When would someone choose massage therapy as a restorative therapeutic healing modality?
The intent of this article is to provide consumers with information when choosing a health care provider. When is it appropriate to choose massage therapy? My motives are to promote my clinic because I am a massage therapist and partly to be useful because the public does not know what services massage therapists provide. I also want to ease the burden on doctors, chiropractors, and physical therapists who are being overburdened by their services for some treatments that can be better performed by massage therapists.
When should you go to the masseur?
For most muscle and joint aches and pains.
Some doctors don’t think of massage therapy as a healing modality when they have a patient in their office who may have other, more serious symptoms.
Massage therapy has been shown to be beneficial in the treatment of injuries resulting from trauma, surgery, or occupational and vehicle accidents. The rehabilitation protocol to restore full range of motion and strength to muscles and joints is practiced by qualified massage therapists. Massage therapists are fully trained in the assessment of muscle and joint imbalances and can successfully treat these dysfunctions and restrictions.
Massage therapy has its place in the healing forum. So how to choose?
There are some healing techniques where physical therapy works best and others where massage therapy works best.
How will you know which treatment is best at rehabilitation time? Massage therapy or physiotherapy?
Ask your local professional massage therapist and physical therapist for a description of their different treatments and then you can make an informed decision.
How will you know which treatment is for you?
Sometimes it’s hard to decide. So trusting your professionals requires asking a few questions!
Sometimes it’s all about training and experience with your particular condition!
Ask your health care provider if he has treated this condition before and what the results were.
Why should a consumer choose massage therapy as a healing modality?
Because it is a scientifically proven healing method. Because it is an established fact that massage therapies
are capable of relieving pain, relieving the patient of symptoms that restrict movement
or limit the range of motion of a particular limb or body part. Because massage therapies are capable of restoring and maintaining functions to maintain well-being. Because massage therapists can treat patients in the acute, subacute, and chronic stages of injury and healing. Because some masseurs are trained in various modalities of hydrotherapy treatments that complement massage therapy and can be used comprehensively.
The choice of healing modality by the healthcare consumer depends on many variables.
The three most important factors I will focus on are:
1. Time elapsed between the healer and the patient.
How long does it take you to tell your healthcare provider about your complete medical history?
Fifteen minutes!
Doctors, chiropractors, physical therapists, massage therapists; they all ask approximately the same questions, but each specialist does it with different means but with the desire to achieve the same goal: to return the patient to a state of health, balance or equilibrium.
Due to the ways in which physicians and chiropractors are paid, by billing the medical health authorities, it contributes to the time they spend with the patient: statistically an average of ten (10) minutes per patient. The masseur, for his part, is not paid by the provincial health authorities, but usually hires his patients for half-hour periods or one-hour appointments. These are paid in cash or billed to a group insurance plan that covers massage therapies. It is not that they work by the hour, or for an hourly rate, but rather that the therapist reserves that time with the patient to allow time for appropriate and adequate evaluation and treatments. The patient pays for the therapist’s training and experience and for his manipulations, mobilizations, and other corrective techniques.
2. Determination of the most appropriate healing modality for a particular condition, condition, or pathology.
Another important feature in selecting a healing option is determining what type of healer is best suited for a particular type of dysfunction. Because each specialist has their different protocols, each one will have a different set of goals and tools to work with.
a) The doctor examines the body from a systemic approach, examining the skin, circulation, breathing, the eye/ear/nose complex, digestion, etc., reduces the symptoms to a limited number of probable pathologies, then prescribes the appropriate medications that will help to eliminate pain and alleviate symptoms and hopefully restore systemic homeostasis or balance. “If the pain persists beyond a week, come back and see me,” is the common refrain. With a revisit, the doctor proceeds with a longer and more detailed exam and test until a more particular diagnosis is reached and a more specific drug prescription can be given.
b) The chiropractor will manipulate the spine or joints to restore neurological function by realigning the vertebrae that were subluxated and restoring nutritional and circulatory pathways to the parts of the body served by those spinal nerve roots. They will assess muscle texture abnormalities before and after manipulations to determine if the treatments have been effective.
c) The massage therapist, like the doctors and chiropractors, will take a detailed medical history of the patient, will eliminate possible pathologies that the patient knows they have and claims they do not have, performs an evaluation of the joints and muscles to determine the restrictions; uses deep tissue and peripheral joint manipulations, as well as active and passive stretching and neural stimulation and inhibition techniques to help restore bilateral symmetry and restore normal tissue texture.
