Janet Travell, JFK's White House physician, wrote the definitive medical text on MPS with her partner, David Simons, over 30 years ago. It went virtually ignored by medical schools. Now the demand for it is so great a new version will be out next year. A lot can be done to relieve MPS, and lighten your patient's pain load. Acute pain from FM creates a reflex neuromuscular contractile response which reverses the desired process of softening and lengthening.
Congestion can impair circulation and neural transmission through the area.
This effects not only the muscles, but the surrounding organs. A muscle in a state of sustained tension is working, thus its need for nutrition is high. At the same time, the sustained contraction reduces circulation in the area by squeezing the small arteries and capillaries which service the working cells with glucose and oxygen. Fluid circulation in and around the nerve cells is curtailed, and the capillaries which supply the nutrition and carry off waste products are squeezed tightly as well. The contracting muscles are producing increased waste products and demanding increased nutrients from capillaries that are less and less able to handle them.