Tag Archive for: dry needling

Orthopedic dry needling

The Top Four Benefits of Orthopedic Dry Needling and Why You Should Consider it.

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Orthopedic dry needling is a modern therapeutic treatment technique that has been adopted by physical therapists and medical professionals to alleviate pain and improve muscle function. But despite its escalating popularity, I’m still surprised at how many people are unaware it even exists.

What exactly is orthopedic dry needling?

Orthopedic dry needling involves the insertion of fine, sterile acupuncture needles into myofascial trigger points (“knots”), tendons, or muscles that are typically painful, stiff, or causing discomfort. Unlike acupuncture, which aims to balance and restore the flow of energy (“chi”) in your body, dry needling focuses on restoring your muscles and soft tissue back to their optimal state. During a dry needling treatment, a needle is inserted into specific areas to encourage blood flow and homeostasis, sometimes eliciting a ‘twitch’ response in the muscles. The needles may remain in place for a short duration, or may be removed quickly, depending on the condition being treated. Dry needling is backed by scientific research and has been shown to work effectively. It’s thought to turn off trigger points, ease muscle tension, reduce inflammation, and relieve pain – all to help improve how your muscles perform and work.

Here are the top 4 benefits of orthopedic dry needling and why you should consider this treatment technique if you haven’t already:

1. Pain Relief 

Dry needling can quickly alleviate pain, which means you can get back to your regular activities sooner. While the treatment itself can sometimes be painful, and lead to residual soreness 24-48 hours after your treatment, you’ll find that the positives far outweigh the negatives. Most of my clients find that a little bit of soreness right after the treatment is well worth the pain relief they experience afterwards. Dry needling works best for pain relief when it’s performed alongside functional and integrative therapies such as corrective movement strategies – which will result in long-lasting pain relief instead of more short-term.

2. Better Mobility

Dry needling does more than just relieve pain – it helps to enhance how you move. When muscles are tight, they can restrict movement and create a lot of discomfort. By releasing tension in tight muscles, increasing blood flow, and reducing inflammation – dry needling facilitates more comfortable and more extensive range motion in your joints. This allows you to move more freely and perform your favorite activities with less pain and restriction. In conjunction with corrective exercises and stretches, dry needling can be an extremely valuable tool for enhancing and maintaining good mobility.

3. Enhanced Muscle Function

Good mobility is just one aspect required for optimal muscle function. Your muscles also need to know how to activate properly and together. Sometimes – when you’ve been suffering from pain for a while – the muscles surrounding the problem area can “fall asleep at the wheel”. While you may be able to successfully get rid of your pain in a particular area, getting rid of and correcting the problem is a different story. I often say: “just because your pain is gone – does not mean your problem is gone”. If you don’t address underlying muscular compensations, your pain will eventually come back and sometimes it’s worse. The stimulation provided by orthopedic dry needling can help get your brain to pay more attention to the affected area, thus, helping “sleepy” muscles come back to the party and work like they’re supposed to.

4. Faster Recovery

When you’re injured, your body needs all the help it can get to heal. Dry needling not only enhances blood flow to the targeted area, but helps to create an environment for muscle regeneration as well – thus – helping to speed up the recovery process of injured or damaged soft tissue. Additionally, the improved blood flow aids in the removal of metabolic waste products and the delivery of nutrients to the tissues, fostering faster healing of the injured areas and less inflammation. This accelerated recovery is particularly valuable for athletes or weekend warriors aiming to return to their sport faster, as well as anyone looking to get back to their favorite activities as quickly as possible.

Should you consider orthopedic dry needling?

When I think of orthopedic dry needling, I think of it like a helping hand to feel better, move more freely, and enhance just about any other treatment you’re using alongside it. For example, a corrective exercise is only going to work if you can execute it properly. If you’ve got stiff, painful muscles that prevent you from performing your exercise or stretch that you know you need to do to help a particular problem – dry needling can be the magic in between.

It’s important to note that dry needling is not necessary or right for everyone.  So it’s important that you know what it is and when it can be used to improve your health. If after reading this article you think orthopedic dry needling could be something that you’re missing – talk to a qualified physical therapist or health care practitioner who practices dry needling – and ask if you’re a good fit for this treatment technique.

Dr. Carrie Jose, Physical Therapist and Pilates expert, owns CJ Physical Therapy & Pilates in Portsmouth and writes for Seacoast Media Group. To get in touch, email her at [email protected].

Three Reasons Your Physical Therapy Didn’t Work

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Have you been to physical therapy once, twice, maybe even three times for the same thing… and now you’re left wondering why it didn’t work?

Or perhaps you went to physical therapy and it “worked,” but you have to do about 10 exercises per day that if you miss… even once… the pain comes right back. (hint – that means it didn’t actually work.)

This is sadly an all too common occurrence in this profession.

Here are three reasons why your physical therapy treatment might not have worked:

1. Incomplete Evaluation

For physical therapy to be successful – it MUST start with a full and thorough musculoskeletal examination. But for varying reasons, this isn’t always possible. The problem in most traditional physical therapy settings is that physical therapists are sometimes restricted with what they can and can’t do.  Sometimes the restriction comes from an insurance company, and sometimes they are simply overworked. If a doctor sends you for knee pain, your PT may only be able to look at and treat your knee. They are administratively prevented from giving you the full and thorough examination that you need. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve seen knee pain being caused by someone’s spine. If I wasn’t able to look at and treat that area, I’d have missed it.

