DRY NEEDLING
VERSUS ACUPUNCTURE
While in acupuncture
the needles are applied at certain points that are located in meridians, which
do not have to be close to the injured area, in dry needling the needle is applied directly to the trigger point. Both are invasive
methods used to treat pain disorders and
can be used for myofascial trigger
points. The two methods use similar needles that pierce the patient's skin
and both dry needling and acupuncture
therapies have proven to be very
useful in clinical practice. “Some studies showed some low – quality to
medium-quality evidences that dry
needling therapy sessions carrying out by a professional physical therapy practitioner is way more efficient
than sham dry needling, no treatments, and other treatment alternatives for
relieving aches and getting a better pressure of pain threshold in convalescent
patients exhibiting musculoskeletal
soreness within a follow-up of eighty four days.” Eric Gattie et la (2017)

“In case of suffering pain located in the lower
back there are researches that displayed that acupuncture solo treatment tenders better outcomes i.e.
specifically giving a short- term ache relief comparing to no treatment
choices and acupuncture plus other management approaches" Stated by
Lizhou Liu et la (2015)
IS DRY NEEDLING AS A PHYSICAL THERAPY TREATMENT
OPTION?
Dry needling is an innovative physiotherapeutic
technique that uses acupuncture
needles to treat certain ailments,
especially myofascial pain syndrome,
but its similarity to acupuncture
ends here, these two techniques should not be confused. It is defined as a
semi-invasive technique because the needles penetrate the skin in search of the
trigger point which is the cause of myofascial pain in order to press it,
deactivate it and end the pain. To find it, the stimulation, comprehension,
contraction, stretching, of the muscle is vital, since if pain occurs this
suggests that there is a trigger point.

Lin liu et la (2015) pointed out that “In the short
and medium term, dry acupuncture
physical therapy method is recommended and suggested to reduce MTrP (Myofascial trigger point) pain found
out in neck and shoulders areas, but in the medium term, wet acupuncture is
observed to be more effective than dry acupuncture in reducing MTrP pain in the
neck and shoulders.”
To understand exactly what dry needling is for, we must delve into myofascial pain syndrome and, for this, we must define its causes; trigger points. Trigger points are areas of the muscle that are weak and with great
sensitivity to palpation. They occur when the sarcomeres (areas of the muscle
fibers where the muscle contracts) are permanently contracted by the continuous
release of acetylcholine, which prevents the relaxation of the fibers and
decreases blood flow.

“Acupuncture
and how beneficial it is, for a one-month period of intense competition for
four international women's volleyball players. Perform dry acupuncture of the shoulder and brachial muscles. Evaluate the range of
motion, intensity, and pain before and after treatment, and perform functional
evaluation of pain immediately after competition and overhead activities. All scores improved after treatment and
athletes were able to continue their daily
activities. Previous studies have shown that myofascial trigger points may cause significant functional weakness
and reduced range of motion, accompanied by pain. Trigger point dry acupuncture has successfully treated athletes
with myofascial pain and impingement symptoms, but it only
improved subjectively, not during the competition phase. It can help maintain
the balance and strength of the rotator cuff, decreasing further pain and injury.” Nichola J Osborne and Ian T
Gatt (2015).

Trigger points can be caused by many different causes, practicing combat/contact sports, repetitive movements, tackles, cold currents that directly affect the muscle, keeping the muscle
in a shortened position for a long time, blows,
injections, etc. There are many
types of trigger points:
Active:
Always painful, they respond to pressure with local spasms.
Latent:
It only hurts when palpating.
Core: Located
near the center of the muscle fiber.
Key: It is
responsible for the activation of one or more trigger points.
Satellite:
Activated by the key trigger point.
Primary:
It is activated by a repetitive movement, acute or chronic overload; it does
not mediate another muscle in the activation.
WHAT ARE THE INDICATORS
FOR DRY NEEDLING?
The indications to perform the Dry Needle are multiple and varied, always remember to attend to
health care premises where you’ll find the professional
practitioners like physical
therapists, sports massage
clinicians and others to carry on your Dry
needling treatment under maneuvers
backed up and warranted by science, the most frequent are: Patients
with any shoulder pathology.
For example:
1. Frozen shoulder.
2.
Hemiparesis.
3.
Subacromial
syndrome (inflammation of the shoulder
muscles, it means of the rotator cuff).
· When
there are muscle problems.

