Adhesions, or scar tissue, is a necessary healing reaction to injury, inflammation and surgery.The minimum healing time is six weeks and remodeling of the tissue may occur over a year.Adhesions are fibrous tissue which is tougher, less elastic and less functional compared to theoriginal tissue and will be felt as pain, pulling or pressure from the ridges or bands in the tissue.
Many patients present with post-surgical adhesions in the abdomen/pelvis from C-sections, abdominal surgery or from mastectomy. These may affect back pain or sciatic pain and clinical diagnostic skills are used to differentially diagnose. Other reasons for adhesions are chronic inflammation, dehydration and repetitive motion injury.
At Annex Clinic manual therapy and visceral manipulation, often combined with cupping therapy, is used to loosen the fused and adhered tissue. This is to restore the tissues to closer to normal, mitigating interstitial debris and the negative effects of adhesions, while maintaining tissue strength and integrity. Typically, five-six sessions will suffice to achieve this. We will recommend rehabilitation exercises to strengthen the area as the adhesions resolve.