Other times PTs have too many patients at once, and are forced to take shortcuts. This could cause them to miss important details. I’ve been at this for 20 years, and in my opinion, the perfect physical therapy evaluation should consist of three major components: the interview, the examination, and the plan. Your therapist should be asking you a lot of questions to find out how your pain is impacting you. They should do a lot of movement testing (not just poke you) to confirm why you’re having pain. And lastly, they should clearly explain to you why your pain is behaving the way it is and have a solid plan to solve it, one that is not dictated by your insurance company. If your PT evaluation didn’t look like this, or your therapist was rushed, chances are something got missed.

2. Too Many Passive Modalities

The second reason I see physical therapy not working for people is because your PT used too many passive modalities. This includes everything from electrical stimulation, ultrasound, dry needling, Graston technique, traction, laser therapy, and even manual therapy. We call these treatments “passive” because they are done to you. There is a time and place for these things, but generally speaking, they should only be used to address very specific pain and impairments that are preventing you from moving in a way that is going to produce real healing .

For example, let’s say you’ve got a tight knot in your upper trap that is giving you neck pain. There are some fabulous modalities like dry needling and massage that will quickly get rid of your pain. But a few days later, the pain will come back. That’s because the tight knot is the symptom, the underlying cause of this recurring tight knot is what’s essential to figure out and address. If all your therapist does is treat the symptom with passive modalities that feel good, your therapy isn’t going to work and you’ll continue to suffer.

3. Too Many Exercises

The last reason I see physical therapy not working is because there are just too many exercises being done. Physical therapists LOVE to give homework, but sometimes that homework can turn into two or three pages of exercises. This is rarely necessary. And the chances of anyone doing all of these exercises every day is highly unlikely. My firm belief is that your physical therapist should be working on highly specific problems with highly specific exercises.

I refer to these as corrective exercises, and you typically should only have 3-5 to do at any given time. These corrective exercises should compliment what you are doing in your session, and be designed to specifically address pain, and/or a very specific impairment or weakness. They should not be generalized or cookie cutter, and you should absolutely have a very good understanding of why you are doing them and what they are designed to accomplish.

Now you know what quality physical therapy should look like. If you’re not getting it, it might explain why it “didn’t work.” Sadly, insurance puts a lot of limitations on what physical therapists can and can’t do. Which is why a lot of people are starting to move away from using their insurance all together. They know they can get better quality care, and have their problem resolved completely, by paying out of pocket to an office that isn’t tied behind red tape. Plus, while it might seem cost prohibitive at first, it’s a lot better than the costly alternative of unnecessary surgery or injections.

Remember that physical therapists are movement experts.

If you’re only doing cookie cutter exercises, riding the bike for 10 min, or just lying on the table every session – you’re not spending adequate time restoring full mobility and quality of movement.

Your physical therapy probably won’t work, and it certainly won’t give you the lasting results you’re looking for.

If this experience is sounding all too familiar – consider working with a practice like ours. We’re not restricted by the red tape and we care about doing things the right way, even if that means more work on our end.

Curious? Talk to one of our specialists for free!

If you’re local to Portsmouth, NH – You can do that by Requesting a Free Discovery Session right HERE!

Dr. Carrie Jose, physical therapist and Pilates expert, owns CJ Physical Therapy & Pilates in Portsmouth and writes for Seacoast Media Group. To get in touch, or get a free copy of her guide to taking care of back pain, email her at [email protected].

What is Dry Needling?

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At CJ Physical Therapy and Pilates, our goal is to help you live a pain-free life without pain pills or invasive procedures.

Trigger Point Dry Needling is one of several strategies we use to treat muscles that are extremely tense and in spasm. The spasm causes the muscle to be in constant tension which reduces blood flow, decreases oxygen, and can produce fibrotic unhealthy tissue over time (scarring). When a physical therapist inserts the very thin acupuncture needle (dry needle) into a knotted up muscle, it creates a local twitch reflex. Research shows that this not only relaxes the muscle, it breaks up the pain cycle by improving blood flow and oxygen to the muscle. This whole process helps to reduce and normalize inflammation in the area to promote healing. However, dry needling is not necessary for everyone, so it’s important that you know what it is and when it can be used to improve your health! Here’s our advice when it comes to pursuing dry needling treatment.

Work with a physical therapist to use dry needling in conjunction with movement based rehabilitation.

Dry needling can work wonders to relax your muscles. However, they’re just going to get tense and damaged again if you don’t learn how to use them properly and address any movement dysfunction that may be occurring. You don’t want to think of it as a quick fix! Dry needling is just the first step for some individuals who aren’t able to begin a physical therapy or movement regimen without first breaking up the pain cycles in the muscles that are prohibiting healthy movement. Dry needling serves as a “helper” to relax those muscles – and should be integrated with physical therapy treatment and strengthening activities such as Pilates.

Don’t be afraid of trying dry needling!

It can be uncomfortable for some people, but others say they feel no pain at all. It’s not dangerous and has lasting positive effects when used in conjunction with hands-on physical therapy under the direction of a specialist. Furthermore, our clients love it:

“After two back surgeries in my 20s and a new hip at 58, I figured I was lucky just to be walking. Dry needling has transformed the way I move. I’m more flexible. My walking stride has more length and I can stand longer.” – John

Do you have questions about dry needling? Want to see what a specialty physical therapy practice can do for you? We offer FREE Discovery Sessions right here in Portsmouth that give you the opportunity to ask any questions you may have! It’s a completely free, no-obligation appointment that will give you all the information you need to make the BEST decision for YOUR health. All you have to do is fill out this quick form, and we’ll be in touch!