My Back Hurts

I had briefly heard about Trigger Point treatment from different therapists who claimed to be experts in hundreds of things, this being one of them. Then I searched for a book on this topic on Amazon and came across a book that almost changed my life. The book is called Trigger Point Therapy by Clair Davies (see recommended reading).

There are many things I like about this book, first is the author’s personal experience with back problems. Like me and I am sure many others, he had suffered for a long time with various back and muscular problems, went to many therapists for treatment but to no avail. He then decided to take his health in his own hands, and did some research in an attempt to fix his own problems. To cut a long story short, he came across a book by Travell and Simons which is a huge volume going into the detail of trigger points, its causes and treatments. The author of this book was the personal physician of John F Kennedy and is based on her personal experience.

Trigger points are taut bands of muscle or muscles fibre which can be delicate to touch, produce referred pain (i.e. pain in a remote area) and a twitch response. It may be easier to explain with an explain, say for example someone has an accident and suffers whiplash. Now their problems may not be just limited to a sore neck, some develop other symptoms of pain around the shoulder blades, mid back, tingling and numbness in the hands, chest pain etc. Then you think, well hold on, I have a problem in my neck, why is there a whole range of other problems? In this example, due to the whiplash injury, muscles such as the Scalenes develop trigger points. Muscle fibres become taut and shorten. These scalenes are connected to the neck vertebrae and the top ribs. The effect the tightening and shortening of the muscles has is that it lifts the rib up creating secondary pain in the check, upper back. At the same time, as its lifting up the rib, the nerve bundle going through the neck vertebrae, under the arm pit into the hand also gets impinged causing symptoms which may appear as Carpal Tunnel Syndrome.

I have read Clair Davies book cover to cover many times, and have managed to solve quite a few of my problems by his techniques of self treatment. This book is primarily a self-treatment guide and gives very good detail on how to apply the self-applied techniques. He goes through every trigger point from your toes to your head and there associated referred pain pattern. So for example, a shoulder problem could be caused by one of many trigger points. Going through the book, you start searching until you come across a trigger point which amazingly reproduces the pain you feel, then you begin to massage.

I have managed to find many trigger points quite successfully, but it requires patients. I had a long problem with my shoulder blades and neck. I tried one of the very many trigger points which could cause this problem. Sometime you think you have found the trouble maker, you massage and it feels good, but then it comes back. I eventually found trigger points in my Scalene muscles at the side of the neck towards the front. When I pressed on the trigger point, the referred pain pattern would go to my shoulder blade, back of my neck, and even down my arm. However, sometimes I have been over enthusiastic with the massage and was left with a pins & needle feeling in my fingers for a week.

This truly is an amazing book and I’d recommend this to everyone. But you have to be patient with it, and follow the instructions noted carefully.

I’ve been so impressed by treatments of trigger points, I have tried to find a therapist who is a specialist in this field, but haven’t been successful so far.

trigger point