Dublin Performance Institute Fitness

Trigger Point Dry Needling

Trigger Point Dry Needling is one of the many treatments available.
This is highly effective as a treatment in itself or when combined with other treatment modalities for use in injury treatment, rehabilitation and injury prevention.
Trigger points are discrete, focal, hyper-irritable spots located in a taut band of skeletal muscle. They produce pain locally and in a referred pattern and often accompany chronic musculoskeletal disorders. Acute trauma or repetitive micro-trauma may lead to the development of stress on muscle fibers and the formation of trigger points.
Patients may have regional, persistent pain resulting in a decreased range of motion in the affected muscles. These include muscles used to maintain body posture, such as those in the neck, shoulders, and pelvic girdle.
Trigger points may also manifest as tension headache, tinnitus, temporomandibular joint pain, decreased range of motion in the legs and low back pain.
Palpation of a hypersensitive bundle or nodule of muscle fibre of harder than normal consistency is the physical finding typically associated with a trigger point.
Palpation of the trigger point will elicit pain directly over the affected area and/or cause radiation of pain toward a zone of reference and a local twitch response. Various modalities, such as manipulative therapy and dry needling, are used to deactivate trigger points.

Trigger-point dry needling has been shown to be one of the most effective treatment modalities to deactivate trigger points and provide prompt relief of symptoms.
Why is this treatment so Effective?
  • When a muscle or group of muscles is initially injured it is usually recommended that treatment can’t start for 72 to 96 hours.
  • However the muscle can be needled straight away.
  • This has the effect of reducing tightness and tension in the area immediately.
  • This allows the muscle(s) relax and causes the healing process to be more rapid.

 A recent example of this was when a client, Brian Gregan, pulled his hamstring in the World Under 23 Championships. Two weeks later he won the National Senior 400m All Irelands.