During the past few months, several new studies, reviews and case studies on myofascial pain syndrome [MPS] and myofascial trigger points [TrPs] have been published. Myofascial pain syndrome and TrPs are increasingly being recognized not only in the United States, but also in Europe. Testa and colleagues [Milan, Italy] published an excellent review article detailing the clinical signs that lead...

Readers who are seriously interested in the promising potential of electromyographic detection of endplate noise as a gold standard for identifying TrPs and its likely limitations should be sure to consider the comments on and compare the papers by Couppe et al. and by Kuan et al. that are reviewed in this column. Those interested in writing a first-class paper on clinical research on TrPs shou...

Myofascial pain syndrome (MPS) is described as the sensory, motor, and autonomic symptoms caused by myofascial trigger points (TrPs). Knowing the potential causes of TrPs is important to prevent their development and recurrence, but also to inactivate and eliminate existing TrPs. There is general agreement that muscle overuse or direct trauma to the muscle can lead to the development of TrPs. M...

Trigger points associated with myofascial and visceral pains often lie within the areas of referred pain but many are located at a distance from them. Furthermore, brief, intense stimulation of trigger points frequently produces prolonged relief of pain. These properties of trigger points--their widespread distribution and the pain relief produced by stimulating them--resemble those of acupunct...

INTRODUCTION The skin resistivity (SkR) measurement is commonly recommended for acupoints measurement, but for trigger points (TrPs) only one study is available. The purpose of the study was to evaluate SkR for latent TrPs compared to non-TrPs and the surrounding tissue. MATERIAL AND METHODS Forty-two healthy volunteers with unilateral latent upper trapezius TrPs (12 men, 30 women) aged 21-23...