The massage therapist has his place in the professional healing medical community. Its approach is both systemic and specific. He specializes in the musculoskeletal aspect of the patient but without excluding the other aspects that the doctor or chiropractor takes into account when evaluating the patient. The masseur includes in his clinical history the medical pathologies that the patient refers to. The massage therapist takes into consideration the spinal and neurological dysfunctions that the patient may report when she evaluates him and establishes a treatment protocol. Then, the masseur proceeds to carry out a series of visual and palpatory examinations of the mobilizations and ranges of movement of the muscles and joints to discover restrictions and asymmetries, which are often the causes of pain or discomfort and the consequences of hypertonic muscles. , restricted joints, or weak muscles that have a muscular or neurological cause or origin. The massage therapist is able, through a variety of techniques, to restore normal resting tone and function to muscles and joints, while providing the patient with appropriate stretching and strengthening of the muscles involved.
3. Cost of treatment or service to the consumer
The billing and payment method largely determines when a consumer will choose their curation modality. The cost to the health consumer of the visit to the doctor is hidden in the provincial tax structure. The health consumer also gets a fixed number of ‘free’ visits to the chiropractor with a ‘supplement’ fee charged by chiropractors without which they would not be able to operate their clinics profitably. The massage therapist charges between $40.00 and $60.00 for consultation, evaluation, and treatments that generally last between a half hour and an hour, with an average of 45 minutes.
This cost is borne by the patient and/or partially subsidized by a personal group insurance plan. Some of these plans, like Blue Cross, or Great West Life, Sun Life, Mutual Life, cover 80% to 100% of massage therapy treatments if they are covered in their particular employee plans.
The big difference in choosing a healing modality comes when one is involved in an “MVA” car accident.
In Manitoba, only chiropractors and physical therapists can get patient coverage from Autopac or
Workers’ compensation in the event of a workplace injury. Therefore, it is cheaper, much cheaper to visit a chiropractor or physical therapist in these cases.
Therefore, most patients involved in these types of injuries choose the physiotherapy or chiropractic healing modality when, in many cases, massage and hydrotherapies would be beneficial in aiding healing and shortening healing time with restrictions. in the muscles and a limited range of motion in the joints.
RULES FOR MASSEUSES AND MEMBERSHIP REGULATIONS
In Manitoba, massage therapists can work professionally once they belong to an association and obtain the appropriate licenses and permits that vary between municipalities and urban jurisdictions.
The minimum requirement in rural Manitoba is membership in an association. The three main associations that regulate massage therapists vary in their requirements for membership. The London County Society of Physiologists and Manitoba Massage Therapists require a 2200 hour course to qualify for membership. The Association of Massage Therapists and Holistic Practitioners requires a minimum course of 1000 hours to qualify for membership.
The City of Winnipeg recognizes this minimum standard and licenses massage therapists with this level of training.
Any complaints about professional conduct can be reported to the various associations and the discipline to be applied varies between associations. As of this writing, there is no provincial standard for massage therapists and there is no political will at this time to enforce one.
There is a national body that is trying to consolidate the various provincial massage associations and the federal government has indicated that there is a federal desire to institute a national standard in the near future to allow movement of labor between provinces. Currently, a massage therapist can operate a 400-hour course in Quebec, a 1,000-hour course in Manitoba, and a 3,000-hour course in British Columbia.
The standard will likely become the 2,200-hour course nationwide, which approximates a two-year full-time or three-year part-time curriculum.
So how does a health consumer know how to recognize the qualifications of a massage therapist in Manitoba?
Just by asking individual practitioners which association they are affiliated with and what course length they have reached.