The Complete Guide to Trigger Points & Myofascial Pain (2016)

1/4/2017

The Com plete Guide to Trigger Points & M yofascial Pain (2016)

Trigger Points & Myofascial Pain Syndrome A guide to the unfinished s cience of musc le pain, with reviews of every theory and self-treatment and therapy option updated January 3 2017 (first ppublished ublished 2001) by Paul Paul Ingraham & Tim Taylor, Taylor, MD

This is an online e‐book: a detailed, current (2017), and practical tour of the science and treatment of muscle pain and trigger points (muscle “knots”), for both patients and professionals. What are the controversies and myths about muscle pain? What works for muscle pain, what doesn’t, and why? Get many troubleshooting ideas for even the toughest cases — more than the popular Trigger Point Therapy Workbook , 1 more readable (and modern) than the famous Travell texts, and more realistic and honest than any other source. Many people suffer from sensitive spots in muscle, known as “trigger “ trigger points.” points.” And yet trigger point therapy is not rocket science. 2 You just need a good selection of rational options: creative tips, tricks, insights and perspectives, based on recent science and years of clinical experience.

1/4/2017


Trigger point therapy is experimental and a bit of a crapshoot, and yet learning even a little about trigger points can solve many pain problems easily. If you feel like you have problems with stubborn and unexplained aching and stiffness — and who doesn’t, really? — please keep reading!

Does your body feel like a toxic waste dump?

It may be more literally true than you realized! Some evidence shows that a knot may be a patch of polluted tissue: a na sty little cesspool of waste metabolites. If so, it’s no wonder they hurt, and no wonder they cause so many strange sensations: it’s more li ke being poisoned than being injured. Back pain is the best known symptom of the common muscle knot, but they can cause an astonishing array of other aches and pains. Misdiagnosis is much more common than diagnosis.

Trigger point therapy is not a miracle cure for chronic pain — but it helps Trigger point therapy isn’t “too good to be true” — it’s just ordinary good. It’s definitely not miraculous. 3 It’s experimental and it often fails. 4 Good trigger point therapy is hard to find (or even define). But it’s also under‐rated, and self‐treatment has the potential to quickly, cheaply, and safely help with many common pain problems that don’t respond well — or at all — to anything else. 5 For beginners with average muscle pain — a typical case of nagging hip pain or low back pain or neck pain — the advice given here may well seem almost seem almost miraculously useful. I get avalanches of email from readers thanking me for pointing out simple treatment options for such irritating problems. Many are stunned by the discovery that their chronic pain could have been treated easily all along.

Attention physicians & therapists: Attention therapists: This massive tutorial is written for both patients and professionals. It includes analysis of recent research that you won’t find in any text, crafted to suit any skill level. 6 Footnotes add a

optional layer of advanced detail that you can take or leave. Trigger Trigger points are more clinically important than most health professionals realize, and body pain seems to be a growing problem. 7 It’s a

1/4/2017


For veterans who have already tried — and failed — to treat trigger points, this document is especially made for you for you.. You should learn more and try more before giving up. This will get you as close to a cure as you can get; I can give you a fighting chance of at least taking the edge off your pain. And maybe that is that is a bit of a miracle.

rewarding topic for doctors and therapists, that makes clear path to helping quite a few people you probably couldn’t help before. Even if you already know about myofascial pain syndrome, syndrome , you will get new ideas here.

What exactly are muscle knots? When you say that you have “muscle knots,” you are talking about myofascial trigger points. [Wikipedia] There are no actual knots involved, of course — it just feels like it. Although their true nature is uncertain, the main theory is that a trigger point (TrP) is a small patch of tightly contracted muscle, an isolated spasm affecting just a tiny patch of muscle tissue (not a whole‐muscle spasm like a “charlie horse” 9 ). In theory, that small patch of muscle chokes off its own blood supply, which irritates it even more — a vicious cycle called a “metabolic crisis.” The swampy metabolic situation is why I like to think of it as sick muscle syndrome. A few trigger points here and there is usually just an annoyance. Many bad ones is a syndrome: myofascial pain syndrome (MPS). (MPS) . TrPs can be vicious. They can cause far more discomfort than most people believe is possible. Its bark is much louder than its bite, but the bark can be extremely loud. It can also be a surprisingly weird bark bark (trigger points can generate some odd sensations).

A “muscle knot” is a trigger point: a small small patch of of muscle tissue in spasm.

1/4/2017


Why muscle pain matters so much Muscle pain matters: it’s an important problem. Aches and pains are an extremely common medical complaint, 10 and trigger points seem to be a factor in many of them. 11 12 They are a key factor in headaches (possibly including migraine and cluster headaches as well 13 14 ), neck pain and low back pain, and (much) more. What makes trigger points clinically important — and fascinating — is their triple threat. They can: 1. cause pain problems, 2. complicate pain problems, and 3. mimic other pain problems. Muscle just hurts sometimes. Trigger points can cause pain directly. directly . Trigger points are a “natural” part of muscle tissue. 15 Just as almost everyone gets some pimples, sooner or later almost everyone gets muscle knots — and you get pain with no other explanation or issue. It’s complicated. complicated. Trigger points complicate injuries complicate injuries and other painful problems. They show up like party crashers. Whatever’s wrong, you can count on them to make it worse, worse, and in many cases they actually begin to overshadow the original problem. “It felt like a toothache.” Trigger Trigger points mimic other mimic other problems. Many trigger points feel like something else. It is easy for an unsuspecting health professional to mistake trigger point pain for practicall for practicallyy anything but a trigger point. For point. For instance, muscle pain is probably more common than repetitive strain injuries (RSIs), because many so‐called RSIs may actually be muscle pain. 16 A perfect example: shin splints. 17 The daily clinical experience of thousands of massage therapists, physical therapists, and physicians strongly indicates that most of our common aches and pains — and many other puzzling physical complaints — are actually caused by trigger points, points, or small contraction knots, in the muscles of the body. The trigger point therapy workbook , by Clair Davies, p. 2

How can you trust

information about muscle pain?

1/4/2017


I apply a MythBusters approach to health care (without explosives): I have fun questioning everything. I don’t claim to have The Answer for trigger points. When I don’t know, I admit it. I read scientific journals, I explain the science behind key points (there are more than 340 footnotes here, drawn from a huge bibliography), and I always link always link to my sources. For instance, there’s good evidence that educational tutorials are actually effective medicine for pain. Good information is good medicine! Unfortunately, “good information” is a challenge with trigger points. The science is a bit shabby. 18 They are under‐explained . They are over‐hyped. They aren’t a flaky a flaky diagnosis, diagnosis, 19 but they’re not exactly on a solid foundation either, and some critics have dismissed the entire concept. 20

The science of trigger points is a bit shabby. They are underexplained.

None of that is a deal‐breaker, though: muscle pain is still an important topic, “trigger points” is a useful work‐in‐progress label for whatever is going on, and everyone agrees that something painful is going on. So all the more reason to have a rational tour guide to take you through a murky subject. What’s useful in the theory of trigger points? What’s half‐baked and obsolete? Who disagrees and why?

Half‐baked ideas can turn out okay as long as they stay in the oven. Trigger point science may be a bit of a hot mess, but it also isn’t over.

Why are trigger points so neglected by medicine? “Muscle is an orphan organ. No medical speciality claims it.” 21 Muscle tissue is the largest organ in the body, complex and vulnerable to dysfunction, and the “primary target of the wear and tear of daily activities,” nevertheless “it is the bones, joints, bursae and nerves on which physicians usually concentrate concentrate their attention.” 22 Family doctors are particularly uninformed about the causes of musculoskeletal aches and pains 23 — it simply isn’t on their radar. They are busy with a lot of other things, many of them quite dire. As serious as muscle pain can be, it’s minor compared to, say, diabetes or heart disease. And it’s also a harder topic than it seems to be on the surface. So it’s not really surprising that doctors aren’t exactly muscle pain treatment Jedi. What about medical specialists? They may be the best option for serious cases. Doctors in pain clinics tend to know about trigger points. But they also often limit their treatment methods exclusively to injection therapies — a bazooka to kill a mouse? — and anything less than really epic chronic pain won’t qualify you for admittance to a pain clinic in the first place. This option is only available to patients for whom trigger points are a truly horrid primary problem, or a major complication. Medical specialists may know quite a bit about muscle about muscle pain, but aren’t all that helpful to the average patient.

An appallingly high percentage of doctors and other practitioners are are still pretty pretty much out of the loop regarding trigger points.

1/4/2017


The trigger point therapy workbook , by Clair Davies, p. 2

Physical therapists and chiropractors are often preoccupied to a fault with joint function, biomechanics, 24 and exercise therapy. These approaches have their place, but they are often emphasized at the expense of understanding muscle pain as a sensory disorder which which can easily afflict people with apparently perfect bodies, posture and fitness. A lot of patient time gets wasted trying to “straighten” patients, when all along just a little pressure on a key muscle knot might have provided relief. Massage therapists have a lot of hands‐on experience of muscle tissue, but know surprisingly little about myofascial pain syndrome. Their training standards vary wildly. Even in my three years of training as an RMT (the longest such program in the world 25 ), I learned only the basics — barely more than this introduction! Like physical therapists and chiropractors, massage massage therapists are often almost absurdly preoccupied with symmetry and structure. The right h ands can give can give you a lot of relief, but it’s hard to find — or be — the right hands.

No professionals of any kind are commonly skilled commonly skilled in the treatment of trigger points. Muscle tissue simply has not gotten the clinical attention it deserves, 26 and so misdiagnosis and wrong treatment is like death and taxes — inevitable! And that is why this tutorial exists: to help you “save yourself,” and to educate professionals. Those clinicians who have become skilled at diagnosing and managing myofascial trigger points frequently see patients who were referred to them by other practitioners as a last resort. These patients commonly arrive with a long list of diagnostic procedures, none of which satisfactorily explained the cause of, or relieved, the patient’s pain. Myofascial Pain and Dysfunction, Dysfunction , by Janet Travell, David Simons, and Lois Simons, p. 36

Does your trigger point therapist have the big red books? In addition to many scientific papers, this tutorial is based on medical textbooks like the massive two‐volume set, “the big red books” — Myofascial Pain Pain and Dysfunction 27 — and “the blue book, Muscle book, Muscle Pain 28 These are not easy reading! 29 They don’t contain all the answers, but anyone who claims to treat muscle pain should still have the big red books books in their office — they are just too historically important not to have. If you don’t see dog‐eared copies, ask about them — it’s a fair, effective and polite way to check a therapist’s competence. Muscle competence. Muscle Pain (the Pain (the blue one) is just as important. I highly recommend it to any professional who works with muscle (or should). It’s more recent, and it covers a much wider much wider range of soft tissue pain issues, putting trigger points in context.