· Low back
pain such as sciatica.
·Radiculopathies and neck pain.
·Pain due
to whiplash.
·When
there is hip pain.
·When
there is knee pain.
·Plantar fasciitis (inflammation of the fascia of the foot, the pain is located in the sole of the foot).
“A steroid jab can relieve plantar pain swiftly, but dry needling can feature more above
standard outcomes in patients presenting plantar
fasciitis in the long term.” Contrast between dry needling treatment and
steroid injection by Shirvan Rastegar et la (2018).
·Tendinopathies, such as Tennis Elbow or Golfer's Elbow, that is to
say any type of tendinitis.
“In fact, a recent study found that 80% of patients
with elbow extensor (tennis elbow) tendinitis had excellent results after using
dry needling. Similarly, 72% of
patients with patellar (knee) tendinitis had great to excellent results after
using dry needling”
·It is
also indicated in some headaches and migraines.
·Fibromyalgia.
·Joint
pain in general.
WHAT IS A
PHYSICAL THERAPY ACUPUNCTURE SESSION TREATMENT?
Acupuncture is made up of thrusting very thin needles into the
skin at cautious and strategic zones over the human body. Acupuncture, a key
component of traditional Chinese
medicine, is frequently used to treat
pain from practicing sports. Its
use is increasingly common to improve general well-being, for example, to manage
stress.
“According to the outcomes of every case report, it
was confirmed that acupuncture was used to treat distinct types of sports injuries that elite athletes experience. Acupuncture can help relieve short-term pain and recover from
dysfunction and is used as a very useful non-surgical and non-invasive
treatment for sports injuries such
as acetabular hit, lateral meniscus rupture, sports hernia and ganglion cysts. In addition, acupuncture has been
suggested as a treatment method worth trying for conditions such as muscle aches and delayed-onset muscle soreness.” Ji-Won Lee et la (2020).

WHAT ARE
THE INDICATIONS FOR ACUPUNCTURE?
The indications to perform an acupuncture treatment are not only for sports injuries, it can also be performed for different conditions, pathologies, ailments, muscle aches and others, such as:
“The entire number of athletes taken into account within the evaluation is 211, of which
119 (56.4%) are men. The age of the athletes
is 8 to 77 years the average is 24.8 yo. Among 211 sports injuries within sports like basketball, football, golf, running, ice hockey, track and field, swimming, etc. Musculoskeletal system and connective tissue diseases scored for
the highest proportion of the main symptoms reported in each case report/series
46.4%. The most injured parts were knees (medial
collateral ligament injury (19 cases), knee
jumping (8 cases), meniscus injury
(1 case)), followed by elbows, tendinopathies, and shoulders (rotator cuff injury - 2 cases). In
addition, studies on various musculoskeletal
diseases are reported, including tendon syndrome with chronic pain in
multiple body parts (22 cases).” Ji-Won Lee et la (2020).

·
Respiratory
and pulmonary disorders.
·
Respiratory
diseases.
·
Digestive
and intestinal disorders
·
Eye, ear,
mouth and throat diseases.
·
Gynecological
disorders, menstrual pain.
·
Joint
diseases and pain.
·
Neurological
disorders.
·
Sudden
acute disorders.
·
Skin
diseases.
·
Urinary
and reproductive disorders.
·
Treatment
to stop smoking.
·
Weight
loss treatment.
·
Treatment
for stress, respiratory and lung disorders.
“Based on the data collected from ten fortuitous trials
showed that there is evidence where, needle
treatment is an efficacious method to treat pain and physical dysfunction linked to knee osteoarthritis. There is insufficient evidence to show whether
acupuncture affects other factors
related to knee arthritis” Terry Kit Selfe et la (2008).
“There was an investigation where it was vouched that
acupuncture keeps to initiate the production of BDNF (Brain derived
neurotrophic factor), and the enhancement of TrkB (tropomyosin receptor kinase
B) expression activates downstream signal transduction pathways to restore neurological deficits, thereby
providing more molecular mechanisms
for understanding traditional acupuncture
therapy.” Xiaohong Li et la (2017).
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