Gua Sha continues to amaze me

“It’s 5am and I’m sitting at the airport and am in complete amazement! I woke up with a full range of motion in my neck and not an ounce of pain. I haven’t even taken any advil yet.  I can hardly believe it! I am one happy girl.”

That is an email I received from a patient who had come in the day before with acute neck pain. Because she was flying the following day, she was desperate to get some relief from pain and the limited range of motion in her neck which had been plagueing her for 3 days. Advil took the edge off, but wasn’t giving her complete relief, and was doing nothing for her inability to turn her head to the right.

Upon palpation I found several very tight areas between her spine and her scapula on the right side, and also in the muscles on the right side of her neck. I did acupuncture locally, and also used a combination of points on her wrists and ankles on the acupuncture channels that traverse the upper back and neck.

The acupuncture certainly contributed to her quick recovery, but I think the key to treatment success in this case was the gua sha which I applied to her upper back following the acupuncture.

Gua sha is an ancient technique in which a smooth-edged tool, usually a ceramic soup spoon, is scraped along the skin in one area repeatedly. The technique stimulates blood flow and produces heat which releases toxins and helps muscles to relax. The feeling is one of a strong massage, and can leave reddish marks referred to as “petichiae”. Using gua sha on the muscles of my patient’s neck and upper back were the key to her relief from pain and return to normal range of motion. I use gua sha quite a bit in the spring when neck pain and spasm are a common phenomenon.