The Best Dry Needling Physical Therapy You Can Find in Midtown, OK 

If you experience long-term pain, visiting a physical therapy clinic may help. Physical therapists offer a wide variety of treatments to improve patients’ quality of life. One of these is dry needling, a technique that utilizes needles to alleviate trigger points.

Conditions Dry Needling Can Help With

While dry needling and acupuncture may seem identical on the surface, they use very different systems to guide treatment. Acupuncture originates from traditional Chinese medicine, and practitioners use needles to influence chi flow. In contrast, dry needling targets trigger points of knotted muscle with the following effects:

• Decrease muscle pain and soreness
• Increase blood flow
• Reduce tightness

Since dry needling works on many parts of the body, certified physical therapists can use it to treat a long list of conditions.

Tendonitis

Athletes and individuals who perform repetitive movements for work are at risk of developing tendonitis. This condition can interfere with daily life due to the following:

• Swelling at the site of the injury
• Tenderness
• Pain

Tendonitis primarily affects the joints or area around the joints, especially the knees, shoulders, wrists and elbows.

While your muscles can withstand a lot of wear, especially if you live a healthy lifestyle, your body needs rest to recover from physical activity. Performing the same action daily (pitching a baseball, for example) puts stress on specific muscles, tendons and joints. That stress can lead to inflammation, which causes soreness. When this inflammation affects tendons, it’s called tendonitis.

Dry needling can alleviate the symptoms of tendonitis by increasing blood flow to the affected area. More blood means increased oxygen and nutrients, helping your cells recover from the injury.

Migraines

Everyone experiences headaches now and then; stress, sinus pressure and an excess of alcohol are all common causes. However, migraines are a completely different beast. While the exact cause is unknown, research indicates that neurotransmitters play a significant role.

Migraine symptoms can be debilitating:

• Sensitivity to sound, light, touch and smell
• Nausea
• Throbbing or pulsing head pain

Dry needling can help with the pain, though not in the way you may think. The upper back can affect migraine pain, so physical therapists dry needle trigger points in this area. The result is a loosening of muscle tension, reducing the symptoms’ severity.

When To Make an Appointment

Dry needling treatments may be helpful to specific types of patients. Of course, it has limitations. For example, you shouldn’t get this treatment if you fall into these categories:

• Have trypanophobia (fear of needles)
• Have a skin condition
• Have a compromised immune system
• Are pregnant

That said, a combination of dry needling, physical therapy and other treatments can significantly help people with chronic pain. If different approaches don’t alleviate your symptoms, or you want to avoid addictive pain relievers, dry needling may be a good solution.

If you live with pain, it’s time to talk to your doctor about dry needling. Contact your Midtown physical therapy clinic to see if it offers this unique and effective procedure. Chronic pain doesn’t have to be a matter of course — you can reclaim your life with the proper medical treatment plan.