The tender points are a diagnostic tool. They aren’t sore because there’s something wrong in that location: they are sore because FM makes everything sore, and it just happens to be most obvious at those carefully chosen spots. You might have also heard about lacrosse ball trigger point therapy. This is another type of ball you might choose to use for the techniques I’m sharing in this post. This is where trigger points really get interesting. In addition to minor aches and pains, muscle pain often causes unusual symptoms in strange locations. For instance, many people diagnosed with carpal tunnel syndrome are actually experiencing pain caused by an armpit muscle (subscapularis). 44 Seriously. I’m not making that up. If a ball is too soft it won’t be able to release trigger points which require a lot of intense pressure. If a ball is too hard it may be too painful to use.

Some symptoms that point away from trigger points: numbness, tingling, very sharp pain, joint pain, pain movement, abdominal pain, diffuse soreness or a widespread feeling of “fragility,” and malaise. But trigger points can and do co-exist with any other kind of painful problem. When choosing a massage ball, you’ll want to choose one with a surface texture that is easy to clean and won’t slip on hard surfaces. Grip Trigger points have many strange “features” and behaviours, and can easily be confused with many other common undiagnosed causes of pain in general 57 and muscle pain in particular. There are several common kinds of muscle pain, or pains that can seem like it: arthritis, medication side effects, exercise soreness, muscle tears, and the profound body aching caused by an infection like COVID-19. 58 The only hope of telling these things apart is a good working knowledge. Some trigger balls have grooves all over them to help get into the trigger points more effectively. You can also try a spikey massage ball for your myofascial release ball exercises. Thank you for delivering information about trigger points and resulting pain in a manner that is understandable to the general public. While I am a Physical Therapist most everything I read or listen to automatically gets translated into a more scientific jargon. This helps me to relay the message to my clients.

Analysis and Test Results

Generally speaking, smaller massage balls are best for massaging small areas of the body, such as the hands, the soles of the feet, the forearms, and the calves.

Chronic pain has hundreds of possible hard-to-diagnose causes, and many of them overlap with myofascial pain syndrome significantly. MPS is a “good fit” for a lot of people and probably can “explain” a lot of pain (if something so poorly understood can explain anything). You can use a massage ball all over the body by applying pressure with the ball on the body parts you wish to massage.The peanut massage ball is most commonly known for its use in rolling down the spine and not much else. Thank you so much for taking the time to put this book together, and in a way that makes it feel like you wrote it just for me! You have a great writing style. Big promises are common on the internet, and it’s a problem when a treatment method or product is presented as being “good for” nearly any kind of pain problem. There are too many kinds of pain for any one idea to work for all of them. There are many different types of massage balls ranging from very smooth and firm like a lacrosse ball to small and soft like a squash ball. Other balls include a tennis ball and the trusty spikey massage ball. To each his own but if you’re new to using a massage ball, perhaps start with a spikey ball or a tennis ball. Where and when