The Big Red Books

Must-have text books for any therapist treating trigger points.

1/4/2017


A brief note about the relationship between fibromyalgia and myofascial pain syndrome Fibromyalgia (FM) causes you to “hurt all over” — widespread chronic pain, and decreased pain threshold. It is also associated with fatigue, sleep disturbance, and “fibro fog” (mental confusion). It is defined by its symptoms, 30 because we don’t know what actually causes it — so people have pain, but “no one has FM until it is diagnosed.” 31 Here’s a good 1‐minute primer on fibromyalgia fibromyalgia from One‐Minute Medical School:

Fibromyalgia Syndrome

1:00

Although unexplained, FM may be a more clearly neurological disease, while MPS may be more of a dysfunction of muscle tissue — and it would be nice if such a clear difference were proven someday someday.. FM and MPS syndrome are both imperfect and imprecise descriptions of closely related sets of unexplained symptoms, which makes them harder to tell apart than mischievous twins who deliberately impersonate each other. They may be two sides of the same painful coin, or different parts of a spectrum of sensory malfunction. They may simply be describing different parts or stages of the same process, and some cases are probably nearly impossible to tell apart — and then they change. Add to that the fact that both conditions are controversial to the point where some people deny they even exist, and it’s understandable that they get confused.

Fibromyalgia & myofascial pain syndrome are harder to tell apart than mischievous twins who deliberately impersonate each other.

Fibromyalgia’s famous “tender points” are the most confusing part of all, but they are a very different idea than trigger points. Trigger points describe localized pain pain in almost any location, which can come and go like the weather, but there are just a few (18) official, specific tender points that are persistent features of FM — literally by definition. If you don’t have the tender points, you don’t have the diagnosis! Whatever the causes or labels, therapy for MPS seems to be helpful for some FM patients as well, 32 although pure FM cases seem to be mostly immune to massage. 33 But this book is still useful for many FM patients, insofar as it overlaps with our main topic. Dr. Taylor’s advice about medical causes of pain are especially helpful; his wife is also a doctor and has has fibromyalgia fibromyalgia and has has gotten considerable relief from the recommendations shared here. So this is not a fibromyalgia book, per book, per se … se … but I certainly hope it’s of interest to fibromyalgia patients.

1/4/2017


Trigger points may explain many severe and strange aches and pains This is where trigger points really get interesting. In addition to minor aches and pains, muscle pain often causes unusual symptoms in strange locations. For instance, many people diagnosed with carpal tunnel syndrome are actually experiencing pain caused by a muscle in their armpit (subscapularis). 34 Seriously. I’m not making that up! This odd phenomenon of pain spreading from a trigger point to another location is called “referred pain.” The neurology will be explained in detail below. Here are some other examples of interesting referred pain leading to misdiagnosis: 35 Sciatica (shooting pain in the buttocks and legs) is often caused by pain in the piriformis or other gluteal muscles, and not by irritation of the sciatic nerve. Many other trigger points are mistaken for “some kind of nerve problem.” Chronic jaw pain, toothaches, earaches, sinusitis, ringing in the ears (tinnitus), and dizziness may be symptoms of trigger points in the muscles around the jaw, face, head and neck. 36 37 A sore throat or a lump in the throat is often caused or aggravated by trigger points anywhere around the throat. 38

often turns out, sometimes after surgery, surgery, to be caused by a trigger point in the abdominal muscles. Wow. “Appendicitis pain” often Severe MPS is often mistaken for fibromyalgia fibromyalgia (and other causes of pain hypersensitivity).

1/4/2017


Sometimes trigger points cause such severe symptoms that they are mistaken for medical emergencies. I treated a man for chest and arm pain — he had been in the hospital for several hours being checked out for signs of heart failure, but when he got to my office his symptoms were relieved by a few minutes of rubbing a pectoralis major muscle trigger point. The same trigger point sometimes raises fears of a tumor. Here’s a particularly excellent example sent to me by a physician who had this experience: I narrowly escaped a breast biopsy because of trigger points in the pectoralis major. I’d had bad chest pain for a month. I was on the table, permit signed, draped. The doctor wasn’t sure: she said she wanted another mammogram. I left confused, relieved … but still hurting. Then I lucked out: my regular internist was puzzled, but thought it might be “soft tissue.” That made me go to a physical therapist. The physical therapist pulled out the big red books on trigger points, and we read together. Treatment was a complete success. A month‐old severe pain that I had been treating with ice packs in my bra and pain‐killers — gone! Janice Kregor, Kregor, competitive swimmer, retired pediatrician and medical school instructor

Another client once spent three days in hospital for severe abdominal pain that doctors couldn’t diagnose — her pain was mostly and quickly relieved by massaging a trigger point in her psoas major muscle. 39 I once suffered a dramatic case of a “toothache” that was completely relieved by a massage therapist the day before an emergency appointment with the dentist: a particularly vivid experience. However, the vast majority of symptoms caused by myofascial pain syndrome are simply the familiar aches and pains of humanity — millions of sore backs, shoulders and necks. Some of which can become quite serious.

Is this like you?

Muscle knot pain can be savage. Over the years I have met many people who were in so much pain from muscle dysfunction that they could hardly think straight. Is muscle pain “trivial”? Not if you have it!

1/4/2017


Two typical tales of trigger point treatment The relationship between trigger points and mild‐to‐moderate pain is often so straightforward that therapy is nearly effortless. One of the nice things about working with trigger points is that sometimes they do make me seem like seem like a miracle worker, because they are such a clinical “slam dunk” for garden variety persistent pain — pain undiagnosed and untreated by a string of other health professionals. For instance, Lois McConnell of Vancouver came to see me complaining that she’d had moderate, chronic back pain for several years. She’d received some common misdiagnoses, particularly sacroiliac joint dysfunction. 40 But she had a prominent gluteus maximus trigger point 41 that, when stimulated, felt exactly like her symptoms — a deep ache in the region of the low back and upper gluteals. In just three appointments, her pain was completely relieved. She was quite pleased, I can tell you! Just wanted to give you a quick update … my back has been absolutely fine. Unbelievable Unbelievable … or perhaps not, considering what I’ve learned from you! A big thank you for all your help. Lois McConnell, retired airline executive, suffered chronic low back and hip pain for a few years

Or consider Jan Campbell. Jan developed a hip pain sometime in early 2004 during a period of intense exercising. The pain quickly grew to the point of interfering with walking, and was medically diagnosed as either a bursitis or a piriformis strain. I did not believe that either of these could be the case, and treated a trigger point in her pi riformis muscle once on June 12, 2004. Her symptom was 100% relieved for about eight months, before it slowly began to reassert itself (as trigger points often do, despite our best efforts — more about that to come). One trigger point therapy treatment completely relieved a nasty stubborn hip pain that I'd had for five months! Jan Campbell, retired French language teacher, Palm Springs, recovered easily from several months of hip pain

Every trigger point therapist has a seemingly endless list of such treatment success stories. Although most such cases involve relatively minor symptoms, this is not to say that they were minor problems. In almost every such case, the pain was relatively mild but extremely frustrating and persistent for many years, then relieved easily by a handful of treatments — an incredible thing, when you think about it. So much unnecessary suffering!

The myth of the trigger point whisperer Can a good enough massage therapist remove all trigger points in a session? Is there such a thing as a “trigger point whisperer”? I got this question by email, and it shows a common theme: the optimistic/desperate quest for the mystique of the magic super therapist who can fix anything in two or three sessions. Or even less. 42 The idea is an annoyance to all honest, humble professionals who know better … and more or less impossible to believe if you know the basics about pain and muscle knots. The skill of a therapist is only one relatively one relatively minor factor among many that many that affect the success of massage therapy for trigger points — or any therapy, for any pain problem.

1/4/2017


Trigger points are not little switches that can be flicked off (“released”) by anyone who has sufficiently advanced technique — they are a mysterious, cantankerous, cantankerous, complex phenomenon complex phenomenon.. Even the best therapists can be defeated by a no‐win situation. 43 And nearly any therapist can luck out and get great results with the occasional patient when all the planets are aligned: sometimes trigger points respond well to virtually any intervention. It really depends. For comparison, can a good enough dog trainer train any dog in a hour? Even Cesar “Dog Whisperer” Millan says he can’t if the dog is traumatized, sick, and/or injured, and requires hours of smart, gradual conditioning. It depends on the situation.

Even the best therapists can be defeated by a no-win situation & nearly any therapist can luck out & get great results with the occasional patient when all the planets are aligned.

It depends, it depends, it depends. This depends. This is a major theme in this document, and it is why I am dedicated to teaching concepts and principles, principles, not treatment recipes and formulae — formulae — and that’s why it’s an important thing to cover in the introduction.

DIAGNOSIS How can you tell if trigger points are the cause of

problem?

