Soft tissue therapy (STT) is the assessment, treatment and management of soft tissue injury, pain and dysfunction.
- Assessment, Treatment and Management of your Workplace, Sporting and General Injuries
- All your hands on treatment techniques to alleviate Aches, Pains and Injuries
- Postural Education
- Home and Gym based Rehab programs
- Stretches and Strengthening programs
People who present with their complaint are assessed via the most appropriate tests according to the person’s presentation. This may include posture, biomechanical, range of movement, neural and other tests that help identify the most likely cause of pain or injury. If the assessment is consistent with pain or injury that is better dealt with other health professionals (sports physicians, podiatrists, etc) then we will refer you to the most appropriate person. Otherwise we will treat accordingly.
Depending on the pain or injury, a number of modalities may be utilised. Most commonly the techniques will be hands on massage type techniques.
- Manual techniques
- Trigger point therapy for the alleviation of trigger points
- Myofascial (muscle and fascia) therapy for flexibility/mobility of the connective tissues of our body, or for alleviating fibrous adhesions and decreasing the severity of scars
- Broad handed techniques for reducing swelling or inflammation
- Frictions for the ridding of adhesions between fascial layers, muscles, compartments and the like. Frictions also promote healing in tendon pathologies as well as decreasing pain perception.
- Sustained pressure (digital pressures) to alleviate hypertonic (tight)areas within muscle and fascia
- Other techniques such as ART® (Active Release Technique is a licensed technique), Myofascial Release and deep tissue massage are all derivatives of the techniques above. They are NOT unique techniques with unique results. These defintions will change from region to region, state to state, country to country.
- Numerous stretching techniques may be employed. During a treatment session, therapists may use static stretches to alleviate an area assessed as excessively tight.
- Therapists may use PNF stretches (proprioceptive neuromuscular facilitation) to decrease the tone in a muscle or muscle group that is assessed as being too ‘tight’.
- Dynamic stretches may be utilised to alleviate symptoms of DOMS (delayed onset muscle soreness), the soreness felt one to two days after excessive, new or eccentric exercise
- Muscle Energy Technique (MET) is now a common technique used by a number of therapies. The Osteopaths designed the technique some 100 years ago but like many techniques these days, it is used by many therapies. MET is the use of light contractions by the client in very specific directions to alter joint restriction and range by altering the resting length of local musculature
- Depending on assessment findings, some people will be given certain exercises to increase strength or simply to ‘wake up’ particular muscles that may be weak or simply not being used well by the person.
- Functional Fascial Taping® is a technique designed by Ron alexander who worked with the Australian Ballet for 10 years. It is a technique that utilises tape to alter pain perception and muscle firing patterns.See this website for further details - http://www.fft.net.au
- Dry Needling involves the use of acupuncture needles to alleviate Trigger Points and their associated taut bands. Trigger Points can be found in most of the tissues of our body. When irritated they will refer pain in repeatable patterns to remote areas about the body. These will include distinct headache patterns. Dry Needling is a method of desensitising these trigger points by inserting the acupuncture needle directly into the focal trigger point (or associated taut band), dimishing or alleviating the associated pain referral.
- Probably the most important part of any treatment plan is the advice given to the client. Within each treatment a treatment plan will be suggested to the client. This may range from a single treatment to a referral to the suggestion of a few treatments. To book an appointment for soft tissue therapy, you can use our online booking form