Tension headaches often mean a life of suffering and symptom relieving drugs, but a clinical trial showed that simple trigger point therapy you can easily do yourself gave complete relief for 58% of sufferers (1) In this article we will show you how this was done and how to do it yourself. However, based on the results of several other studies you may be able to do much better. We’ll help you with this to.
The way we’ll do this is by first going over:
Tension headaches (also known as muscle contraction or stress headaches) are by far the most common types of headache (one references stated 90%) (2). There is no concise definition. What happens is that if the headache fits the general pattern below and the doctors cannot find a cause it is labelled a “tension headache”.
There are no laboratory tests or imaging that shows a tension headache. Rather headaches are diagnosed as tension headaches if the fit the general pattern below, and doctors don’t find another cause.
A long standing headache generally
Most medical journals and even the Mayo Clinic’s web site will tell you that the cause of tension headaches is unknown or uncertain (3–5). However many more scientifically oriented journals say that there are several causes, with the main one being referred pain from (myofascial) trigger points in the muscles of the head, neck and shoulders (1,6–19).
Trigger points are those tender lumps in your muscles that therapists find, and have been shown to refer pain as shown in this diagram. As testament to these being a main cause, the trial referred to in this article treated trigger points and fully relieve the headaches in 58% of the cases.
Why the difference in opinion? Medical researchers and journals rely heavily on drug company funds. If the doctors were told to look for trigger points the drug companies would sell less drugs. Unfortunately profits and funding come before people’s wellbeing.
The patients were adults who had suffered from at least three tension headaches per week for several years.
Previous research had found that trigger points in the following muscles referred pain to the head. These were examined, and trigger points were treated using a pressure technique where pressure or pinching was used until the muscle relaxed, or for 90 seconds. This was only done once.
58% of the patients had complete relief, while 42% had either partial or no relief.
The techniques used are very simple and easy to apply on yourself. We have a separate guide Your complete guide to pressure points and massage for headaches- with self help advice. This shows:
This was a simple trial that used just one application of therapy to test whether i) trigger points were involved, and ii) whether treating them would help, yet 58% had complete relief. Based on the results of several other studies (1,8,9,14,16,18) and 27 years experience as a chiropractor I believe we can do a lot better.
The trial only used one application of therapy. Sometimes several applications of therapy are needed to relieve a trigger point and more still to completely eliminate them. When self applied this is not an issue, as the therapy is easy, convenient and usually free.
The simple techniques used in the trial are widely used, but our guide to pressure points and massage for headaches lists others that may be more effective.
Several studies have found that restrictions in the movement of vertebrae in the upper spine are usually associated with these trigger points and either add to the headaches or cause them in their own right. The trial did not deal with these, but you can.
It’s actually very easy to do these. We have complete, easy to follow instruction in our guide Your complete guide to pressure points and massage for headaches- with self help advice.
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