Trigger points have many strange “features” and behaviours, and can easily be confused with many other problems. Because of their medical obscurity and the half‐ baked science, they are often the last thing last thing to be considered in spite of their their clinical importance and many distinctive characteristics. There are several things you can look for that will help you to feel more confident that, yes, muscle pain is pain is the problem instead of something else. The next several sections will discuss all of them in detail. Whether you knew it or not, you were probably already familiar with trigger points even if you’d never heard of them before starting this tutorial. Almost everyone has a head start in self‐diagnosing trigger trigger points, because almost everyone already more or less knows what it’s like to have a muscle knot. If you have ever had muscle stiffness, wrenched your neck around trying to stretch and wiggle your way free of discomfort, or gotten a friend or partner to dig into that annoying spot in your back, then you already have some experience with this — this — you have trigger points. You have pain and stiffness that feels like it’s in your muscles. But there may be many things you don’t yet know about how trigger points behave and feel…

END OF FREE INTRODUCTION

1/4/2017


Purchase full access to this tutorial for USD $1995. Continue reading immediately immediately after purchase.

read on any device, no passwords refund at any time, in a week or a year call 778-968-0930 778-968-09 30 for purchase help

Secure payment takes about 2 minutes. No password or login, delivery is instant, and get a full refund whenever. What do you get, exactly? A tutorial, the size of a small book (127,500 words). Get free updates forever, read on any device, online or off, lend it out. Buy more & save 50%! Get a “boxed” set of all eight tutorials for great savings.

iD Vendor Identification company Regeneration Training owner Paul owner Paul Ingraham location 6001 Vine St Vancouver, Canada service 778-968-0930 [email protected] guarantee 100% guarantee 100% money-back read more company policies store by eSellerate security by GeoTr GeoTrust ust

TABLE OF CONTENTS PREVIEW

Introduction 1.1 1.2

Trigger point therapy is not a miracle cure for chronic pain — but it helps What exactly are muscle knots?

1/4/2017


Why muscle pain matters so much 1.4 How can you trust this information this information about muscle pain? 1.5 Why are trigger points so neglected by medicine? 1.6 Does your trigger point therapist have the big red books? 1.7 A brief note about the relationship between fibromyalgia and myofascial pain syndrome 1.8 Trigger points may explain many severe and strange aches and pains 1.9 Two typical tales of trigger point treatment 1.10 The myth of the trigger point whisperer 1.3

Diagnosis

How can you tell if trigger points are the cause of your problem? Trigger point diagnosis is not reliable … but it also may not matter that much Where are the charts and diagrams of trigger point locations in this tutorial? 2.3 Quick checklist: classic trigger point symptoms 2.4 Slow checklist: a more detailed diagnostic checklist for myofascial pain syndrome 2.5 Negative checklist: symptoms that are probably not caused not caused by trigger points 2.6 If you have trigger points, will your muscles be “tight”? 2.7 Identifying your trigger points by feel 2.8 “Out of nowhere”: a signature symptom of trigger points 2.9 Chasing pain: hurting in all the wrong places 2.10 Nerve pain is overdiagnosed 2.11 Case study: a story about nerve pain that wasn’t really nerve pain 2.12 Morning symptoms: an uncomfortable daily mystery for many people 2.13 From the frying the frying pan of pan of injury pain to the fire of fire of trigger point pain 2.14 Could it be __________? Several specific problems that trigger points get confused with 2.15 Case study: “Bursitis” strikes again! 2.16 Predictably unpredictable: trigger point symptoms are erratic by nature 2.17 All the noise! Trigger points, joint popping, and crepitus 2.18 What are the worst‐case scenarios for myofascial pain syndrome? 2.19 Worst Case Scenario 1: Being triggery 2.20 Worst Case Scenario 2: Rare but extremely severe cases of myofascial pain syndrome 2.21 Worst Case Scenario 3: Quick‐start trigger points 2.1 2.2

The science of trigger points

It’s a little half-baked, but at least it’s not boring 3.1 3.2 3.3 3.4 3.5 3.6 3.7

The dominant theory of trigger points spelled out in a little more technical detail Micro muscles and the dance of the sarcomeres One: The vicious cycle (why trigger points are stubborn) Two: Good pain (why pressing on trigger points hurts like hell but feels like heaven) Three: Tightness (why stretching is appealing but underwhelming) Four: Weakness (why muscles with trigger points are weak and should not be not be challenged with strength training) Everything we just discussed … in a few bullet points

1/4/2017


Triggers for trigger points: what makes patches of sarcomeres go haywire? 3.9 The all‐powerful acne analogy 3.10 The evolution of muscle pain: does muscle “burn out”? 3.11 Referred Pain Science (basic) 3.12 Referred pain science (advanced) 3.13 Other trigger point theories 3.14 Quintner: “It’s the nerves, stupid” 3.15 “The bamboo cage” — what immobilization torture can tell us about the nature of muscle pain and massage 3.16 Case study: an example of getting unstuck and feeling “giddy with joy” 3.17 Muscle knots are not inflammatory: the myth of the inflamed myofascial trigger point 3.18 Adhesions and contracture: when trigger points freeze in place 3.19 The science of adhesions: atoms stick to each other 3.20 The scar tissue issue — are you scarred for life? 3.8

Basic Trigger Point Self-Treatment

What can you do about garden variety trigger points? Downloadable quick reference guide Basic self‐massage instructions 4.3 How do you know it’s working? Getting a trigger point to “release” 4.4 Basic tips and tricks for better, longer‐lasting trigger point release 4.5 Top 5 mistakes beginners make 4.6 What about massage tools? 4.7 Can you damage your nerves when self‐massaging? 4.8 Don’t hesitate to recruit amateur help 4.9 A little more perspective on amateur assistance 4.10 How to get adequate professional help 4.11 Common medications that might make a difference (and might not) 4.1 4.2

Advanced Trigger Point Troubleshooting Troubleshooting

What can you do about severe and persistent trigger points? A brief detour: why not The Trigger Point Therapy Workbook ? Workbook ? Fundamental limitations of trigger point therapy, and how to take advantage of them 5.3 Several more treatment mistakes and problems (that you can fix) 5.4 More serious barriers to success 5.5 New evidence that squishing trigger points works at least a little 5.6 Upgrade your self‐massage technique 5.7 Don’t get hung up on anatomy, and be persistent 5.8 Focussing on one trouble spot versus “a little bit of everything” — which is the better strategy? 5.9 More information about exactly how to how to rub (moving strokes) how to rub (pressing and holding) 5.10 Yet more information about exactly how to 5.11 Using “press and hold” to identify a trigger point release in progress 5.12 Identifying your trigger points by feel (once again, as it pertains to treatment) 5.1 5.2

1/4/2017


Referred pain is not a not a diagnostic feature of trigger points! 5.14 Don’t be fooled by “reverse referral” 5.15 Beyond the tennis ball: commercial massage tools 5.16 Commercial massage tools to avoid 5.17 Massage tools: 7 free (or very cheap) and tools from objects not originally intended for massage 5.18 The sock trick 5.19 The bath trick 5.20 Introduction to non‐massage self‐treatments for trigger points 5.21 Stretching (executive summary) 5.22 Mobilizations: massaging with movement and the Goldilocks zone 5.23 Case study: mobilizations prove to be crucial factor in recovery from neck pain that started in the 1970s 5.24 Trying to squirm your way out of trigger point pain? Don’t do it! Consider a little more method in your madness 5.25 How to take your trigger points to the gym (if you must) 5.26 Thermotherapy 5.27 Breathing deeply is free, safe, and possibly amazing therapy for trigger points 5.28 Neutral positioning: find a comfortable muscle length and rest there 5.29 An introduction to medicating muscle pain (hint: not a great option) 5.30 Anti‐inflammatories and Tylenol 5.31 Voltaren® Gel, an intriguing new option 5.32 The nuclear option: “Hillbilly heroin” (Oxycontin), codeine and other opioids 5.33 The surprising futility of muscle relaxants such as Robax‐whatever, Valium and other benzodiazepines 5.34 Lidocaine patches 5.35 Combination treatments: why and how to throw everything at it but the kitchen sink 5.36 Troubleshooting referred pain: the referred pain field guide 5.37 Case study: referred pain causes a “heart attack” and completely fools dozens of professionals 5.38 Troubleshooting Troubleshooting negative reactions to treatment 5.13

Perpetuating Perpetuating Factors

What makes trigger points stubborn? 6.1 6.2 6.3 6.4 6.5 6.6 6.7 6.8

Troubleshooting Troubleshooting “stuck” trigger points — adhesions and contracture Troubleshooting stress (without meditation or yoga, unless you like that sort of thing) Troubleshooting Troubleshooting posture, ergonomics, and muscle imbalance Troubleshooting Troubleshooting mysterious perpetuating factors The relationship between trigger points and other physiological disorders and diseases, especially fibromyalgia Way beyond stubborn: troubleshooting extreme cases Reality checks: some self‐treatments that don’t work at all (or not nearly as well as you would hope) What if trigger points only partly explain partly explain your chronic pain? Several other causes of chronic, undiagnosed pain

Medical Factors That Perpetuate Pain

The effect of statin drugs, nutritional and hormonal deficiencies, infections, and inflammatory diseases 7.1 7.2

Some usual, unusual, and unique medical disclaimers Getting tested and treated: the hard way, the easy way, and the right way

1/4/2017


Pain‐causing drug side effects: statins (cholesterol‐reducing drugs) and bisphosphonates (for osteoporosis) 7.4 Nutritional and hormone deficiencies 7.5 Vitamin D deficienc y 7.6 Thyroid hormone deficiency 7.7 Iron deficiency (and excess) 7.8 Vitamin C deficienc y 7.9 Vitamin B12 deficienc y 7.10 Vitamin B1, B2, folate, and magnesium deficiencies 7.11 Testosterone Testosterone defic iency 7.12 Estrogen deficiency 7.13 Infections 7.14 Inflammation 7.15 Smoking 7.16 Overall treatment strategy 7.3

Stretching

Stretching is generally over-rated … but it might be good for trigger points The anecdotal evidence for stretching (is just huge) Case study: A cautionary tale of stretching: that time I almost ripped my own head off 8.3 Winning a tug‐of‐war: how stretching might help trigger points in principle 8.4 The bad news about stretching for trigger points 8.5 Like a knot in a bungie cord 8.6 The spray‐and‐stretch method, if it works, implies that stretch alone may not work 8.7 Other practical limitations of stretching for trigger points 8.8 What about neurology? Stretch tolerance 8.9 What about stretching the antagonist muscle? 8.10 Stretching “conclusions” 8.1 8.2

Getting Help

How do you find good therapy for your trigger points? Types of therapists and doctors and their relationship to trigger point therapy Massage quality control issues (“But I’ve already tried massage therapy …”) 9.3 Two case studies: highly‐trained therapists failing miserably 9.4 Worst practices in massage therapy 9.5 How to find good trigger point therapy 9.6 The Pressure Question: how much is too much? 9.7 Pain in three flavours: the good, the bad, and the ugly 9.8 Training your therapist 9.9 Other kinds of therapies 9.10 How about spray and stretch therapy? 9.11 How about the Paul St. John Method of Neuromuscular Therapy? 9.12 How about transcutaneous electrical nerve stimulation therapy? (TENS or ENS) 9.1 9.2

