You will not find a standard, clear-cut definition for medical massage.

According to David G. Simons, MD:

"Muscle is an orphan organ. No medical specialty claims it. As a consequence, no medical specialty is concerned with promoting funded research into the muscular causes of pain, and medical students and physical therapists rarely receive adequate primary training in how to recognize and treat myofascial trigger points. Fortunately, massage therapists, although rarely well trained medically, are trained in how to find myofascial trigger points and frequently become skilled in there treatment."

Source: Clair Davies, "Forward", The Trigger Point Therapy Workbook, 2001, New harbinger Publications, Inc.

According to the American Medical Massage Association (AMMA), medical massage is:

"A system of manually applied techniques designed to reduce pain, establish normal tissue tension, create a positive tissue environment and to normalize the movement of the musculoskeletal system. A scientifically based method of manual therapy that seeks a clear understanding of the scientific principles of physiology that affect connective tissue healing and treatment."

From an insurance billing perspective, medical massage typically refers to massage performed according to a prescription from a physician.

Most people do not realize that they have insurance coverage for many services offered by Massage Therapists.

It's really not in the best interests of the insurance companies and managed care providers to provide this information to consumers.

CLICK HERE to learn more about Insurance Billing

Therapeutic Massage is usually thought of as a general massage system. Practitioners, while competent and well trained in relaxation-based massage, generally lack both the knowledge and experience to treat specific musculoskeletal disorders. Most initial Certification Programs in therapeutic massage and bodywork do NOT include the classes in health and medical sciences needed to gain expertise in these areas.

Medical Massage Therapy strives to achieve the following clinical criteria:

• Medical Massage is not a general treatment. Rather, Medical Massage is applied as manual therapy to the specific area and the primary pathology of the client's chief complaint.
• Medical Massage is delivered to an anatomical region based on soft tissue and joint findings and after assessment procedures, such as muscle tests and palpation.
• Medical Massage protocol involves several progressive steps or stages of treatment that attempt to correct abnormal conditions affecting the joint complex.
• Medical Massage therapy is not limited to myofascial tissues, but includes the joint complex and highly specialized joint mobilization techniques, such as stretching.
• Medical Massage adopts the medical techniques and protocols of other systems of health care.

As a result, Medical Massage Therapy is re-emerging in the United States as a manual therapy system of treatment that does address the needs of clinical rehabilitation.

Once a primary form of treatment in the United States, massage fell out of favor in the 1940's, replaced by surgical interventions and drug therapies (i.e., allopathic medicine). However, massage remained a mainstay of medicine in virtually all other parts of the world, including Canada and Europe.