SOFT TISSUE THERAPY
Soft tissue therapy is targeted clinical massage. It is hands on bodywork that can get you out of many kinds of painful episodes and reduces tensile and compressive stress on your body, dramatically speeding up the healing process. 'Soft tissue’ refers to the type of body structures that are targeted in a treatment session and include:
Muscles, tendons and ligaments
Fascia (superficial and deep)
Fluids such as blood, lymph, interstitial fluid (between cells)
Arteries, veins, lymph nodes and channels
Nerves and motor programs (brain maps that direct movement/ dysfunctional patterns)
One of the strongest aspects of Soft tissue therapy is that it aims to make a big improvement of symptoms in the first treatment. Clinically we see this 95% of the time. Longer lasting change occurs in many problems within 3-4 treatments.
What is Soft tissue therapy good for?
Random muscle aches and pain that move around the body
Neck and lumbar spine disc bulges.
Computer posture-rounded shoulders and sway backs
Functional and structural scoliosis of the spine
Growing pains in children and adolescents
Thoracic outlet syndrome
Muscle tears
Tendon and bursitis conditions
The need to increase range of motion for various sports eg. shoulder and thoracic spine flexibility for snatch in Olympic weight lifting
Poor posture and repetitive strain injuries
Tennis and golfers elbow
Plantar fasciitis
Whiplash
Many kinds of nerve conditions in the neck, lumbar spine, arms and legs
Tension headaches and some migraines.
Erasing compensation patterns post injury and post surgery
Post joint surgeries (once surgeon/physio approval has been given)
Adrenal fatigue and central fatigue (nervous system burnout)
Unusually rigid tight muscles throughout the body
Also, most conditions being over seen by a physiotherapist, podiatrist, chiropractor or osteopath
Soft tissue therapy techniques:
Remedial massage and sports massage techniques
Trigger point therapy
Nerve pain release techniques
Myofascial dry needling for trigger points
Deep Ischemic release techniques with elbows, thumbs or fingers
Myofascial release techniques
Passive tissue tensioning techniques
Muscle energy techniques
PNF pain elimination techniques
Active release technique
Positional release technique
Loaded stretching for accelerated flexibility development and improved joint stability
Kinesiotaping for support
Postural taping techniques
First stage exercise rehabilitation
Breathing retraining
Swedish massage techniques
Relaxation massage techniques to in aid recovery from central fatigue (nervous system burnout)
Chris also uses Bowen Therapy as a part of Soft Tissue Therapy sessions as he finds it very often adds positive change to the session. Chris also uses Bowen Therapy as a stand alone technique.