Most people love to relax and receive massages. It is calming and helps our body recover. A massage is a term used to explain pressing, rubbing, and manipulating the skin, muscles, tendons, and ligament. Individuals call professional massage therapists to loosen up tight areas in the body. They most likely use their hands and fingers, but could also use their forearms, elbows, and even feet to get into the deep tissue.

There are many health benefits with having a massage. Individuals with back pain can benefit from a massage. There are studies that suggest that massage therapy is effective for back pain. It even has the potential of reducing cost of care and therapy. An hour-long Swedish massage once a week has the ability to alleviate pain and stiffness, and improve movement.

Multiple studies have suggested that massage therapy can reduce the number of migraines an individual can have and improve sleep. One of the reasons why individuals are able to sleep is because massages can help decrease the body’s production of the stress hormone, cortisol, by up to 50%. This has the ability to reduce the risk of depression. It is also recommended that cancer patients get massages, since it can relieve fatigue, pain, depression, and nausea in cancer patients.

Additional Resource:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12779300 (accessed on 04/02/2016)

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11322842 (accessed on 04/02/2016)

https://nccih.nih.gov/health/massage/massageintroduction.htm (accessed on 04/02/2016)

http://online.liebertpub.com/doi/abs/10.1089/acm.2009.0634 (accessed on 04/02/2016)

https://nccih.nih.gov/health/massage (accessed on 04/02/2016)

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