Feeling tense? Get a massage

Massages can relieve tense, tired muscles and help you relax, but their benefits can go much further. Massage therapy is becoming not only more popular, but increasingly demanding as more people understand how far its merits can go to improve physical and emotional health.

At local businesses like European Skin Care and 1604 Day Spa Salon, customers can benefit from different types of massages, depending on personal needs. 1604 offers Swedish, deep tissue, hot stone and pregnancy massages, and more spas and massage clinics are offering tailor-made massages as customers request them.

The Massage Clinic offers a new spin on massage therapy through medical massage, which more women, men and even children are turning to for relief from physical ailments like migraines, fibromyalgia, depression, chronic pain, foot conditions and post-surgical problems.

“Our goal has been to help the community understand how massage can benefit them in maintaining health,” says Michelle Sager, owner of The Massage Clinic.

Sager, a massage therapist as well as an instructor for massage and former anatomy and physiology teacher, realized how closely connected medicine and massage therapy could be to bring relief to people with chronic medical problems.

The clinic offers Clinical Solutions, a unique group of techniques geared toward treating specific problems.

“It’s many techniques rolled into one,” Sager says. “For example, we concentrate on neck muscles for migraine. Massage helps train the muscles to stay where they’re supposed to stay.”

Sager says the goal of medical massage is to teach clients how to keep muscles aligned and to maintain that at home.

“Massage therapy doesn’t have to be a one-time thing,” Sager says. “We show patients how to stretch those muscles so they go where they’re supposed to go.”

The word is getting out about how successful massage can be in people’s lives.

“It’s becoming more demanded because people are seeing the benefits in their lives,” Sager says. “It helps the baby boomers get rid of aches and pains, and for post-surgery patients, it helps with range of motion. What we’re all about is increasing the quality of life for people, and it’s become a way of life for a lot of people.”

The Massage Clinic employs a staff nurse and therapists with years of experience in massage.

Sager says massage is affordable, and The Massage Clinic has monthly specials to meet the needs of clients. The clinic hosts couples and friends massages, and it uses South American hot stones for every massage at no additional charge.

Some of the main benefits of massage include:

n Improves blood and lymph circulation.

n Removes metabolic waste and improves immunity.

n Strengthens and tones muscles.

n Increases restorative sleep.

n Enhances sports performance.

n Increases overall quality of life.

For Sager, combining her expertise in physiology with massage was bringing her knowledge “alive under my hands.”

More and more clients are seeing a change in how they feel and their quality of life once they turn to massage to help them manage their physical conditions.

“We have clients come in showing a level of pain that is obvious,” Sagersays. “Then they leave happy, and we can see that extreme evidence of what we’re doing. It’s about increasing their quality of life.”