PT for the skin, glands, and organs, oh my!

Incorporating visceral manipulation into your recovery

Visceral manipulation incorporates physical touch to promote tissue mobility around the internal organs and glands. That could include areas within the abdomen (like the small and large intestines, the mesentary), the thoracic cavity (including the lungs, liver, esophagus) and the pelvis (bladder, reproductive organs).

All of our organs are close neighbors to the spine, the joints and muscular connections of our limbs, and to be truly integrated, both mobility and stability has to occur at all tissue layers in a coordinated fashion.

To be clear, visceral manipulation is not repositioning an organ in a new (or “better") place. But as the organs have intimate connections to fascial and neural structures, encouraging motion of the body’s various layers can be critical in the delicate orchestration of breathing, circulation, digestion and metabolism.

Considering all life’s various insults both within and with-out the body, throughout life’s milestone shifts (puberty, pregnancy, menopause and yes, MANopause), it is critical to regularly move the body, hydrate the body, and yes, manually remind the tissues to move especially after a period of sedentary, stagnant positioning (this goes out to all of us working on screens for long hours these days).

Not only can holistic manual therapy help with the body’s reset, it can improve your posture, your breath, and help with pain relief from musculoskeletal injuries to digestion issues and many things in-between.

Consider these conditions that can benefit from visceral manipulation:

• Repetitive stress injuries

• Swallowing dysfunction

• Migraines

• Gastric reflux issues

• Persistent neck pain

• Chronic thoracic and lumbar pain conditions

• Chronic pelvic pain

Explore more information about visceral mobilization.

Give me a call, and let’s explore how visceral manipulation and integrative physical therapy can unlock all your various layers for lasting pain relief to return you to all the work you want to do.