Massage Therapy and Neuroendocrine Modulation: Clinical Promise - Research Gaps

Clinical Relevance: While short-term benefits are promising, it’s unclear whether regular massage is needed to sustain hormonal changes. Maintenance protocols have not been defined nor are they being looked at. Many manual therapy research articles look at the short-term positive effects but few delve into the long-term effects. Those that do leave us wanting more as we are seeing little long-term research that stands up to scrutiny justifying the long-term biochemical changes from massage therapy.