Dry Needling for Heel Pain | Whitney Bjerken Gymnastics

Whitney has had intense pain in her heel for the past 2 weeks. Her orthopedic doctor did not find any fractures or obvious soft tissue damage. Whitney's physical therapist, Lauren, is usually successful at making Whitney feel better. Here she uses dry needling to loosen up the muscles connected to Whitney's heel.

From Wikipedia:
In the treatment of trigger points for persons with myofascial pain syndrome, dry needling is an invasive procedure in which a filiform needle is inserted into the skin and muscle directly at a myofascial trigger point. A myofascial trigger point consists of multiple contraction knots, which are related to the production and maintenance of the pain cycle. Deep dry needling for treating trigger points was first introduced by Czech physician Karel Lewit in 1979. Lewit had noticed that the success of injections into trigger points in relieving pain was apparently unconnected to the analgesic used.

Proper dry needling of a myofascial trigger point will elicit a local twitch response (LTR), which is an involuntary spinal cord reflex in which the muscle fibers in the taut band of muscle contract. The LTR indicates the proper placement of the needle in a trigger point. Dry needling that elicits LTRs improves treatment outcomes, and may work by activating endogenous opioids. The activation of the endogenous opioids is for an analgesic effect using the Gate Control Theory of Pain. Inserting the needle can itself cause considerable pain, although when done by well-trained practitioners that is not a common occurrence. No study to date has reported the reliability of trigger point diagnosis and physical diagnosis cannot be recommended as a reliable test for the diagnosis of trigger points.

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