Muscle Adhesions: Getting in the Way of Your Performance

WHAT ARE ADHESIONS?

Our bodies contain special protein structures called connective tissue, also know as Fascia. This substance connects each part to other parts and the whole, very much like a flexible skeleton. When this tissue is healthy it is smooth and slippery, allowing the muscles, nerves, blood vessels or organs to move freely and function properly. Imagine a piece of scotch tape, the smooth side is healthy fascia; the sticky side is scar tissue or unhealthy fascia. Rub the tape along your skin, both sides, to "feel" what an adhesion is like. The drag that you feel, the "pulling" sensation, is what an adhesion is like. These adhesions attach to muscles, nerves and lymph decreasing their ability to work properly. You really know when you have an adhesion on a nerve; you get many abnormal sensations like numbness, tingling or pain.

DOESN'T STRETCHING GET RID OF ADHESIONS?

Stretching plays a very important role in the treatment and prevention of injuries but it will not break down adhesions. Adhesions, or scar tissue, are much stronger than normal healthy tissue. Muscle groups can often adhere/bind to one another preventing the normal sliding necessary for full mobility. When an individual performs a stretch, the tissue that lengthens is not the adhered tissue but the healthy tissue. This can actually cause more damage to healthy tissue resulting in the increase of adhesions. Stretching correctly is still essential, but it will never release the restrictions that are already present.

HOW WILL EXERCISES AND STRETCHING THAT DID NOT WORK BEFORE, WORK AFTER (ART) TREATMENTS?

Stretching and exercises are only effective after the dysfunction within the soft-tissue structures have been correctly released. Stretching and exercising dysfunctional tissues will only lead to a dysfunctional result. The combination of finding the origin of the problem, (ART) treatments, functional training, stretching and behavioral modifications will result in long lasting results...

HOW DO OVERUSE CONDITIONS OCCUR?

Over-used muscles (and other soft tissues) change in three important ways:

• Acute conditions (pulls, tears, collisions, etc),
• Accumulation of small tears (micro-trauma)
• Not getting enough oxygen (hypoxia).

Each of these factors can cause your body to produce tough, dense scar tissue in the affected area. This scar tissue binds up and ties down tissues that need to move freely. As scar tissue builds up, muscles become shorter and weaker, tension on tendons causes tendonitis, and nerves can become trapped. This can cause reduced range of motion, loss of strength, and pain. If a nerve is trapped, you may also feel tingling, numbness, and weakness.

This article originally appeared on performance-therapy.com

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What is Scar Tissue?

Scar tissue replaces normal skin tissue after the skin is damaged. Though scar tissue is made up of the same substance as undamaged skin, it looks different because of the way the fibers in the tissue are arranged. Scars form every time the skin is damaged beyond its first layer, whether that damage comes from a cut, burn, or a skin condition like acne or a fungal infection. Though there are ways to minimize the appearance of scars, there is no way to remove them entirely.

How it Forms

Human skin is made up of three main layers, the epidermis, dermis, and hypodermis. When the dermis — the pink middle layer in the cross-section of skin — is injured, the body first responds by making blood clot in the area to close off the wound. After the blood clots, the body then sends in fibroblasts, a type of cell that helps rebuild skin tissue. These cells break down the clot and start replacing it with proteins, primarily collagen, that make up scar tissue.

Though both scar tissue and normal skin are made with these collagen proteins, they look different because of the way the collagen is arranged. In regular skin, the collagen proteins overlap in many random directions, but in scar tissue, they generally align in one direction. This makes the scar have a different texture than the surrounding skin. Scar tissue is also not as flexible as normal skin, and does not have a normal blood supply, sweat glands, or hair.

Types of Scar Tissue

How an individual scar looks depends on a few things, including the circumstances of the injury and a person's skin tone. For instance, a puncture wound causes a different looking scar than a burn wound, and whether the wound gets infected or not can also influence the appearance of the scar. A wound in a place where the skin is stretched tight, like the chest, often causes a thicker scar, since the body has to make more tissue to keep the wound from pulling open. Skin tone plays a role too. Though scars in general tend to turn white over time, those with dark skin may get scars that get darker with time. Those with darker skin may also be more prone to keloid scars.

There are five main types of scars:

Atrophic scars: These scars are sunken down into the skin. This type of scarring is often seen with acne scars or with wounds where skin or muscle is removed by an injury. This type of scarring can also happen when the body produces so much scar tissue in one area that it prevents new cells from growing where the wound took place.
Hypertrophic scars: These are usually red or purple and are slightly raised above the skin. They tend to fade and get flat over time.
Contracture scars: These types of scars often happen with burns, and end up pulling the skin in towards the site of the injury. This can make the skin look puckered around the wound.
Keloid scars: These are very elevated, red or dark scars that form when the body produces a lot of extra collagen in a scar. Keloid scars are actually a benign type of tumor, and often grow bigger than the area of the original injury. Those with darker pigmented skin are thought to be more prone to keloid scarring, but it's not clear why.
Stretch marks: Also called striae, these are considered a unique type of scar since they don't happen in response to an injury, but because of the skin being stretched rapidly, often during pregnancy or adolescence. The tissue here is often sunken a little into the skin, and tends to fade with time.

Preventing and Treating Scar Tissue

Though there is no way to entirely get rid of scar tissue aside from avoiding a skin injury, there are ways to minimize its appearance both while the wound is healing and after a scar has formed. Except for keloid scars, most scars will fade on their own even without treatment.

While the wound is healing:

Covering the wound with a bandage — This is particularly important before going out in the sun, since UV rays can cause the newly formed tissue to get discolored and may slow down the healing process.
Cleaning wounds properly — Doctors recommend cleaning a wound with a gentle soap and lukewarm water. Cleaning with hydrogen peroxide, alcohol, or iodine can all damage the newly forming cells and lead to a more noticeable scar.
Soothing gels — Rubbing aloe vera gel on the skin after the wound has closed can help lessen redness. Vitamin E gels are not recommended, since studies show that they are not very effective are minimizing scars.
Anti-itch cream — This can help with the urge to scratch or touch the healing wound, which could irritate it and make a more noticeable scar.
Pressure bandages — Some doctors say that putting a specific type of pressure bandage on a wound can help prevent the appearance of elevated scars since it pushes the collagen down. There are several different brand name versions of these bandages, which are often called scar therapy bandages or scar sheets.

Ways to minimize scars after they form:

Massage — Massaging a scar with lotion or a doctor-recommended gel can help fade many types of scars. This is particularly recommended for keloid scars, since this can keep them from getting sensitive and painful, and can help break down some of the built-up collagen.
Injections — Steroid injections may help with hypertrophic or keloid scars, and atrophic scars can sometimes be filled in with collagen injections. One downside to this type of treatment is that it is almost always temporary, and has to be repeated regularly.
Skin resurfacing — This can be done with lasers or with equipment that works like very fine sandpaper in a procedure called dermabrasion.
Cryotherapy — This is a technique of freezing the scar, and can reduce the appearance of keloid and hypertrophic scars.

In extreme cases, a doctor might recommend surgery. Though surgery can't get rid of a scar, it can make it less noticeable. Surgery is not recommended for hypertrophic or keloid scars though, since it can make them worse. Another type of treatment for severe scars is radiation therapy, which can sometimes reduce keloid and hypertrophic scars.

This article originally appeared on wisegeekhealth.com