foreign
ERS one of my followers asked me how do you do a medical history when you're going to
do a medical massage or a neuromuscular massage which is a little bit different than when you're
just going to do a Swedish massage the number one thing you need to allow for is a little bit
longer time because obviously you can ask a lot more questions I want you to think
as you're investigating something you know you're investigating a case this is the part
that I really enjoy from neuromuscular and medical massage treatments because they're very specific
and you're trying to get as much information as you can from your clients so beware that you're
going to need a little bit more time with your client to do the interview to ask the questions
so I usually allow you know 15 minutes because when you're going to do a Swedish massage they
fill out the form and they usually don't have any issues right so with a medical history for for
more specific work you want to make sure of course list of medications and you also want to ask if
they've seen a doctor if there's a diagnosis from a medical professional that has diagnosed them you
know as to what's wrong with them because most clients come in and they say oh I have a rotator
cuff injury but they don't tell you specifically which muscle there are four muscles to the rotator
cuff is it the supraspinatas the infraspinators the teres minor the subscapularis so they're not
going to know that so it's our job to ask us many questions like how did the injury happen what were
you doing do you remember exactly what you were doing when and you were you know hurting or how
long after you did let's say you were playing football or softball or volleyball or whatever
the case may be you must investigate you must ask them a lot of clients don't even know how
they injure themselves I have clients that have told me they hurt themselves in the sleep you
know and one of them is because she slept with her arms straight up underneath and eventually
it started you know really wearing down her you know her uh she she slept wrong and hurt
her shoulder so it's our job to investigate and to ask questions like how did you injure
yourself I have another client that reached to the back seat you know to get her laptop from
the back seat and when she pulled it she tore her subscapulars tendon which is on the anterior part
and this is where the information is very handy because that's exactly what that told me is like
when she reached back and she pulled it and she says that it hurt right here then I knew it was a
subscapularis and I needed to work you know that muscle so the more information you have and the
more you know your muscles and how they work and what the action is the better you're going to get
at getting to exactly what muscle you you know is injured and what synergist muscles you need
to work on and um okay so investigation is very important finding out what the doctor has said
and they have a diagnosis very important another thing that's very important is you know doing some
of the tests you know some of the passive tests like let's say somebody has you know shoulder
problems you might want to do the uh Hawkins Kennedy test or some the slump test for somebody
that might have you know uh nerve problems in the low back or the straight leg test or the braggers
test for sciatic nerve and the performance test so there's learn about the test and you
can Google them you can Google you know a test for the sciatic nerve and learn how to do them
just beware that you want to be gentle with these tests you never want to take a client
past the range of motion or be aggressive or Force anything when you do a passive test you
don't want to force anything you got to go just to how far they can move this is just to give you
information of what you need to do so these tests can be important and tell you and I've had clients
a lot of times that come in and tell me oh this is as far as I can lift my you know my shoulder
with frozen shoulder and you know it hurts when I start lifting and I feel the pain right here and
right away that tells you probably supraspinatas probably being impinged between the chromium
process of the scapula and it hurts because the supraspinatus is the one that does the uh the
the raising your arm to begin with along with a deltoid so anyway you've got to know your muscles
and uh write down all the information and I want to show you this form this form that I have and
I will include a link below or or contact me at massage therapeutics915 gmail.com and I can email
it to you if you'd like but as I'm interviewing the client I'm also you know highlighting what
muscles could be and these are broken down into lower extremities upper extremities rotator
cuffs you know back neck head so I highlight and then this tells me what other synergist
muscles I need to take a look at this is a very important form that I use and it really helps me
to you know to be able to see what all I need to work on when you're working specific injuries you
do not want to spend an hour working on just the shoulder or working just the low back that
really over stimulates the nervous system and you don't want to do that you know even when you go to
a chiropractor they usually or you know or that does 15-minute increments of massage that's all
they do 50 minutes on your shoulder 50 minutes on your back 15 minutes on whatever it is that
is injured you don't want to over stimulate that area because then the body gets guarded
so make sure you write down everything that they're telling you and that you highlight all
the muscles that you're going to work on and soap notes I can't emphasize enough how important soap
notes are that you take you know you write them down all the treatments that you did did you do
range of motion passive active what muscles you treated uh what else did you do did you
incorporate you know cryotherapy or heat therapy all of that's very important in a treatment plan
usually with a Swedish massage if there's nothing wrong with them and they want to come in every
two weeks every three weeks once a month is okay however when a person is injured you want to get
them in you know closer together you don't want to wait two weeks or three weeks between treatments
because it's like starting over again if they have adhesions and you're working on the fascia you're
doing myofascial release if you schedule them three weeks from today you're gonna have to start
all over again so with injuries it's a little bit different I recommend three massages once
a week for three weeks in a row to be able to see Improvement that's different than when you're just
coming in for a relaxation massage very important that you stay within 10 days and no more than
10 days because then you have to start all over again the adhesions begin to form with a fascia
so if you go to PT or a chiropractor wherever you go for therapy it's usually two or three times a
week right same thing with massage so make sure you explain this to your client at the beginning
okay make sure you explain to them what the treatment plan is come up with a treatment
plan and what works for them and what works for you and the last thing I want to talk about is
uh building trust that is half the battle half the the winning for getting somebody to heal
their body because if they trust you they will heal a lot faster it's very important to build
that Rapport of trust I I talk about this in my book don't forget to buy my book too
on Amazon and leave a review we've already read it I appreciate that but I talk in my
book about a case that I had of a woman that had a rotator cuff from an accident she had
had many years previously and it took her two years to trust me to work on that shoulder now
her shoulder was healed because that accident had happened like 15 years previously however
she was very guarded emotionally she had not healed from that and she was very guarded so
please respect what the body is telling you never Force anything never push anything never say well
no gain no pain no gain that's a No-No you need to learn a little bit more and learn about how
relaxation begins with a nervous system so for your client to trust you is very important for you
to you know have that trust between the client and yourself so they can open up relax maybe at the
beginning they're not so open but they'll start relaxing they'll start letting you work maybe a
little deeper this is where I say let your hands do the talking if you feel that they're tense and
they're guarded it's going to take you a little bit more time you might need to go easier you know
maybe do a little bit of effleurage warming up the muscles before you really get in there so this is
very important for when you're doing specific work neuromuscular or medical massage and I hope you
take these notes and apply them for your clients until the next time create a great day foreign