~~~~ Atlantic Chair Massage ~~~~ Research ~~~~

Research related to Chair Massage

Benefits of Chair Massage

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Did you know?

Research indicates that a 15-minute chair massage results in decreased stress, increased alertness and increased speed & accuracy on math computations. (1)

Up to 90% of all visits to primary care physicians are for stress-related complaints. (2)

Office workers massaged regularly were more alert, performed better and were less stressed than those who weren't massaged. (1)

Stress accounts for $26 billion in medical and disability payments and $95 billion in lost productivity per year. (2)

Over 50% of lost work days are stress related which keeps about 1 million people per day from attending work. (2)

Health care expenditures are nearly 50% greater for workers who report high levels of stress. (3)

40% of job turnover is due to stress. (4)

1. Field, Ironson, Pickens et al. (1996). Massage therapy reduces anxiety and enhances EEG pattern of alertness and math computations.International Journal of Neuroscience 86, 197-205 2.Occupational Health and Safety news and the National Council on compensation Insurance (U.S.A.) 3..Journal of Occupational and Environmental Medicine 4. American Institute of Stress

Current Articles

History of the Massage Chair

David Palmer is the San Francisco practitioner who created the world's first massage-specific chair, the High Touch Massage Chair, in 1986. Today we find the massage chair being used wherever one's imagination may take them. The massage chair has indeed been one of the most influential new tools for the practitioner since it was first introduced, and has contributed toward an expansion of the career opportunities in the industry like no other tool now on the market.

Chair Massage keeps illness down, productivity up

Some companies provide chair massages on a regular basis, while others use it as a reward for a job well done or a relief during a particularly stressful time, such as tax season for CPAs or the end of a challenging project. Calvert Group, a Bethesda, Md. based mutual fund firm, has offered chair massages to its employees for 16 years…and about half of its 180 employees are regular users of the service. "There were definitely legitimate business reasons for doing it," according to Dennis Truskey, vice president of human resources... "It's a very good benefit. We're extremely satisfied. It's not something we would even consider taking away.” The company pays the full cost of the massages.

Enjoying Massage in the Workplace
Adapted From: Massage For Dummies

Massage in the workplace has many benefits, including the following:

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Increases employee morale
Lowers stress,
Decreases overuse injuries
Provides some high-touch to counterbalance high-tech environments
Offers employees something new and different.

The benefits of workplace massage quickly outweigh the concerns:

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Nobody has to undress, and if they really don't want their hair messed up, they just have ask the massage practitioner not to massage their head.
The massage is usually given in a public space and is very conservative.
The boss realizes that happy employees are productive employees.
Employees who receive this extra benefit are more likely to feel grateful and be more responsible

Chair Massage Research

Massage reducing anxiety and improving alertness

There are now a number of research papers demonstrating the beneficial effects of massage therapy in relation to the physiological and psycho-logical aspects of stress (see ALTERNATIVES in healthTM Vol 1;2 and Vol 1:5) and the latest controlled study conducted at the Touch Research Institute, University of Miami School of Medicine, Florida, USA shows once again that massage therapy has an important role to play in the alleviation of stress and stress-induced illnesses.

In the study two times every week for five weeks, twenty-six adults were given a chair massage and twenty four adults were asked to relax in the massage chair for 15 minutes to be used as controls.

On the first and last days of the study all of the participants were monitored for EEG, before, during and after the sessions. In addition, before and after the sessions they performed math computations, they completed POMS Depression and State Anxiety Scales and they pro-vided a saliva sample for cortisol.

At the beginning of the sessions they completed Life Events, Job Stress and Chronic POMS Depression Scales. The results revealed the following:

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Frontal delta power increased for both groups, suggesting relaxation;
The massage group showed de-creased frontal alpha and beta power (suggesting enhanced alertness); while the control group showed increased alpha and beta power;
The massage group showed in-creased speed and accuracy on math computations while the control group did not change;
Anxiety levels were lower following the massage but not the control sessions, although mood state was less depressed following both the massage and control sessions;
Salivary cortisol levels were lower following the massage but not the control sessions but only on the first day; and
At the end of the 5 week period, depression scores were lower for both groups but job stress score were lower only for the massage group.

This small-scale study suggests that massage therapy offers benefits in not just alleviating the physiological effects of anxiety, but also in improving mental alertness.

Field T; lronson G; Scafjdi F; Nawrocki T; Goncalves A; Burman I; Pickens J; Fox N; Schanberg 5; Kuhn C.Massage therapy reduces anxiety and enhances EEG pattern of alertness and math computations. mi Neurosci (ENGLAND) Sep 1996,86 (3-4) p197-205.

Further reading: Massage Therapy by Adam Jackson (published by Vermilion)

Massage therapy and stress management

The mind, which before massage is in a perturbed, restless, vacillating and -even despondent state, becomes after massage, calm, quiet, peaceful and subdued; in fact, the wearied and worried mind has been converted into a mind restful, placid, and refreshed.

~ Dr Stretch Dowse, Eminent Victorian Physician, 1887

Stress is a subject about which the general public is becoming increasingly aware. It seems that every day a new study is reported in the press or medical journals relating stress to one disease or another. Some physicians suggest that stress may be responsible for 75 per cent of all diseases in the Western world including skin diseases (e.g., psoriasis and eczema), headaches and migraine, digestive disorders, high blood pressure and heart-related diseases, as well as back-ache and muscle pain, poor eyesight and depression.

As the world in which we live becomes increasingly stressful both physically and emotionally we are left with two choices; either we avoid stress, or we learn how to deal with it effectively. It is, of course, impossible to avoid stress, and therefore the only real solution is to find ways to manage the stresses and strains we encounter each day. One way is the use of massage therapy.

Zhu S, Wang N, Wang D, Wang M, Tong K, Xu H, Wang J, Li Q, Peng J, Wang J, Jianye District TCM Hospital, Nanjing.

Massage Reduces Dancers' Stress, Helps Range of Motion

Massage lowers anxiety, improves mood and increases range of motion among dance students, according to a recent study. Researchers at the Touch Research Institute showed that twice-weekly massage lowered the stress hormone cortisol, eased neck, shoulder and back pain, and helped range of motion, including neck extension and shoulder abduction. Results showed that (they) had less anxiety, better mood, and less pain in the neck, shoulder and back… and an improvement in range of motion, including neck extension and shoulder abduction.

Source: Touch Research Institute. Originally reported in the Journal of Dance Medicine & Science, 1999, Vol. 3, No. 3, pp. 108-112.