Myofacial Pain Syndrome and fibromyalgia treatment

This short, 2-minute, video is about the Trigger point injections to treat chronic muscle pain. 

What do you think of this treatment option?
We would all love to hear from you if you have tried it.

Trigger points can be found in people with fibromyalgia but they can be found in anybody.  Fibromyalgia and myofascial pain syndrome are two separate and distinct syndromes. You can have both of these conditions together. Fibromyalgia is a systemic disease process that requires a multidisciplinary treatment approach. Myofascial pain syndrome (MPS) is a condition that arises from the referred pain and muscle dysfunction caused by trigger points. It responds to manual treatment  such as ischemic compression and various specific stretching techniques. 

What are trigger points?

Tight muscles that develop in your muscles after overuse are called trigger points. They cause pain throughout the muscle. When this pain persists it may become myofascial pain syndrome. According to the American Association of Family Physicians Palpation of a hypersensitive bundle or nodule of muscle fiber of harder than normal consistency is the physical finding typically associated with a trigger point. 

How can trigger points be treated?

Nonpharmacologic treatments include acupuncture, osteopathic manual medicine techniques, massage, acupressure, ultrasonography, application of heat or ice, diathermy, transcutaneous electrical nerve stimulation, ethyl chloride Spray and Stretch technique, dry needling, and trigger-point injections with local anesthetic, saline, or steroid. 

You may also like to read these other articles I wrote about:
Fibromyalgia & Chronic Myofascial Pain Syndrome (book review)
Fibro and Chronic Myofascial Pain Syndrome
Myofascial Trigger Points in chronic muscle pain: Causes and Treatment

RESOURCES

NIH Tender points/fibromyalgia vs. trigger points/myofascial pain syndrome
PubMed Trigger points and tender points

American Association of Family Physicians

LINKED UP AT FIBRO FRIDAY, where you can read fibro posts from great fibro bloggers.

Homeopathy helping Fibromyalgia

A plant used in a homeopathic tincture - Rhus toxicodendron

Scientific studies published in the journal of the British Society for Rheumatology have confirmed the real benefits of homeopathic medicines for fibromyalgia as distinct from a placebo.

Scientific Evidence for Homeopathy 
The first controlled trial testing the homeopathic treatment of patients with fibromyalgia was an impressive and sophisticated double-blind "crossover" trial that was published in the prestigious British Medical Journal (Fisher et al, 1989). 

A crossover trial is a sophisticated method to test the efficacy of a treatment because each patient's results with the "real treatment" are compared with that same patient's results with a placebo. 

While most double-blind studies compare one group of people who receive the "real treatment" with another (hopefully similar) group of people who receive a placebo, crossover trials compare the results of each person and his/her response to real treatment with his/her response to placebo.

The researchers found that there was a substantially significant degree of improvement in the reduction of tender points and improved pain and sleep when the subjects were taking the homeopathic medicine, as compared to when these same subjects were taking a placebo.

Read Dana Ullman's full article in the Huffington post.
A study done into fibro and homeopathy.

If you are interested in alternative therapies for Fibromyalgia please see my post on all the natural treatments I have tried. 

DIMENSIONS OF WELLNESS

Have you heard of the eight dimensions of wellness? Here you can find a summary of what they are...

Wellness, or our sense of well - being, is all about how we feel about life and how we function.

It is not just about our health or lack of it.

Wellness involves many dimensions that make up the whole person. 

There are eight areas that influence our ability to function at a healthy level: 

1. Physical Wellness — a lack of illness and/or disability and the role you take in maintaining your body for strength, vitality and energy.

2. Emotional Wellness — an ability to cope and manage stress and being at peace with who you are.

3. Intellectual Wellness — the ability to think, reason and remember and staying open to new ideas.

4. Social Wellness — the ability to connect with a support system of family and friends or the wider community.

5. Occupational Wellness — the ability to contribute, use your own skills and abilities.

6. Spiritual Wellness — understanding of your place and purpose, having a sense of purpose and meaning beyond self. 

7. Environmental Wellness — feeling safe at home and around your area and the impact you have on the planet and the planet has on you.

8. Financial Wellness — having sufficient money to meet your basic needs. 


So I am off to think about each of these eight areas, to see if I have a balance in the aspects of wellness? To decide where are things going well and where they need improvement?
Besides physical wellness, which is a given area anyone with fibromyalgia would like to improve, where else would you like to see change?


The 8 petalled paris japonica

FURTHER READING: Why Do We Get Sick? Why Do We Get Better? A Wellness Detective Manual

This post is linked up at Fibro Friday week 9 where you can check out great fibro bloggers.