Adelaide - Pasadena 5042
Treatment for Muscle Pain in the Back
Back pain is quite a common occurrence in today’s life, as we don’t move our muscles anything like we used to do any more.
There are very few people who have never experienced back pain at least once in their lives. That’s probably why we don’t think much about it when it does happen, and anyway in most cases it disappears quite quickly, so why worry?
Often clients who come to see us with acute muscular back muscle pain have had several warning signs of short pain episodes beforehand which they have simply ignored.
Acute and Chronic Muscular Back Pain Causes
It sometimes happens that a sudden seemingly minor bodily movement causes excruciating back pain, which forces a person to have to literally put his / her life on hold. This often sparks fear that a nerve is pinched, a disk ruptured or that he / she finally has contracted arthritis like the parents.
It is always best to first let your doctor rule out any serious underlying condition, but in most cases the most likely cause of back pain is found in your muscles: trigger points.
If you have already ignored several episodes of back pain, you are likely to have accumulated an impressive number of latent (sleeping) trigger points. At some point in time a minor movement, a slip or some unaccustomed exercise may activate these untreated trigger points, which in turn may begin sending out pain into your back (or somewhere else).
Chronic Pain in the Back
The longer you’ve had back pain the more likely it is that more than one muscle or trigger point are the cause of this discomfort.
The muscles responsible for pain in the back are not necessarily muscles in your back - there are several muscles in the front of your body which also can refer pain [1] to your back.
If you have only had massage to these back muscles so far, and your back pain is still there, you should then have other areas checked, before you give up on the belief that muscles might be the underlying cause of your pain.
The longer you wait before starting treatment, the more trigger points you will accumulate and the more dysfunctional your muscles and body will become. More and more muscles tighten and weaken, resulting in a downward spiral which ends in less mobility and more pain.
The more pain you feel, the less inclined you will be to move, which again leads to more trigger points. These cause more muscle pain, and so it becomes a vicious circle.
Back Muscle Pain Relief
At ToThePoint Massage in Adelaide we are trained to find the trigger points which can cause back pain.
We also always aim to find the original source of your muscle problems and eliminate it, so to ensure you will stay pain-free in the future.
Further Readings
References:
Myofascial Pain and Dysfunction, Dr. Janet Travell, Dr. David Simons & Lois Simons, vol 2,1993 [1] p.23ff
Study about effects of massage on back pain: ANN. INTERN. MED. 2011;155;1-9;
www.nccih.nih.gov/training/videolectures/15/6