1/4/2017


How about ultrasound therapy? (ESWT and “Sonic Relief™”) 9.14 How about chiropractic joint adjustment and popping? 9.15 How about myofascial release and fascial stretching? 9.16 How about trigger point injection therapy? 9.17 How about Botox injection therapy? 9.18 How about nerve blocks? 9.19 Maybe stabbing will help! How about Dry Needling, AKA Intramuscular Stimulation (IMS) therapy? 9.20 How about acupuncture? 9.21 Acupressure: what if we pressed those points instead of puncturing? Techniques® (ART)? 9.22 How about Active Release Techniques® 9.23 Measuring progress in trigger point therapy 9.13

Final Thoughts

How is a lemon like a trigger point? Appendices Appendices Appendix A: Trigger Point Reference Materials or: Diagrams, Diagrams, Diagrams! Trigger Trigger Point Symptom Checker 11.3 Appendix C: The Perfect Spots Spot #1 for pain almost anywhere in the head, face and neck, but especially the side of the head, behind the ear, the temples and forehead Spot #2 for pain anywhere in the low back, tailbone, lower buttock, abdomen, groin, side of the hip Spot #3 for pain in the shin, top of the foot, and the big toe Spot #4 for pain in the upper back (especially inner edge of the shoulder blade), neck, side of the face, upper chest, shoulder, arm, hand Spot #5 for pain in the elbow, arm, wrist, and hand Spot #6 for pain in the low back, hip, buttocks (especially immediately under the buttocks), side of the thigh, hamstrings Spot #7 for pain in the side of the face, jaw, teeth (rarely) Spot #8 for pain in the lower half of the thigh, knee Spot #9 for pain anywhere in the chest, upper arm Spot #10 for pain in the bottom of the foot Spot #11 for pain anywhere in the upper back, mainly between the shoulder blades Spot #12 for pain in the lower back, buttocks, hip, hamstrings Spot #13 for pain in the low back, buttocks, hamstrings Spot #14 for pain any part of the shoulder, and upper arm 11.4 Appendix D: Trigger Point Therapy Resources 11.5 Acknowledgements 11.6 Reader Comments 11.7 What’s new in this tutorial? 11.8 Notes 11.1

11.2 Appendix B: The

1/4/2017



Does your tutorial include diagrams showing common trigger points? Yes, thirteen classic trigger points are explored, the “Perfect Spots” for massage, accounting for about 75% of common pain problems. Other reference material is reviewed and recommended, recommended, especially the best free online option, The Trigger Point Symptom Checker. Will the tutorial solve my problem? What if it doesn’t? Maybe! But, naturally, I can’t guarantee “results” … and I don’t want to. I don’t believe in giving false hope, and trigger point therapy is far from perfect. My goal is to give you the best chance of chance of success, and help you avoid wasting your time and money on bollocksy therapies. If that’s not worth $20, I should get out of the publishing business. Does the tutorial include information on [insert your pain problem]? Probably not! Many specific pain problems are mentioned, but the book doesn’t go into detail about any of them. Once you understand the nature of trigger points, you don’t really need me to spell out their relationship to every common injury. Trigger points cause and complicate all injuries in quite predictable ways — that’s why they are clinically interesting! Why not

?

Clair and Amber Davies’ popular book is well‐written. well‐written. It is illustrated nicely, nicely, and offers detailed muscle‐by‐muscle reference reference material — something this tutorial actually deliberately lacks. lacks . (This is a very short version of my full review.)

1/4/2017


I used to wonder why I even bothered to create this tutorial! Why not just recommend the Workbook ? Because this tutorial has grown to offer a lot that the Workbook doesn’t, doesn’t, and probably never will. The strength of this tutorial is the delving into the nature of the beast (the science), while Workbook has has fallen behind the times. The 3rd edition (2013) promises too much and neglects important new knowledge. knowledge. Trigger point therapy has been challenged by many scientific disappointments and controversies, controversies, and new ways of understanding pain, but the Workbook doesn’t doesn’t acknowledge any of that. This topic is too important for such neglect. The goal of this tutorial is to offer a more realistic and balanced view of trigger point therapy, to meet the challenge of difficult cases head on, and to explore every possible treatment option — option — their potential and their their limits and risks. I believe it has been doing a better job of that than the Workbook from from the beginning… now more than ever.

The Workbook promises too much and neglects relevant science.


APPE AP PEND NDIC ICES ES

1/4/2017


Acknowledgements Acknowledgeme nts This document and all of PainScience.com was, for many years, created in my so‐called “spare time” and with a lot of assistance from family and friends. Undying thanks to my wife, Kimberly, Kimberly, for countless indulgences large and small, and for being my “editor girlfriend”; girlfriend”; to my parents for (possibly blind) faith in me, and much copyediting; and to Mike Gobbi, buddy and digital mentor, for many of the nifty features of this document (hidden and obvious). And thanks to all of the above, and many others, for many (many) answers to “what do you think of this?” emails. Thanks finally to every reader, reader, client, customer, and big tipper for your curiosity, your faith, and your feedback and suggestions and stories. Without you, all of this would be pointless. And a few thanks to some health professionals who have been particularly inspiring to me: Dr. Rob Tarzwell, Tarzwell, Dr. Steven Steven Novella, Dr. Dr. David Gorski, Sam Homola, DC, Dr. Harriet Hall, Simon Singh, and Dr. Stephen Barrett. Thank you finally to Dr. Tim Taylor, MD, author of this book’s vital sections about medical factors that perpetuate pain pain,, new as of the summer of 2010. More than a collaborator, Tim is an idealistic and decisive volunteer, who didn’t just offer to contribute to this book, but made it happen quickly and well and all for the sake of helping people. In twenty years of writing and publishing, I have never seen a collaboration go that smoothly, smoothly, and I am extremely grateful for it.

Reader Comments Here is what some readers have said about the trigger points tutorial over the years. Feedback is always welcome. I focus on the positive in this section, but I want to acknowledge that I certainly do receive some criticisms as well. In many cases I respond by making improvements to the tutorial. However, the vast majority of feedback is enthusiastic. Thanks, everyone!

Just wanted to say how great a job you’ve you’ve done on all this stuff. People claim they know about trigger points, but the majority really, really don’t. t. If I didn’t become my own doctor I’d be in a really dark place right now. What you’re doing is really important. I still have the Trigger Point Therapy Workbook and and Travell and Simons’ “big red books,” but you offer some really important commentary and reality checks missing from both of those sources. — J.M., chronic pain sufferer

1/4/2017


If every disorder had such a well written self‐diagnostic and treatment guide we'd be a lot closer to manageable spending on health care. Thanks. — Timothy Trutna, programmer with chronic muscle pain, California

I purchased the low back tutorial recently and got the free trigger point one also. Many thanks. They are great! I had already accessed the perfect spot series and have been working on my trigger points. It is very pleasing to have the full discussion on the chemistry and physiology, and I now have a much better idea about the whole ghastly business. — Leah Brannen, Saskatoon, Canada

I owe you many thanks. Your tutorial has given me great hope. I was extremely discouraged and frustrated by the issues I was having, but I experienced more relief in my first session with a trigger point therapist than I did in 12 weeks of physical therapy therapy. — Ryan Luke, MA, CSCS, Department of Kinesiology and Health, Georgia State University

From Allan’s review of my trigger point book: “The thing that really jumps out at me about Paul's trigger point tutorial is the fairly mind‐boggling amount of research he has done. It's pretty incredible. It's obvious that he does his homework. It's obvious that he's been doing it for many years. And yet it's not a boring or academic document. He keeps it surprisingly light and fun while simultaneously explaining a lot of physiology and pathology.” — Allan Saltzman, owner of YogaTools.com YogaTools.com,, maker of some fine hand‐crafted tools for yoga and self‐treatment

I have been suffering from lower back pain for the last 5 weeks and found your page to be very informative and interesting. I really can’t thank you enough actually because for the first time I’m really starting to feel like I’m on the right track here. — Glenn Hill, Canterbury, Australia

Thanks to your website, I pretty much got rid of my back problems almost overnight. It’s also fun and thought provoking to read! — Amsterdam Jeroen Strompf, MFA, Screenwriting, Chapman University

I’m really enjoying your work! — Janice Kregor, competitive swimmer, retired pediatrician, medical school instructor

1/4/2017


READ 19 MORE COMMENTS

One more special comment. In the Spring of 2009, I received an incredible endorsement from Jonathon Tomlinson, a GP in Hackney, East London, praising the whole website and every tutorial: I'm writing to congratulate and thank you for your impressive ongoing review of musculoskeletal research. I teach a course, Medicine in Society, at St. Leonards Hospital in Hoxton. I originally stumbled across your website whilst looking for information about pain for my medical students, and have recommended recommended your tutorials to them. Your work deserves special mention for its transparency, transparency, evidence base, clear presentation, educational content, regular documented updates, and lack of any commercial promotional material. — Dr. Jonathon Tomlinson, MBBS, DRCOG, MRCGP, MA, The Lawson Practice, Practice , London

High praise indeed! Thank you, Dr. Tomlinson — testimonials just don’t get much better than that.

What’s new in this tutorial? Regular updates are a key feature of PainScience.com tutorials. As new science and information becomes available, I upgrade them, and the most recent version is always automatically available to customers. Unlike regular books, and even e‐books (which can be obsolete by the time they are published, and can go years between editions) this document is updated at least once every three months and often much more. I also log updates, log updates, making it easy for readers to see what’s changed. This tutorial has gotten 101 major and minor updates since I started logging carefully in late 2009 (plus countless minor tweaks and touch‐ups). Repairs (Jan 3 '17, section #11.4 ) — Repair of the resource list, purging some that are no longer available and making many corrections to those that still are. See section #11.4, Appendix D: Trigger Point Therapy Resources. Science update (Nov 21 '16, section #7.5) — Added a few new citations about the prevalence of vitamin D deficiency and it’s correlation with chronic pain. See section #7.5, Vitamin D deficiency.

Most links to sections shown here work for customers only. For access to all sections, buy the tutorial for $19.95. You’ll get the full version right away.

