Occupational therapy question?

Massage therapy question?

• This is a question for someone who has graduated from a massage therapy program... I am in such a program myself...and my instructors have us addressing muscle groups which are deep rather than superficial. My question is, how much of the "cross fiber friction" that we are doing for the rhomboids, for example, actually "gets" to them, or are we in reality just working the trapezius ? Does it depend on how thick one's trapezius is ? I just have this suspicion that some of what I am being taught is wishful thinking.....

• Answer:

  Good for you! You are thinking instead of just accepting what your teachers tell you. There is very little fact or research to support the techniques taught in massage school. It's strange that the organizations that only study bodywork (like the Touch Research Institute) ALWAYS find that massage is beneficial for EVERY condition, while unbiased institutions find mixed results. The fact is that most pain resolves itself in 8 weeks without any treatment at all. I just read a case study on piriformis pain with 10 weeks of cross-fiber friction and other treatments. The practitioner concluded the treatment helped. Really? So the answer to your question is, we don't know, but common sense tells you the technique doesn't work below superficial layers. Just keep an open mind and you'll find some techniques that work better than others. I very rarely used CFF. Edit: Please notice that answers after mine will say, "Sabeena's wrong" but then offer no proof. They just BELIEVE it works, just like well-meaning "healers" in the past believed leeches and trepanation worked. We simply have no proof that ANY of it works very well.