Fibromyalgia Trigger Points

What are fibromyalgia trigger points?Fibromyalgia is a condition where even a slight touch to a sensitive area causes pain.

It is primarily a disease that affects women since over 80 percent of fibromyalgia sufferers are women. Most of the time stress, an illness or some type of trauma sets off the disease. No one knows what exactly causes it but there are common factors in the patients that have it.

They all tend to have low level of Serotonin in their system. They also tend to have high levels of substance P, a chemical in the body that signals nerves. There are high levels of the nerve growth factor in the spinal fluid of patients with fibromyalgia.

On top of all this, most patients have no non-REM sleep. Non-REM sleep is the deep sleep as opposed to REM, rapid eye movement sleep, where dreaming occurs. It accounts for the fact that many of the fibromyalgia patients are chronically fatigued.

Trigger Points vs. Tender Points

In fibromyalgia, there are two different types of points of pain. A trigger points fibromyalgia is a sure sign of fibromyalgia. When you touch a trigger point, it causes pain to radiate to other areas. This deferred pain comes to areas along specific pathways.

Tender points are quite different. When you touch a tender point, you feel the pain at that location. While people have tender points with fibromyalgia, it is the referred pain of the trigger point that sets it apart from other diseases.

How do you Determine Trigger Points

Trigger points for fibromyalgia are active or latent. If the trigger point is active then you have pain at referred areas from tapping it lightly but not felt at the site of the trigger point. You don't feel the pain at the site of the trigger point.

Which are Fibromyalgia 18 Tender Points?

While many people call them tender points, again, these are the trigger points for the deferred pain. Even though there seems to be only nine, there are indeed 18 because there's a spot on both the right and left side of the body.

Areas:

The front neck area or low cervical region

The second rib in the front of the chest area.

The back of the neck at the occiput.

The trapezius muscle area located on the back area of the shoulder

The shoulder blade area at the supraspinatus muscle.

The elbow at the lateral epicondyle

The buttocks at the Gluteal

The rear hip at the greater trochanter

The knee on the fat pad next to the joint line.

How Can You Tell and Know if You Have Fibromyalgia?

Most people with fibromyalgia have the same complaint; they hurt everywhere. In addition, they're often tired, feeling depressed, have headaches, bad sleeping patterns and bowel problems. Some people explain it feels like a lifetime of influenza. However, there are many diseases that make you feel the same way. So, how do doctors tell if this is fibromyalgia or something else?

There is no test for fibromyalgia. What most doctors do is rule out other diseases where there are tests. They look at the collection of the symptoms, particularly the fibromyalgia trigger points and deferred pain. After ruling out everything else, the doctors deduce that the patient suffers from this malady.

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