Rewrite (Nov 15 '16, section #8.5) #8.5 ) — A new way of looking at how trigger points cause the sensation of “stiffness” and what happens when we try to stretch them out. See section #8.5, Like a knot in a bungie cord. Modest revision (Nov 15 '16, section #8.4) — Reorganized presentation of the practical and theoretical challenges with stretching trigger points. See section #8.4, The bad news about stretching for trigger points. Minor editing (Nov 12 '16, section #8.6 ) — Made the point of the section more clearly. See section #8.6, The spray‐and‐stretch method, if it works, implies that stretch alone may not work. Edited (Oct 20 '16, section #2.4) — Thorough revision and modernization. Although I revised this section just five years ago, it needed it again! See section #2.4, Slow checklist: a more detailed diagnostic checklist for myofascial pain syndrome.

1/4/2017


Simplified (Sep 12 '16, section #5.32) — This section has been simplified, and now only covers key points about opioids and the relevance of opioids to MPS specifically. Detailed information about opioids has been moved to a separate article, Opioids for Chronic Aches & Pains. See section #5.32, The nuclear option: “Hillbilly heroin” (Oxycontin), codeine and other opioids. Major rewrite (Sep 2 '16, section #3.2 ) — Thorough revision of the introduction to sarcomeres, inspired by the book Life’s Ratchet, Ratchet, about molecular machines. See section #3.2, Micro muscles and the dance of the sarcomeres. Correction (Aug 9 '16, section #2.4) — Removed overconfident statements about the clinical significance of the effects of psychoactive drugs, plus related minor updates. See section #2.4, Slow checklist: a more detailed diagnostic checklist for myofascial pain syndrome. Safety update (Jul 6 '16, section #5.32) — Updated for consistency with new CDC guidelines. Thorough editing of the section. See section #5.32, The nuclear option: “Hillbilly heroin” (Oxycontin), codeine and other opioids. New section (Jun 24 '16, section #5.34) — No notes. Just a new section. See section #5.34, Lidocaine patches. Important new related reading (Jun 2 '16) — Although not an update to the book itself, I’ve published some important related articles about the scientific controversy over the explanation for trigger points:

1. a heavily referenced referenced review of the evidence evidence that a trigger trigger point is a “tiny cramp” cramp” 2. a summary of the academic controversy controversy about trigger point science 3. the story of my own doubts and how they’ve changed over the years years (this is the “main” article on this theme; it was around before but has been revised heavily) All of this stuff is inside baseball, and not of interest to most readers, but it’s critical to my credibility as an author on this topic — it shows that I’ve really done my homework, and I’m not ignoring the concerns of skeptical experts — so for now I’ve made everything freely available to all site visitors instead of integrating them into the book. Nevertheless, the book has already been heavily influenced by this work, and will continue to be. Minor update (May 23 '16, section #1.10) — Added a good new example of a trigger point “whisperer” myth. See section #1.10, The myth of the trigger point whisperer. Minor update (May 7 '16, section #5.17) — Finally added lacrosse ball recommendation. See section #5.17, Massage tools: 7 free (or very cheap) and tools from objects not o riginally intended for massage. Science update (Feb 13 '16, section #3) — Beefy tune‐up for the “pillars” of trigger point science: several new and carefully written footnotes, linking to many painstakingly summarized papers for readers who really want to delve. It’s a bigger update than it looks like on the surface. See section #3, The science of trigger points: It’s a little half‐baked, but at least it’s not boring. Edited (Nov 18 '15, section #9.2) — Yet more modernization and clarification. See section #9.2, Massage quality control issues (“But I ’ve already tried massage therapy …”). Edited (Nov 17 '15, section #9.7) — Modernization and clarification. See section #9.7, Pain in three flavours: the good, the bad, and the ugly. Edited (Nov 17 '15, section #9.6) — Modernization and clarification. See section #9.6, The Pressure Question: how much is too much? Edited (Nov 17 '15, section #3.4) — Modernization and clarification. See section #3.4, Two: Good pain (why pressing on trigger points hurts like hell but feels like heaven). Edited (Nov 9 '15, section #9.3) — Tuned for consistency with my current views. See section #9.3, Two case studies: highly‐trained therapists failing miserably.

1/4/2017


Science update (Nov 6 '15, section #1.8) — Added a footnote about trigger points being associated with jaw pain. See section #1.8, Trigger points may explain many severe and strange aches and pains. Revised (Oct 16 '15, section #9.5) — Just modernizing and clarifying. See section #9.5, How to find good trigger point therapy . Science update (Sep 15 '15, section #3.12) — Some referencing about central sensitization, especially this “fun” fact: muscle pain may be especially good at causing CS. See section #3.12, Referred pain science (advanced).

al. (2004). See section #3.1, The dominant theory New Section (Sep 11 '15, section #3.1) — Better late than never, I’ve added a summary of the expanded integrated hypothesis from Gerwin et al. (2004). of trigger points spelled out in a little more technical detail. New section (Sep 5 '15, section #9.21 ) — No notes. Just a new section. See section #9.21, Acupressure: what if we pressed those points instead of puncturing? Science update (Feb 28 '15, section #2.10 ) — Added three good references and a diagram about how much “wiggle” room nerve roots have. See section #2.10, Nerve pain is overdiagnosed. Science update (Feb 22 '15, section #9.17) — Two new science reviews considered and cited. See section #9.17, How about Botox injection therapy? Rewritten (Jan 4 '15, section #5.1) — Completely revised for the 3rd edition of the Workbook : I no longer recommend it. See section #5.1, A brief detour: why not The Trigger Point Therapy Workbook? New citation (Dec 30 '14, section #1.4) — Added an important new reference to a scientific paper critical of conventional wisdom. See section #1.4, How can you trust this information about muscle pain? Minor update (Jul 8 '14, section #9.20) — New footnotes about the theory of acupuncture/trigger point overlap. See section #9.20, How about acupuncture? Science update (Jul 7 '14, section #9.19) — And, so sorry, it’s bad news. See section #9.19, Maybe stabbing will help! How about Dry Needling, AKA Intramuscular Stimulation (IMS) therapy? Science update (Mar 19 '14, section #6.5 ) — Added evidence about the effect of massage on fibromyalgia. See section #6.5, The relationship between trigger points and other physiological disorders and diseases, especially fibromyalgia. Editing (Jan 16 '14, section #3.3 ) — General revision for quality. Added the cheek‐bite analogy story for colour. See section #3.3, One: The vicious cycle (why trigger points are stubborn). Editing (Jan 16 '14, section #3.2) — General revision for quality. See section #3.2, Micro muscles and the dance of the sarcomeres. Minor update (Jan 5 '14, section #3.11) — Added a story about phantom limb pain. See section #3.11, Referred Pain Science (basic) . Minor update (Dec 21 '13, section #5.33 ) — Minor but fascinating new item about the myth of anaesthetic paralysis and the dominance of the CNS over muscle tone — the kind of nifty item I just love to add to the book! See section #5.33, The surprising futility of muscle relaxants such as Robax‐whatever, Robax‐whatever, Valium and other benzodiazepines. New section (Dec 13 '13, section #3.14) — An introduction to one of the most important theoretical challengers to the traditional explanation for trigger points. See section #3.14, Quintner: “It’s the nerves, stupid”. Science update (May 29 '13, section #7.5) — Good news update: new study shows a clear reduction in nonspecific musculoskeletal pain after vitamin D supplementation. See section #7.5, Vitamin D deficiency. Minor update (Mar 29 '13, section #5.31) — Upgraded risk and safety information about Voltaren Gel. See section #5.31, Voltaren® Gel, an intriguing new option.

1/4/2017


Major update (Mar 1 '13, section #8) — Almost all of the stretching sections have been edited, revised, and modernized. See section #8, Stretching: Stretching is generally over‐rated … but it might be good for trigger points. Minor update (Mar 1 '13, section #1.7 ) — Modernized and expanded a bit, a couple new references, and a generally much better explanation of what fibromyalgia is. See section #1.7, A brief note about the relationship between fibromyalgia and myofascial pain syndrome. Science update (Dec 14 '12, section #7.15) — Some more evidence showing the role of smoking in chronic pain. See section #7.15, Smoking. Science update (Dec 7 '12, section #7.15) — Added references showing connections between smoking and chronic pain. See section #7.15, Smoking. Minor update (Dec 7 '12, section #5.7 ) — Added a funny sidebar about bad anatomy. See section #5.7, Don’t get hung up on anatomy, and be persistent . Minor update (Oct 25 '12, section #3) — A minor case study and some science to help establish that muscle can indeed be the source of pain. See section #3, The science of trigger points: It’s a little half‐baked, but at least it’s not boring. New section (Oct 24 '12, section #8.9) — No notes. Just a new section. See section #8.9, What about stretching the antagonist muscle? Minor update (Oct 24 '12, section #2.5 ) — Added an item about “mobile” bumps that people often mistake for trigger points. See section #2.5, Negative checklist: symptoms that are probably not caused by trigger points. Edited (Aug 27 '12, section #2.16 ) — Now more accurate and clearer. Edits in preparation for audiobook version. See section #2.16, Predictably unpredictable: trigger point symptoms are erratic by nature. Major update (Jul 23 '12, section #5.38) #5.38 ) — New evidence that massage can cause “rhabdomyolysis” makes it quite a lot easier to understand a lot of negative reactions to trigger point therapy. This is valuable perspective, and the section has been heavily revised to exploit it. See section #5.38, Troubleshooting negative reactions to treatment. Minor update (Jun 9 '12, section #3) — This introduction now does a better (and more honest) job of mentioning some trigger point controversies, and links to an important companion article about them, for keener readers, Trigger Point Doubts. See section #3, The science of trigger points: It’s a little half‐baked, but at least it’s not boring. Minor update (May 2 '12, section #2.8) — A minor but good: clearer, better language. Editing continues as I work on the audiobook version. See section #2.8, “Out of nowhere”: nowhere”: a signature symptom of trigger points. Minor update (Apr 25 '12, section #2.4) — More editing for clarity and thoroughness. This also happens to be one of the first edits I’m doing to prepare for audiobook production. See section #2.4, Slow checklist: a more detailed diagnostic checklist for myofascial pain syndrome. Science update (Mar 28 '12, section #6.7 ) — I revised the warning away from hydration, and included some fun new myth‐busting evidence about hydration and cramping. See section #6.7, Reality checks: some self‐treatments that don’t work at all (or not nearly as well as you would hope). New section (Mar 8 '12, section #5.28 ) — No notes. Just a new section. See section #5.28, Neutral positioning: find a comfortable muscle length and rest there. Minor update (Mar 8 '12, section #2.5) — Added an item about non‐pain symptoms, like itching. See section #2.5, Negative checklist: symptoms that are probably not caused by trigger points. Minor update (Mar 7 '12, section #5.32) — Important new, skeptical footnote about the dangers of the powerful narcotic drugs. See section #5.32, The nuclear option: “Hillbilly heroin” (Oxycontin), codeine and other opioids. Modest expansion (again). And the sassy new “muscle stabbing” section name. (Jan 12 '12, section #9.19) — See section #9.19, Maybe #9.19, Maybe stabbing will help! How about Dry Needling, AKA Intramuscular Stimulation (IMS) therapy?

