Dry Needling

[carolynm]

......does anyone know about this? One physical therapist in town does it, not sure whether to waste my time.

thanks,
cari

[donstore]

Dr. Weiss did this on me a few times. I think the idea is to release muscles that are in spasm. Didn't help me although as I later found out from Dr. Potter, I had scarring at my rt STL so all the PT in the world would be useless for me.

Don

[helenlegs 11]

I had dry needling, I don't think it was very deep so probably just the gluteus maximus muscle? ? It didn't do me any good but I do understand the concept and it may relax the muscles and therefore help if not truly entrapped. The needles would NOT come out at the end of the treatment, so I guess that shows just how tight my muscles are . It took ages!

[HerMajesty]

Dry needling is a musclular trigger point release mechanism. If you have had any trigger point massage, you probably understand that trigger points are tender focal points within a muscle that make it more short and spastic overall. They can be massaged out, which is not terribly practical for the entire pelvic floor.
Dry needling involves relaxing trigger points instead by locating them and inserting an accupuncture needle. It is not accupuncture, however here in Nevada the Accupunturists lobbied against other health care practitioners doing it because they wanted to be the exclusive group sticking accupuncture needles into people. So dry needling is not legal here, and when my PT wanted me to get needles stuck into my muscular trigger points, she had to refer me to a pain clinic for trigger point injections instead. The only difference is, with dry needling just a needle goes into the trigger point and with injections a liquid must be pushed through the needle. The guy who did mine used vitamin B6 as the liquid which is a way to do no harm; sometimes steroids are used which can have adverse effects.
Trigger point release of any kind is used to treat pelvic floor dysfunction which is generally an effect not a cause of PNE but can exacerbate it. In my experience, The treatment I got for PFD, which included trigger point release and PT excercises, had a very positive impact on the neurogenic bladder which was a part of my PN issues, but no really significant effect on other symptoms of neuropathy.
Accupuncture needles are generally painless; if your PT is recommending dry needling I would suggest agreeing to try it on a limited basis to confirm it does not induce any kind of flare. If not, you can try a more aggressive course to see if it actually helps, I wouldn't expect miracles but you don't know what it can do for you til you try.