Medical massage for chronic back pain
Massage therapy can help chronic back pain not just by dulling the pain — but by actually changing the conditions that create and maintain it. It works both locally (the site of pain) and systemically (the whole nervous and musculoskeletal system), which makes it one of the most powerful non-pharmaceutical options for long-term relief.
Let’s take a closer look at how massage can help:
Why does chronic back pain happen?
There is a huge variety of causes and symptoms when it comes to back pain. Aside from varieties of low back pain, upper back pain, mid back pain... there are more specific conditions with their own unique patterns. But lets focus generally on the most commonly shared aspects of all back pain:
Causes
- Muscle tension and imbalance
- Postural strain (desk work, service work, couch life, etc.)
- Poor movement patterns or body mechanics
- Disc or joint degeneration
- Nervous system sensitization (the brain starts perceiving more pain than the damage warrants)
- Past injuries that never healed quite right
- Emotional/mental stress that finds a home in your back
Symptoms
- Feeling stiff and locked up
- Difficulty or pain moving in certain directions
- Constant aching feeling
- Sharp pains along spine
- Pains elsewhere that feel connected to your back/spine
- Feeling tense/tight and unable to fully stretch
- Feeling like you can't fully relax your back
These symptoms can show up anywhere in your back, though it is most common to have symptoms close to the spine, or spread out around the lower back and pelvis. You could also experience it in your ribs, behind your shoulder blades, or anywhere else on your back.
How massage therapy can help manage or eliminate chronic back pain
Release Tight muscles around the spine
Muscles in your back can all tug on the spine or pelvis and lock the body in dysfunctional holding patterns. This constant tightness can be due to past or current injuries, postural challenges, stress, and other demands on the body. The pain and discomfort this causes can be due to the muscles pulling on surrounding structures, putting pressure on nerves, inflammation, or being overly worked and fatigued from staying tight all the time.
Massage helps reset that tension, giving the spine a break. Many techniques I use are aimed at creating slack in the muscles to give them a chance to relax, and rebalancing tension so that all the muscles can share a load equally rather than putting all the strain on certain muscles.
Calm the nervous system
Whenever you deal with chronic pain, injury, or dysfunction in the body, it affects the nervous system. The nervous system can become stressed and overly sensitized to pain leading to a vicious cycle of more pain and more discomfort. Massage can interrupt this cycle and introduce relaxing, calming movements and touch. Over time this can retrain the nervous system to have a healthier relationship with the affected area, and encourage the overall process of moving towards relaxed, comfortable movement and posture.
Improve mobility and posture
It can be extremely difficult to improve your motion capabilities and posture when you already in pain. Yet, lots of movement and correct posture are both essential to the healing process. Massage can help create healthy movement of your spine and the muscles in your back when you are unable to. Think of this like jump-starting the process of healing. Rebalancing the relationship between muscles and introducing movement gets you to a more comfortable, less painful place where you can continue to build up on your own.
When massage is most helpful for back pain
In my experience with clients, massage can be beneficial in a wide variety of people with back pain. Since massage is able to help through the various avenues described above, there is usually some benefit that can be had from massage. The following are some of the most common examples that I have seen benefit from massage:
- Pulled muscles
- Chronic postural strain
- Pain from repetitive motions
- Non-specific low back pain
- Myofascial pain syndrome
- Degenerative disc disease (mild/moderate)
- Pain with no clear anatomical cause
- Rehabilitation from injury or surgery
Some strictly physical changes might not benefit as much from massage (such as spinal stenosis), although it is generally safe to try a massage. Some people do find that they at least get relief from massage that makes things more bearable, even when massage can't directly address the cause of their back pain.
When to be cautious with massage for chronic back pain
- Severe herniation with nerve impingement (especially if there's loss of bowel/bladder control – red flag)
- Active inflammation or infection
- Osteoporosis or spinal instability (use lighter techniques)
- Acute trauma, recent injury (wait until the acute phase passes)