1/4/2017


Science update (Dec 21 '11, section #2.6) — Added quite an interesting citation about the correlation (or lack thereof) between tissue hardness and sensitivity. See section #2.6, If you have trigger points, will your muscles be “tight”? Trivial update (Dec 14 '11, section #2) — Added minor but odd note about “sensory annoyances” and hats. Yes, hats. See section #2, Diagnosis: How can you tell if trigger points are the cause of your problem? Products added (Nov 11 '11, section #5.15) — Three new product reviews, and some miscellaneous revision of the section. See section #5.15, Beyond the tennis ball: commercial massage tools. Updated (Oct 16 '11, section #9.15) #9.15 ) — Added new references to fascia science about the toughness and contractility of fascia, and some interpretation. This is also supported by a substantial new free article, Does Fascia Matter? See section #9.15, How about myofascial release and fascial stretching? New section (Aug 26 '11, section #7.15 ) — No notes. Just a new section. See section #7.15, Smoking. Minor update (Aug 26 '11, section #7.10) — Added a paragraph about magnesium. See section #7.10, Vitamin B1, B2, folate, and magnesium deficiencies. New section (Aug 26 '11, section #1.10) — No notes. Just a new section. See section #1.10, The myth of the trigger point whisperer. New section (Jul 13 '11, section #8.8 ) — Some new thoughts about how stretching for trigger points might work — quite different from the mainstream theory — inspired some new stretching science. See section #8.8, What about neurology? Stretch tolerance. Major rewrite (Jul 13 '11, section #3.15) — This might as well be a new section — not only did I re‐write it, I gave it a completely new purpose. Previously the “bamboo cage” was a minor metaphor used to illustrate a possible mechanism for sensitization of muscle tissue. Now it is the basis of an extended and (I think) interesting exploration of how the concept of trigger points might actually be debunked. Pretty weighty stuff, but delivered with a major effort to make it interesting to any reader. Hope you enjoy it! See section #3.15, “The bamboo cage” — what immobilization torture can tell us about the nature of muscle pain and massage. Minor update (Jul 12 '11, section #7.5) — Added an interesting observation about how Vitamin D supplementation might work. See section #7.5, Vitamin D deficiency. Minor update (Jul 12 '11, section #2.4) — Miscellaneous editing and improvements, plus a couple new items. See section #2.4, Slow checklist: a more detailed diagnostic checklist for myofascial pain syndrome. Minor update (May 30 '11, section #9.7) — Added some basic information about the damage that “ugly pain” can actually do, inspired by a recent anecdote received from a reader. See section #9.7, Pain in three flavours: the good, the bad, and the ugly. Science update (May 7 '11, section #7.5) — The Vitamin D advice provided to readers has not changed, but the science supporting it has been dramatically beefed up — more science, new science, better summarized — to confirm that D supplementation is a safe and sensible option for patients. See also the separate article, Vitamin D for Pain. See section #7.5, Vitamin D deficiency. Major update (Apr 20 '11) — Major improvements to the table of contents, and the display of information about updates like this one. Sections now have numbers for easier reference and bookmarking. The structure of the document has really been cleaned up in general, making it significantly easier for me to update the tutorial — which will translate into more good content for readers. Care for more detail? Really? Here’s the full announcement. Minor update (Apr 10 '11, section #5.32 ) — Edited to distinguish more clearly between “dependence” and “addiction,” to reduce alarmism about addiction or contributing to the excessive stigma against opioids. (Thanks to reader Evelyn D. for pointing out the issue to me — a good example of how readers contribute to the improvement of this tutorial.) See section #5.32, The nuclear option: “Hillbilly heroin” (Oxycontin), codeine and other opioids. Minor update (Mar 22 '11, section #9) — Updated the disclaimer (sidebar) about my “conflict of interest.” I no longer have it, since I am retired from my massage therapy practice. See section #9, Getting Help: How do you find good therapy for your trigger points?

1/4/2017


Minor update (Feb 3 '11, section #5.5) — Added evidence showing that trigger point therapy improved ankle range of motion. See section #5.5, New evidence that squishing trigger points works at least a little. Minor update (Feb 3 '11, section #2.5 #2.5)) — Added a checklist item about muscle wasting. See section #2.5, Negative checklist: symptoms that are probably not caused by trigger points. Major update (Dec 30 '10, section #9.13) #9.13 ) — Previously this section discussed ultrasound rather generally, without much discussion of the science; it is now beefed up with a thorough, fun discussion of the somewhat squishy evidence. See section #9.13, How about ultrasound therapy? (ESWT and “Sonic Relief™”). Minor update (Dec 30 '10, section #1 ) — Added an interesting footnote about the Google Book Ngram for “trigger points.” See section #1, Introduction. Many minor repairs (Dec 1 '10) — A large batch of minor errors and glitches were corrected today, thanks to the sharp eyes of readers Effie and Doris. Modest expansion (Nov 25 '10, section #9.19) — See section #9.19, Maybe #9.19, Maybe stabbing will help! How about Dry Needling, AKA Intramuscular Stimulation (IMS) therapy? New section (Oct 6 '10, section #8.2) #8.2 ) — Not just for customers: this particular section is a short version of a new free article. See section #8.2, Case study: A cautionary tale of stretching: that time I almost ripped my own head off. Major update (Sep 23 '10, section #7 ) — Numerous repairs and upgrades to all of Dr. Taylor’s sections of the book, especially links to the clinics that Dr. Taylor recommends, some new charts, and a colorful anecdote about drinking blood (seriously). Thanks to several readers, readers, and especially Elaine M., for their assistance with this. It’s quite amazing how the new chapter is driving immediate refinements. People read it and write to ask questions, and that spurs little email debates between me and Dr. Taylor, a trip to PubMed for more evidence or detail, or a clarification wrangle with the language ... and the results get put into the book within hours or even minutes … so cool! As reader Bill C. put it, “Your books are alive!” It does kind of feel like that. See section #7, Medical #7, Medical Factors That Perpetuate Pain: The effect of statin drugs, nutritional and hormonal deficiencies, infections, and inflammatory dis eases. Many new sections (Sep 20 '10, section #7 ) — An important new chapter (with several sections) by Dr. Tim Taylor. This is the first major collaborative effort on PainScience.com, and I’m extremely proud of it, and pleased with how well it went. See section #7, Medical Factors That Perpetuate Pain: The effect of statin drugs, nutritional and hormonal deficiencies, infections, and inflammatory diseases. New section (Sep 15 '10, section #5.5 ) — I’m delighted to add a whole small new section about evidence of the efficacy of trigger point therapy. See section #5.5, New evidence that squishing trigger points works at least a little. Minor update (Sep 15 '10) — I’ve done a bunch of work to continue integrating Dr. Taylor’s new chapter into the book: discussing perpetuating factors wherever they are relevant, and linking to the chapter. Thus there are many more spots in the book now where the importance and relevance of Dr. Taylor’s contribution is emphasized. New cover (Aug 6 '10) — At last! E‐book finally has a “cover.” Corrected (Jul 20 '10, section #3.19) — Fixed some wrong science about hydrogen bonding and tissue adhesions. Hat tip to reader and chemist K.D. for the good catch. See section #3.19, The science of adhesions: atoms stick to each other. Minor update (Jul 7 '10, section #5.33) — Updated the muscle relaxant section with a summary of a bizarre experiment with muscle relaxants that had quite surprising results. See section #5.33, The surprising futility of muscle relaxants such as Robax‐whatever, Robax‐whatever, Valium and other benzodiazepines. Minor update (Jun 25 '10, section #1.8) — Added a nice anecdote from a doctor about a trigger point that was almost mistaken for a possible tumor. See section #1.8, Trigger points may explain many severe and strange aches and pains. New section (May 26 '10, section #11.3 ) — This is a major upgrade to the presentation of PainScience.com’s own Perfect Spots series of articles. They have always been here, but perhaps not presented in as useful a way as they could have been. I’ve also made many upgrades to the articles themselves over the last 2 months. See section #11.3, Appendix C: The Perfect Spots.

