If you haven’t already done so you will find our vibration massagers to be ideal for treating (myofascial) trigger points. Basically, you just sit the machine over the point and allow the vibrations to penetrate. To help you get the best results I’ll go over the main issues here, and we have this excellent guide. Trigger point therapy guide
One of my pet hates is trials of trigger point therapies that deliberately mislead colleagues about the effectiveness of their therapies. The issue is that the researchers know that their therapies will not eliminate the trigger points (see below) so they deliberately do not check whether they are still there after their courses of treatment. Instead they just make symptom related measurements, usually short term (“acute”). That way all their courses of treatments need to do is make a patient temporarily feel a bit better and they can write the up the treatment as a success.
The consequence is after their course of say half a dozen dry needling sessions the trigger points are still there. They still affect posture and biomechanics. They still reduce the performance of muscles and cause fatigue, and of course relapse is usually inevitable. Research suggests that substantial elimination is possible, but requires regular therapy over a much longer time (see below), which is where vibration massage provides a practical solution.
Research shows that trigger points are a complicated entity involving muscle tightness/spasm, reduced blood flow, and accumulated waste products and neurotransmitters. There are many treatments that help with these, but therapeutic vibrations have been shown to address all those components. This means that treatment for treatment vibration massage is as good as any and better than most.
The advantage of vibration massage is that you just need to sit the machine on the surface and let the vibrations penetrate and have their therapeutic effects. It is safe, very comfortable with no need for needles or expensive specialised equipment. The major advantage though is that it is simple enough for self use. If a patient needs 50-100 applications (a realistic figure- see below), with one of our massagers and some advice from yourself this becomes practical and achievable.
The chart below is from a trial where some of the best trigger point scientists in the world used 12 weeks of therapy. Each session was much longer than a typical professional consultation and included multiple trigger point therapies. As the results show, after all this two thirds of the trigger points were still there. At that rate it would take about 36 sessions to eliminate them all. Considering that the scientists were the best in the world and sessions were way longer than typical professional sessions it is not unreasonable to believe that in the real world 50-100 typical sessions may be needed.
To eliminate trigger points properly professionals will be needed help diagnose, address aggravating issues, address biomechanical changes, help with rehabilitation, etc. etc. etc. However, a lot of those 50-100 simple applications of therapy can be done at home.
To eliminate trigger points properly professionals will be needed help diagnose, address aggravating issues, address biomechanical changes, help with rehabilitation, etc. etc. etc. However, a lot of those 50-100 simple applications of therapy can be done at home.
If you have any colleagues who might benefit from using vibration massage can you please send them to our professional's sample page .
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