Previously I have written about 5 Tips For Preventing Neck & Shoulder Pain which contains some powerful strategies for lessening and keeping neck and shoulder pain at bay.  This time I thought I’d actually say more about how I help clients to resolve their neck and shoulder pain.

Upfront I want to say that some conditions (for example joint degeneration, arthritis or physical injury etc.) can’t be cured with massage, but I successfully manage the symptoms for clients and many experience little or no pain as they continue to come for regular work once a month.

My objectives when I work with clients are simple – to reduce or remove the pain as quickly as possible, to give them the power to manage their own situation and continue to improve and to help them understand how the problem arose which – critically – helps to reduce the chances of it coming back.

I also don’t claim that 1-treatment fixes-it, although to honest, occasionally it does!  To accomplish this, I use a simple 4 step plan:

1. I want to understand how the problem arose in the first place, because without this information, it’s likely that the problems will just reoccur in the future.  So I take a full medical history and also discover how long the condition has been present and how it first started – i.e. from an incident of some sort or whether it just crept on slowly over time.  this gives me valuable information to help the client to avoid a reoccurrence.
2. I do a series of massage treatments to soften and mobilise the joints and muscles and begin to reduce the pain immediately.  The number of treatments necessary varies from person to person, but as a guide, 5 treatments over about 6-8 weeks is usually really effective and for many clients, most – if not all – of the symptoms – have disappeared after that.
3. I recommend exercises that the client can do at home to keep the mobility going.
4. I discuss simple lifestyle changes for the client to incorporate into their day to reduce the strain on the problem areas and lessen the chances of the symptoms reoccurring.

The exercises I recommend are always simple and safe to do and require little or no equipment, because I believe that if you have to have all the right stuff, it just won’t happen!  Also, I always make sure that clients understand that these exercises should not hurt, to do them gently, slowly but regularly.  If they don’t hurt and are easy to do, it makes it must more likely that clients do them, which means they actually work.

With this approach, I have been able to help virtually every client I have worked with and many continue to come for on-going treatment that has kept them symptom-free for years. To find out how I can help you, simply get in touch for a free consultation.  Call me on 07836 545 382 or get in touch here.