1/4/2017


New section (May 26 '10, section #11.2) — Describes a new partnership with the publishers of the best online reference available. See section #11.2, Appendix B: The Trigger Point Symptom Checker. New section (May 26 '10, section #11.1) — Reviews and recommendations of other sources. See section #11.1, Appendix A: Trigger Point Reference Materials Materials or: Diagrams, Diagrams, Diagrams! Major update (May 25 '10) — A weakness of this tutorial has finally been eliminated: reference material! Where are the trigger points? Although this is still not an encyclopedia of trigger points, and it never will be (by design), the book now helps readers find specific trigger point information in three new ways, in three new sections. Many minor repairs (May 17 '10) — No specific update today, but a particularly large dose of editing love, with my thanks to reader Elaine M. for pointing out several errors that got me started. Elaine received some free product for her assistance, of course, and so can you if you send me any more than a few error reports. Minor update (Apr 17 '10, section #9.1) — Improved description of physiatrists (a medical speciality). See section #9.1, Types of therapists and doctors and their relationship to trigger point therapy. New section (Apr 3 '10, section #11.4) — Finally, I’ve added a (free) appendix of online resources related to trigger point therapy. Better late than never. See section #11.4, Appendix D: Trigger Point Therapy Resources. Tiny update (Feb 13 '10, section #5.33) — Tiny‐but‐interesting: I added some pretty good evidence that a muscle relaxant was no better for injured neck muscles than ibuprofen. See section #5.33, The surprising futility of muscle relaxants such as Robax‐whatever, Robax‐whatever, Valium and other benzodiazepines. New section (Jan 19 '10, section #3.10) — No notes. Just a new section. See section #3.10, The evolution of muscle pain: does muscle “burn out”? Minor update (Jan 19 '10, section #3.9) — A little revision, slight expansion. See section #3.9, The all‐powerful acne analogy. Major update (Jan 12 '10, section #2.20) — Section heavily revised, improved, and expanded. See section #2.20, Worst Case Scenario 2: Rare but extremely severe cases of myofascial pain syndrome. Major update (Jan 12 '10, section #2.19) — Section heavily revised, improved, and expanded. See section #2.19, Worst Case Scenario 1: Being triggery. Minor update (Jan 7 '10, section #5.38) — A small but significant update on nutrition, based on Bischoff‐Ferrari et al , which basically boils down to a recommendation to take vitamin D — it might help. See section #5.38, Troubleshooting negative reactions to treatment. Older updates — Listed in a separate document, for anyone who cares to take a look.

Notes 1. The most popular trigger trigger point book for for patients is still The Trigger Point Therapy Workbook: Your self‐treatment guide for pain relief , by Clair & Amber Davies. Unfortunately, it was scientifically weak when the first edition was published in 2001, and it still is after a new edition in 2013. It ignores some important scientific findings and controversies of the last 20 years, and promises too much.

1/4/2017


Many people have written to me over the years to tell me how the Workbook did did not really do the trick for them, but this tutorial did. The Workbook ’s ’s qualities and limitations are reviewed more thoroughly elsewhere.

2. Here’s a funny quote:

Rocket science isn’t all that difficult. It’s not brain surgery. a rocket scientist

3. Big promises are common on the internet, internet, and it’s a problem when a treatment method or product is presented presented as being “good for” nearly nearly any kind of pain problem. There are too many kinds of pain for any one idea to work for all of them.

4. Sorry to be the bearer of bad news. The reality is harsh, a major downer. downer. I will get back to this: the difficulties pain patients face in getting getting good, effective care is an serious serious and complicated problem. I’ll deal with it in considerable detail later on in the book. In particular, I’ll do my best to substantiate the accusation that a lot of care is poor quality — which many professionals take exception to, of course.

5. Commenting on two fascinating 2008 research papers (Chen and Shah), Dr. David Simons wrote, “Currently, “Currently, consideration consideration of the possibility of a myofascial trigger point component of the pain complaint is commonly not effectively included in the differential diagnosis and therefore is missed cold turkey, which can be very expensive for the health care system (expensive examinations looking for a phantom diagnosis) and disastrous to the patient (wrong diagnosis, wrong treatment).”

6. There is a bit of “neato” in any any good research. Making it understandable and interesting interesting for all kinds of readers is simply simply a matter of expressing that.

7. It’s not certain that this is the case, nor why it would be. However, However, there is certainly plenty of suggestive evidence. Consider a recent Spanish study (Jiménez‐Sánchez et al ): studying health surveys of the population of Spain, researchers looked for changes in rates of serious musculoskeletal pain since the early 90s, finding that it “increased from 1993 to 2001, but remained stable from the last years (2001 to 2006).

8. Simons writes, “Many authors through the years have ‘discovered’ ‘discovered’ a ‘new’ muscle pain syndrome ….” For instance, the popular Dr. John Sarno is still stubbornly calling it “tension myositis myositis syndrome” to this day, the term he invented when he “discovered” MPS. Such discoveries are akin to Columbus ‘discovering’ America … much to the surprise of the natives. MPS has been named for the anatomical neighbourhood that a particular researchers happens to find it in. It has been thoroughly confused with fibromyalgia. It has been called fibrositis and

1/4/2017


muskelharten and myofascitis and myelgelosis. It has been stuck with the labels non articular or soft‐tissue, rheumatism, osteochondrosis, and tendomyopathy. Every last one of them is a historical artifact.

9. Other muscle injuries are often confused with trigger points. But a trigger point is not a regular whole‐muscle spasm, or a “muscle strain” (torn muscle), which is an actual rip in muscle tissue that occurs suddenly and is instantly very painful. The differences will seem more obvious as you learn more about trigger points.

10. Smith DR. Prevalence and Distribution of Musculoskeletal Musculoskeletal Pain Among Australian Australian Medical Students. Journal of Musculoskeletal Pain. Pain. 2007 Aug 29;15(4). It’s amazingly difficult to find hard data on the prevalence of musculoskeletal problems. However, this Australian study of medical students found that almost 90% of them had some kind of body pain problem, mostly in the neck, lower back and shoulders — and these are young people. It may not be an exaggeration to say that virtually the entire population of planet Earth has musculoskeletal pain!

11. Travell Travell J, Simons D, Simons L. Myofascial Pain and Dysfunction: The Trigger Point Manual. 2nd ed. Lippincott, Williams & Wilkins; 1999. p. xi. Or, as stated more eloquently and authoritatively by Drs. Travell and Simons, “Myofascial trigger points are a frequently overlooked and misunderstood source of the distressingly ubiquitous musculoskeletal aches and pains of mankind.”

12. Much more recently recently than in the previous previous footnote, in 2008, 2008, Dr. Simons writes: “Currently, consideration of the possibility of an MTP component of the pain complaint is commonly not … included in the differential diagnosis and therefore is missed cold turkey, which can be very expensive for the health care system (expensive examinations looking for a phantom diagnosis) and disastrous to the patient (wrong diagnosis, wrong treatment).”

13. Fernández‐de‐Las‐Peñas C, Simons D, Cuadrado ML, Pareja J. The The role of myofascial trigger trigger points in musculoskeletal pain syndromes syndromes of the head and neck. Current Pain & Headache Reports. Reports. 2007 Oct;11(5):365–72. PubMed #17894927. This important review of the scientific literature on the relationship between trigger points and neck and head pain generally found that there is not much literature to review. Interestingly, the authors do note that there is more evidence “that both tension headache and migraine are associated with referred pain from trigger points.”

14. Calandre EP, EP, Hidalgo J, Garcia‐Leiva JM, Rico‐Villademoros Rico‐Villademoros F, Delgado‐Rodriguez Delgado‐Rodriguez A. Myofascial trigger points in cluster cluster headache patients: a case series. Head & Face Medicine. Medicine . 2008 Dec 30;4(32):32. PubMed #19116034. PainSci #55349. Although this research was “preliminary and uncontrolled” and is not powerful enough to prove anything, its results were certainly noteworthy — the sort of results that can inspire more research, hopefully. All of 12 patients with chronic cluster headaches (a kind of migraine, nicknamed “suicide headaches”) had myofascial trigger points, and treating them (with injection) produced “significant improvement in 7 of the 8 chronic cluster patients.” The authors speculate that trigger points are not the cause of cluster headaches, but a nasty complicating factor: “chronic pain or repeated acute pain sensitize muscular nociceptors creating active trigger points which, in turn, contribute to potentiate headache pain. This kind of vicious cycle explains why the number of active trigger points has been found to be higher in pa tients with chronic primary headaches than in healthy subjects or in pa tients experiencing less frequent headache a ttacks.” ttacks.”

1/4/2017


15. I believe that trigger points may be a by‐product by‐product of the “volatility” of muscle. It’s a truism of engineering that the chance of a breakdown goes goes up with the number of moving parts. Muscle Muscle tissue is more powerful and biologically complex than most people give it credit for, and like any finely‐tuned machine, perhaps it breaks down easily. I suspect that we get trigger points as a relatively small price to pay for having high‐functioning muscle tissue, an evolutionary compromise. Higher function would require an escalating risk of dysfunction. Reduced function would probably result in fewer trigger points … but also in weaker and less responsive muscle.

16. InteriorsAndSources.com [Internet]. Office Place RSIs Decreased in 1994; 1996 Sep [cited 10 Nov 9]. Estimates of the incidence of repetitive strain injuries generally range from 3‐6% of all cases requiring time away from work. In comparison, MPS is ubiquitous. In my own clinical experience, treating RSIs represent a negligible fraction of my work, whereas MPS is either a cause or complicating factor in nearly every case I treat — including the RSIs! In 1996, Interiors and Sources magazine reported that, “the total number of serious injuries or illnesses attributed to all repetitive motion was just ... four percent of the total number of cases requiring time away from work. Of those, the majority of cases or 53 percent were recorded in the manufacturing sector ... ‘Clearly, most repetitive motion injuries are not occurring in the offices of America,’ said PJ Edington and executive director of the Center for Office Technology (COT). ‘And the so‐called epidemic of office‐related repetitive motion injuries reported in the media has been a clear case of misdiagnosis.’”

17. There are several types of shin splints, and most of them have nothing to do with trigger points. However, However, the meaty part of the shin — the tibialis anterior muscle — is often the culprit. At least a few seemingly unbeatable cases of shins splints can be easily treated … if you know where and how to rub the tibialis anterior muscle.

18. Most importantly, importantly, the rubber has never hit the road in the form of well‐designed clinical trials trials of outcomes for patients: that is, do people actually get get their pain problems solved by good good quality trigger point therapy, well enough and often enough to be worth the costs? If treating trigger points works well as as a therapy, then there should have been such studies more or less easily proving it many years ago — but there still aren’t. That’s a concern at this point in history.

19. I’d put them somewhere somewhere in the middle of the range: trigger trigger points are nowhere nowhere near as as bad as a lot of common pseudoscience and quackery gets, but they certainly do fall well short of “proven” and well understood. At worst, they may even be a bad idea — a “legitimate misunderstanding,” an idea that was reasonable 20 years ago but which now needs to be retired or heavily revised.

