Dry Needling: How It Fits Into Your Treatment Plan


We all have that one area (or more!) where we hold tension and stress. Maybe you’ve had a recent injury or you work at a desk all day. There can be many reasons you feel muscular pain; dry needling is one option for helping alleviate it. Although it is becoming more widely available, the techniques we use today date back to the late ‘70s with the realization that in trigger point injections, the needle itself was responsible for pain reduction, not the medication injected into the muscle. Trigger Point Dry Needling (TDN) is a treatment used for reducing myofascial trigger points, which can be a source of pain. TDN uses a thin, solid needle to access the trigger points, or taut bands of tissue, that create pain and dysfunction.  So what does a treatment feel like? When the needle is inserted into a trigger point, we anticipate a deep ache or twitch response in the muscle, which dissolves as the muscle releases. This response helps untie the myofascial “knot” and promotes healing of the tissue, allowing the muscle to function more efficiently. Depending on your unique issue, you could have multiple trigger points treated in one session, and a few sessions may be necessary to get the most benefit.

To reach your full potential and return to the activities you love, it is important to realize that this is only one tool of many that physical therapists use. Roper Physical Therapy is a clinic that focuses on Myofascial Release to manually treat the entire fascial system in conjunction with Medical Therapeutic Yoga to address the neuromuscular re-education necessary to regain musculoskeletal stability. We are now offering TDN in combination with these treatments.

Trigger Point Dry Needling and Myofascial Release are separate treatments that can be utilized in combination to attain the mutual goal of reducing myofascial pain. If you would like to schedule an appointment or join a yoga class, please call our office: 980-298-6706 or email us at [email protected].