Massage Therapy

Massage therapy worked wonders for my mother. She went from one doctor to another for chronic neck and back pain, without much relief. Finally her physician recommended massage therapy. Her treatment was a few times a week. After the first week she was pain free. The insurance paid for a few weeks of treatment. My mother felt great for a while.

Like some chronic problems the pain came back. She set up her appointment to find the insurance would no longer pay for treatments. Insurance is all another story. Making appointments when she could no longer handle the pain and knowing she had to pay for it herself.

Massage therapy works on the direct targeted tissues being treated. Various application techniques involving rubbing, kneading, tapping, compression, friction, vibration, and pressure is applied to the muscular structure or soft tissues of afflicted area on the body. This is done manually with the hands, fingers, elbows, knees, forearm, and feet. Or with mechanical aids of various massage equipment with applied manipulating pressure.

Target tissues may include muscles, tendons, ligaments, skin, joints, or other connective tissue, as well as lymphatic vessels, or organs of the gastrointestinal system.

Energy and proper circulation is often restored to the areas of chronic pain. A massage has other benefits which include relieving stress, tension, arthritis, fatigue, bursitis and depression. Some therapist claim that it reduces high blood pressure, beneficial on diabetics, helps immunity suppression, infertility, smoking cessation and more.

The type of massage therapy my mother went for is called the deep tissue massage. Deep tissue massage is used for chronically tight or painful muscles, repetitive strain, postural problems, deeply rooted stress, or recovery from injury.

Read below for other types of massage.

Massage therapy in general involves treating targeted areas directly with pressured motion of hands or mechanical devices on the body. This treatment is applied where the pain is located.

Acupressure is pressure applied to various points on the body. The most common areas are the hands, legs and head. These pressure points are not necessary where the pain is located. Application of finger or hand pressure is applied to points on the body, which are sometimes called acupoints. These points lie along invisible lines of energy flow called meridians. There are four to five hundred named acupoints along the meridians, some of which are associated with specific internal organs or organ systems.

This Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) goes back further than acupuncture and works in the same manner, except with pressure and not the needle.

Read more about these TCM treatments on Acupuncture versus Acupressure.

The copyright to this article is owned by Sandy Mertens (sandyspider). Permission to republish this article in print or online must be granted by the author in writing. (You can, however, freely use the opening introduction and photo with a link to the article here on HubPages to read the remainder of the article.)