20. Quintner JL, Bove GM, GM, Cohen ML. A critical evaluation evaluation of the trigger trigger point phenomenon. Rheumatology (Oxford) (Oxford).. 2015 Mar;54(3):392–9. PubMed #25477053. Quintner, Cohen, and Bove think the most popular theory about the nature of trigger points (muscle tissue lesions) is “flawed both in reasoning and in science,” and that treatment based on that idea gets results “indistinguishable from the placebo effect.” They argue that all biological biological evidence put forward over the years is critically flawed, while other evidence leads elsewhere, and take the position that the debate is over. (They also point out that the theory is treated like an established fact by a great many people, which is definitely problematic.) However, their opinion is extreme, and most experts do not think we should throw out all the science so far (see Dommerholt et al ). This controversial opinion is discussed in more detail later.

1/4/2017


21. Simons D. Foreword Foreword of The Trigger Point Therapy Workbook. Workbook. 1st ed. New Harbinger Publications; 2001. The full quote reads: “Muscle is an orphan organ. No medical speciality claims it. As a consequence, no medical specialty is concerned with promoting funded research into the muscular causes of pain, and medical students and physical therapists rarely receive adequate primary training in how to recognize and treat myofascial trigger points. Fortunately, massage therapists, although rarely well‐trained medically [BC being one of the obvious exceptions, see Massage Therapy In British Columbia, Canada — PI], are trained in how to find myofascial trigger points and frequently become skilled in their treatment.”

22. Travell Travell J, Simons D, Simons L. Myofascial Pain and Dysfunction: The Trigger Point Manual. 2nd ed. Lippincott, Williams & Wilkins; 1999. Vol 1, p13.

23. Doctors are unqualified to care properly properly for most common pain and injury problems, especially especially the stubborn ones, and this has been proven by other doctors: Stockard Stockard et al found that 82% of graduates lacked “basic competency” in this area. For more information, see The Medical Blind Spot for Aches, Pains & Injuries: Most physicians are unqualified to care for many common pain and injury problems, especially the more stubborn and tricky ones.

24. “Structuralism” “Structuralism” is the excessive focus excessive focus on crookedness and “mechanical” problems as causes of pain. It has been the dominant way of thinking about how pain works for decades, and yet it is source of much bogus diagnosis. Structuralism has been criticized by several experts, and many studies confirmed there are no clear connections between biomechanical problems and pain. Many fit, symmetrical people have severe pain problems! And many crooked people have little pain. Certainly there are some structural some structural factors in pain, but they are generally much less important than messy physiology and neurology. Structuralism remains dominant because it offers comforting, marketable simplicity. For instance, “alignment” is the dubious goal of many major therapy methods, especially chiropractic adjustment and Rolfing. See Your Back Is Not Out of Alignment: Debunking the obsession with alignment, posture, and other biomechanical bogeymen as major causes of pain.

25. And it certainly certainly felt like like it at times.

26.

Ingraham. A Historical Historical Perspective Perspective On Aches ‘n’ Pains: We are are living in in a golden age of pain science and musculoskeletal musculoskeletal medicine … sorta.

PainScience.com. 1804 words.

27. Travell Travell J, Simons D, Simons L. Myofascial Pain and Dysfunction: The Trigger Point Manual. 2nd ed. Lippincott, Williams & Wilkins; 1999.

28. Mense S, Simons DG, Russell Russell IJ. Muscle pain: understanding its nature, nature, diagnosis and treatment. 1st hardcover ed. Lippincott Williams Williams & Wilkins; 2000. A dense text, important reading for professionals.

29. And not impossible reading, either. Over the course of a decade, I have seen several keen patients tackle Travell and Simons’ massive red texts and get good value from them. The diagrams are exceptionally clear, and the writing is generally quite good. It’s not out of the question for patients to try to work with them. But they are expensive reference books, filled with jargon, and intended for clinicians who are dealing with every area of the body on a daily basis.

1/4/2017


30. Here’s Dr. Dr. Fred Wolfe’s technical but readable definition of fibromyalgia, from a 2013 blog post. Dr. Wolfe Wolfe is a rheumatologist with a long history of expertise about trigger points and fibromyalgia: Fibromyalgia is a name given given to a clinical syndrome whose main features currently currently are the presence of chronic pain simultaneously in many areas of of the body together with multiple somatic symptoms. In particular, persistent and substantial fatigue , sleep disturbance and cognitive difficulties are among the most common of the symptoms. Decreased pain threshold is almost always found, and is strongly correlated with the extent of body pain. Because the symptoms and their intensity are variable, the boundaries of fibromyalgia are somewhat indistinct . The identification of fibromyalgia is based on the overall severity of symptoms. The gold standard for necessary severity was set by the 1990 American College of Rheumatology (ACR) criteria: roughly, it is the level of symptoms found in persons with ≥11/18 tender points when examined by capable examiners. As fibromyalgia symptoms at less than criteria level are often found before fibromyalgia is diagnosed, it is uncertain when fibromyalgia begins. There are no consistent clinical laboratory or imaging abnormalities.

31. Ehrlich GE. Pain Pain is real; real; fibromyalgia isn't. J isn't. J Rheumatol . 2003 Aug;30(8):1666–7. PubMed #12913918. PainSci #54771. When one has tuberculosis, one has tuberculosis, whether or not it is diagnosed. The same is true for cancer, rheumatoid arthritis, hookworm infestation — really, of the gamut of diseases. But not for fibromyalgia (FM). No one has FM until it is diagnosed.

32. Staud R. Are tender point injections beneficial: the role role of tonic nociception in fibromyalgia. Curr Pharm Des. Des . 2006;12(1):23–27. “…interventions aimed at reducing local FM pain seem to be effective but need to focus less on tender points but more on trigger points (TrP) and other body areas of heightened pain ….”

33. Li YH, Wang FY, Feng CQ, CQ, Yang XF, Sun YH. Massage therapy therapy for fibromyalgia: a systematic review and meta‐analysis of randomized controlled trials. PLoS One. One. 2014;9(2):e89304. PubMed #24586677. PainSci #53919.

This is a review of massage therapy for fibromyalgia that epitomizes the “garbage in, garbage out” problem with meta‐analysis: there was virtually no research on this topic worth analyzing to begin with, and trying to pool the results of several weak studies is meaningless. To the extent that the study results are generally inconclusive and ambiguous, the conclusions of any review are going to have more to do with the authors’ opinions and biases than hard data. In this case, they report “significant” positive results without mentioning that they only mean “statistically significant,” and the effect size is barely‐there — clinically insignificant. They also boast about traditional Chinese massage in the abstract, which is odd. And they fail to note that a much of the data did not even measure the effect on pain, just mood. So here’s my conclusion: whoopty‐do. whoopty‐do. There’s really nothing here, except maybe massage for fibromyalgia being damned by faint, ambiguous praise. I’ve written several more paragraphs about this paper in Does Massage Therapy Work?

34. Travell et al., op.cit. (Virtually op.cit. (Virtually all information in this article is drawn from Travell and Simons, so I won’t cite page references for every instance.) The subscapularis case is a good example of how MPS is probably much more clinically significant than RSIs: not only is MPS a causal or complicating factor in many RSIs, it frequently imitates them and is the correct diagnosis! This is why at least some RSIs do not respond to conventional treatment.

35. It’s possible to richly reference this section with individual scientific papers backing up every single example of trigger points mimicking some other health problem. This kind of information is everywhere in everywhere in the MPS literature. For now, here’s just one of many, a 1995 paper, “Myofascial pain syndromes — the great mimicker”.

1/4/2017


36. There’s a large large body of research about this, but Rocha is a good good recent example. In 2007, these researchers found that “in 56% of patients with tinnitus and MTPs, the tinnitus could be modulated by applying digital compression of such points, mainly those of the masseter muscle.” And how many people with tinnitus had trigger points? Quite a few. The researchers found “a strong correlation between tinnitus and the presence of MTPs in head, neck and shoulder girdle.”

37. Fernández‐de‐Las‐Peñas C, Galán‐Del‐Río F, F, Alonso‐Blanco C, et al . Referred pain from muscle trigger points in the masticatory and neck‐shoulder musculature in women with temporomandibular disoders. J disoders. J Pain. Pain. 2010 Dec;11(12):1295–304. PubMed #20494623. This study compared 25 healthy women to 25 others with temporomandibular disorders (TMD). Trained examiners looked for trigger points (without knowing which group they were in), specifically in the neck and jaw muscles. According to the criteria they used, they found more and worse trigger points in the women with TMD (where by “worse” I mean larger areas of referred pain). The trigger points in the neck produced more referred pain that those in the jaw muscles.

38. This is one I know well from personal experience: a couple of times per year, I get a disturbing achey lump in my throat, a hitch in my swallow. It used to get me worried and anxious and thinking about going to the doctor. Then I discovered that it’s closely associated with a recurring patch of sensitivity in the muscles under my jaw, in the upper throat … and it can be massaged away in about a minute. I have been doing this successfully for several years now.

39. The iliopsoas muscle (“illy‐oh so‐ass”) is a two‐in‐one hip flexing pair, mostly only palpable through the guts. Its clinical importance is often curiously exaggerated, but sometimes it does need a massage. For more information, see Psoas, So What? Massage therapy for the psoas major and iliacus (iliopsoas) muscles is not that big a deal. Except when it is.

40. As discussed above, such “structural” misdiagnoses are are a common red herring, and almost always wrong. Mistaking a gluteus maximus trigger point for sacroiliac joint pain is a particularly common diagnostic error. See Massage Therapy for Low Back Pain (So Low That It’s Not In the Back) for more about this particular area.

41. This is one of the “perfect spots” for massage: massage: spot #12, specifically. For For more information, see Massage Massage Therapy for Low Back Pain (So Low That It’s It’s Not In the Back).

42. Perhaps just a couple of magic touches. Here’s another question I received by e‐mail: “If a massage therapist told you that all he had to do was touch a trigger point with one finger, then touch you somewhere else on the body far from the trigger point with his other hand, that the trigger point would vanish instantly. Is that true?”

43. For instance, what if trigger points are present mainly due to an incurable neurological disease like fibromyalgia? There are many significant medical factors that make treatment impossible or nearly so. A much more common example is smoking, which makes treatment so difficult that my co‐author, Dr. Tim Taylor, will not accept smokers as patients.

There are 287 more footnotes in the full version of this book. I like footnotes, and I try to have fun with them.

1/4/2017



The Complete Guide to Trigger Points & Myofascial Pain (2016)

Recommend Documents