What Is Rehabilitation & Sports Injury Massage?

Rehabilitation and sports injury massage is a no-nonsense massage technique that deals directly with the body’s soft tissue – Muscles, Tendons and Ligaments.  It assists the healing and rehabilitation of injuries, their dysfunction and to facilitate improved movement.  During this style of massage, we focus on the area causing the issue and the supporting areas that are compensating to get you through the day.
It has developed over the years to deal with the specific conditions that the human body experiences before and after injury. It utilises such techniques as MET (muscle energy technique), Soft Tissue Release, Deep Tissue Techniques, Classical Swedish Massage techniques and NMT (neuromuscular technique) along with Trigger Point Therapy and stretching.

How does it work?

When injury to muscle tissue occurs the muscle fibres will often misalign themselves whilst healing. Our muscles are covered by a layer connective tissue called fascia. This fascia covers all the individual muscle fibres, the larger bundles of muscles, and the whole muscle groups. It is one continuous piece of tissue that never stops growing and covers our whole body.  Normally, when covering healthy, moving muscle it is a soft, gel like substance.
However, when our muscle movement is restricted (such as in the case of injury or postural misalignment), tissue fluids cannot reach the areas they need to in order to lubricate the fascia. The fascia hardens and scar tissue forms, further trapping toxins and waste materials, such as lactic acid. This causes pain and dysfunction as the body tries to remedy the situation by setting up a series of structural compensations - leading to further pain and more problems.
By moving these toxins and breaking down adhesions within the muscles, it allows improved flow of the nutrient rich blood and oxygen to the injured/pre-operative area.  This in turn speeds up recovery, mobility and gets you back to where you need to be to continue with your life.

Who is it good for?

Everyone and anyone, from athletes to office workers to retired folk.  If you have an injury and are recovering from an injury, then rehabilitation massage may just speed up your recovery, improve your flexibility and mobility.  If you are preoperative it can help ensure that the body is in the best position possible to aid a quick recovery after the event. 

There are of course some people/injuries that massage may not be suitable for, the following list is not exhaustive but is a good guideline:
Suffering with; Infectious Diseases/Skin Diseases, Cancer, Current Diarrhoea/Vomiting, Haemophilia, First Trimester of Pregnancy, Recently Given Birth, Thrombosis.
GP’s approval may be required for: Epilepsy, heart conditions, un-medicated blood pressure issues, Osteoporosis, Bells Palsy, Rheumatism/Arthritis.