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Rocky Road Sunday
Or
Why Did the Chicken Cross the Road?
By George S. Pellegrino, LMT, CMTPT
and Victoria L. Magown. CMTPT, LMT
It was a cold winter day, a Sunday to be exact. Martha
was leading the way to her new house in the North Valley as her brother
Paul followed in his one ton pickup truck
As they drove down the road, Paul was distracted by the
shifting load of furniture in his pickup. Martha was startled by
a run away chicken that ran into the path of her car. She jammed
on the brakes, sliding on loose gravel.
By the time Paul realized Martha had jammed on the brakes,
he was too close to stop, skidded on the loose gravel, rear ending
his sister’s car. Paul insisted he wasn’t hurt in the mishap, but
Martha experienced pain in her neck and low back almost immediately.
When she came to MyoRehab for her consultation, Martha
had already been in pain for six months without any relief from pain
medication or muscle relaxers.
After a brief evaluation, we were convinced Martha would
benefit from a series of Myofascial Trigger Point Therapy treatments.
Her doctor agreed.
On her first visit, an in-depth evaluation revealed the
source of Martha’s low back pain. Myofascial Trigger Points were
found in several key muscles that had been traumatized at the moment
of impact.
A Myofascial Trigger Point is a hypersensitive spot in
a muscle that when stimulated, usually produces pain referred in
a predictable pattern away from the Trigger Point. Trigger Points
in the rectus abdominis are often responsible for low or mid back
pain. (Illustration A)
When Martha’s car was rear ended, the lap portion of her
seatbelt tightened across her hips causing injury to the lower abdominal
muscles including the rectus abdominis. When low back x-rays showed
no spinal injury, her doctor knew immediately soft tissue was involved.
When Martha tried to stretch her abdominal muscles or shortened
them by sitting for long periods of time, her low back pain increased.
Martha was really surprised to learn that Myofascial Trigger Points
referred pain through the body from front to back.
Solving the mystery of her low back pain gave Martha hope.
Although she suffered from headaches, she attributed these to allergies
and not the car accident. Martha did not mention her headaches during
her first few visits.
When she asked for advice about her headaches, we discovered
they began weeks after the car accident. Because of the delayed onset
of head pain, Martha never made the connection.
Her pain patterns were typical for two muscles frequently
injured by whiplash; the sternocleidomastoid or SCM (Illustration
B) and the trapezius (Illustration C). Martha was amazed when we
showed her the pain patterns for these two muscles exclaiming, “That’s
my pain”.
She was also relieved to discover that her dizziness and
tearing eyes were due to Myofascial Trigger Points in the SCM. After
successfully treating the SCM and trapezius, her “allergy headaches”
completely resolved.
A Home Exercise Program specifically designed for the muscles
injured insured Martha’s pain would not return. When we asked her
about her brother, Martha said he was so impressed with her pain
relief that he too wanted to come to MyoRehab for an evaluation.
It seems that ever since he rear ended his sister’s car, Paul was
suffering from what he thought were allergy headaches. Has there
been a “Rocky Road Sunday” causing pain in your life?
Give us a call at MyoRehab.
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