Contract. Relax. Contract. Relax. Listen to the soothing sounds of my voice. Contract. Relax. Let’s be real. It might be hard to feel soothed as I pin your calf muscle down and tell you to contract, then relax. Welcome to the hurt-so-good world of myofascial release. It is a technique used by many chiropractors but by few in the Plantation area. As we learned before, the fascia is a layer of connective tissue that surrounds the muscle. Today we are going to talk about what myofascial release techniques are and how they are beneficial.
With a little anatomy lesson, we see that muscles are surrounded by fascia. As these muscles become overused or suffer an injury, scar tissue and inflammation sets in. A muscle is made up of actin and myosin fibers (remember your high school biology teacher… she’s back to haunt you!), which allow a muscle to shorten and elongate. Look at the picture below and imagine it is your bicep. As you curl your bicep, the blue lines will come closer together (contracting the muscle) and when you relax your bicep, the blue lines will move apart (relaxing the muscle).
As we leave the muscle cells of your body (the anatomy lesson is over, I promise), think of the scar tissue mentioned before. If there is excess scar tissue, a muscle may have a hard time firing, causing decreased range of motion and weakness leading to pain and dysfunction. This is where myofascial release techniques come into play in conjunction with Chiropractic.
The main premise of myofascial release techniques – MRT – is contracting a muscle, applying tension over the muscle fibers, and then lengthening the fibers. The tension applied over the muscle helps break up scar tissue as a muscle moves through its entire range of motion. The benefits are increased blood flow to the area, decreased inflammation, lengthening of muscle fibers, increased range of motion, and improved healing time. Many people ask what the difference is between a deep tissue massage and MRT. In MRT, more tension is placed on a muscle as it moves through its range of motion with the muscle fiber orientation, versus simple deep pressure applied over the muscle. In some cases, MRT can be painful to a patient, but it has been described as that “hurt-so-good” feeling or a “deep stretch.” The goal isn’t to inflict pain for a patient but rather release any adhesions to allow a patient to improve their movement.
MRT has been shown to be a beneficial tool when working on neuromusculoskeletal conditions. There is moderate evidence that myofascial release has positive effects on multiple fibromyalgia symptoms especially pain, anxiety, and depression, for which the effect sizes are clinically relevant(1,2). During my time as a Chiropractor, I’ve discovered information on documented improvement when compared to traditional Swedish massages(3). If you have ever applied pressure to an area of pain and felt relief, it is very similar to grade 1 MRT and you are on your way to a speedy recovery as you sing to yourself John Cougar Mellencamp!
For more information about MRT visit www.stumpffchiro.com or My Page on Myofascial Techniques. You can schedule yourself in for most of our treatment options here.