Alternative medicine may be rooted in ancient healing arts, but it’s ideal for keeping 21st-century bodies active and on the go.
Just ask Michael Phelps, who gave cupping a worldwide stage. Or, closer to home, talk to Kris Young.
The 52-year-old Young discovered cupping around 2014, not for sore muscles but for sinus and allergy relief. Soon, the paralegal and Lancaster-area resident was getting cupping to relieve upper-back tension and keep up her regular workouts.
“I like to do Zumba,” she says. “I do a little bit of yoga. I do Insanity. It’s a little bit crazy, but I love it.”
Young gets cupping at six-week intervals from Jo Ellen Wisnosky, who is licensed in acupuncture and massage, of Blossoms and Roots Wellness, Lancaster (blossomsandroots.com). It feels “as if you take your vacuum cleaner and put it toward your hand,” she says. “You feel the suction.” When the treatment is complete, Young’s body is relaxed and relieved of pressure and tension, and the facial version of cupping really does relieve sinus issues.
Young is sure that cupping has helped her stay active. Like Michael Phelps, she’s not afraid to show the world.
“When I first started getting it done, I would try to hide all my circles, because sometimes she would do it close to the neck,” she says. “But now that it’s popular, I expose my circles.”
Cupping and acupuncture
After Michael Phelps appeared poolside with red circles down his back, everyone had the same question: “What is cupping?”
Wisnosky calls it “a negative pressure massage” that loosens the restricted blood flow of tight muscles.
“It’s like pulling the tissue away from the area of tightness,” she says. “It has the capability of creating space in the tissue, rather than just pushing in with a deep tissue massage. You’re pulling up the skin and allowing oxygenated blood flow to get into that area.”
Cupping can improve range of motion, hasten recovery, and decrease chronic pain—all important factors in staying active. Facial cupping is a milder version that leaves minimal marking but can open up sinuses.
Cupping uses flash-heated cups to create a vacuum and suction the skin away from the muscles and tissues beneath. It can augment acupuncture by breaking up blood stagnation at acupuncture points, says Wisnosky.
“Where acupuncture specifically works on calming the nervous system, in combination with something like cupping, we can release that muscle tissue and create an environment where there’s a lot more natural healing response,” she says.
Active Release Technique
Michael Phelps isn’t the only athlete whose alternative treatment has caught the imagination of the world.
“Often, professional athletes are the first ones to take advantage of new, groundbreaking treatments, and after some time, the general public finds out and seeks out care,” says Dr. Jonathan Pavlick of Pavlick Chiropractic, Harrisburg (pavlickchiro.com). That’s the path taken by Active Release Technique, or ART, developed by a chiropractor for the Super Bowl-champion Denver Broncos.
ART is a non-invasive, “massage-based treatment for muscles, ligaments, nerves and tendon problems,” says Pavlick, who underwent the rigorous training and maintains yearly certification to practice it, either on its own or complementing traditional chiropractic treatments. “While traditional chiropractic treatment focuses on bones in the spine and the nerves associated with those bones, ART’s focus is more on the muscular system, so we can treat conditions without turning a patient’s neck or adjusting their lumbar spine.”
ART offers more than 500 treatment protocols to heal or alleviate the symptoms of specific conditions, including “headaches, sciatica, tennis elbow, carpal tunnel, shoulder problems, knee pains, plantar fasciitis, sprains and strains,” Pavlick says.
How does it work? It starts with torn, imbalanced muscles caused by a traumatic event or a repetitive motion. The body puts scar tissue in that area, further limiting function. The ART practitioner puts a thumb or finger on targeted muscle groups, and the patient is an active participant, instructed to perform stretching motions to break up the scar tissue. The body re-heals, says Pavlick, “and they’re able to function without that problem.”
“Fibers will typically run in one direction through a muscle, and it’s very important that the patient’s motion and the pressure are in line with those muscle fibers,” Pavlick says. “Their body is doing the work. I’m just putting them on that path.”