All You Need to Know About Trigger Points

Do you commonly experience pain in the same area of your neck and shoulders? You must have thought it was stress causing these pains. While you aren't wrong, there is more to chronic pain in certain muscles than simply that. These areas where you experience periodic pain are called trigger points. Trigger points are muscle knots or lumps which are responsible for causing you pain. A person can have more than a single trigger point. These trigger points usually occur in your neck, shoulders, lower or upper back, head, jaws, legs, or even your buttocks. Let's learn more about these trigger points below.

How are the Trigger Points Formed?

Trigger points may be formed due to an injury that you have sustained. They could result from overexercising your muscles. Poor posture while sitting/standing or sleeping could also cause trigger points to be formed. If you are in the habit of subconsciously tensing your muscles every time you experience emotional stress, trigger points could develop in these muscles.

How Can You Tell if You’re Experiencing Trigger Point Pain?

You can identify trigger point pain by certain signs and symptoms. These are –

• Weakness felt in your muscles . Trigger point formation can weaken your muscles.
• Pain trigger point pain can be deep-set and unrelenting. While some trigger points cause discomfort only when pressure is applied to them, others are a constant source of pain. Moving the muscle with the trigger point could also activate this pain. Pain can also spread away and extend to areas around your trigger point. When this happens, it is called referred pain.
• Decrease in range of motion. Trigger points in a muscle restrict its range of activity by shortening muscle length.
• You could also experience redness in your trigger point area, skin sensitivity, excessive watering in your mouth and eyes, and so on.

Diagnostic Criteria Used for Trigger Points

A trained medical professional will be able to make a trigger point diagnosis for you by following the process of elimination. They ask you in detail about your health history, the pain you are experiencing and conduct tests to come to a certainty about their diagnosis. They may even physically examine your trigger point areas to determine whether the pain you are feeling is, in fact, stemming from a trigger point. X-rays, CT scans, and MRIs can aid them in making an accurate trigger point diagnosis.

How are Trigger Points Treated?

Trigger Point Injections can effectively treat trigger points. They usually include Botox – which prevents muscle contraction that causes trigger points, a local anesthetic to help relieve pain or a corticosteroid, which reduces inflammation in the muscle.

Physical therapy and medicines can also help you deal with trigger point pain. At Phoenix Family Medical Centre, we provide all kinds of therapies that can help you relieve pain and other symptoms caused by trigger point pain. You can walk into our clinic anytime to have your trigger point pain diagnosed and treated. Similarly, you could also call or email us in advance to set up an appointment at a time that is convenient for you.

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