Hard	Soft	Low	Low
2	Hard	Soft	Low	Regular
3	Hard	Soft	Low	Low
4	Hard	Soft	Low	Low
5	Hard	Hard	Low	Low
6	Hard	Soft	Low	Regular
7	Hard	Soft	Low	Low
8	Hard	Soft	Low	Low
9	Hard	Soft	Low	Regular
10	Hard	Soft	Low	Regular
11	Hard	Soft	Low	Regular
12	Hard	Soft	Low	Low
13	Hard	Soft	Low	Low
14	Hard	Soft	Low	60% Regular
15	Hard	Soft	Low	Regular
16	Hard	Soft	Low	Regular
17	Hard	Soft	Low	Low
18	Hard	Soft	Low	Regular
19	Hard	Soft	Low	66% Regular
20	Hard	Soft	Low	Regular
21	Hard	Soft	Low	33% Regular
22	Hard	Soft	Low	Regular
23	Hard	Soft	Low	36% Regular
24	Hard	Soft	Low	Regular
25	Hard	Hard	Low	Regular
26	Soft	Soft	Low	33% Regular
27	Soft	Soft	Low	55% Regular
28	Soft	Soft	Low	Regular
29	Soft	Soft	Low	Regular
30	Soft	Soft	Low	55% Regular
Better	23		21
Same	7		9
Worse	0		0
P	1.3×10-5		4.0×10-6

Table 3 CTT results for day 4, 7 and their sum. Application of Student’s t-test for paired samples and Pearson’s correlation coefficient.

	Markers count d 4 and 7			Markers count d 7			Markers count d 4
	B-L	Treatment	%	B-L	Treatment	%	B-L	Treatment	%
Average CTT	92.3	49.38	47	40.23	15.46	62	52.08	33.92	35
SD	32.35	31.30		17.71	19.0		16.14	17.47
K-S d1	0.168	0.139		0.123	0.212		0.114	0.177
K-S P2	>0.2	>0.2		>0.2	>0.2		>0.2	>0.2
Lilliefors P	>0.2	>0.2		>0.2	>0.1		>0.2	>0.2
Student’s
t-value		5.239		5.228				3.317
Student’s P		0.000208		0.000212				0.00614
Pearson’s r		0.570		0.569				0.313
Pearson’s P		0.042		0.042				0.298

¹Kolmogorov-Smirnov distance.

²Kolmogorov-Smirnov P-value.