What happened during the session?
For this session, I massaged my clients upper back. I have massaged this client before and due to her work and social situations I believe she is holding a lot of tension in her upper back which is worsened by the sports she performs and the intensity she trains at. My client is working 3 days a week at a desk as well as being a full-time occupational therapy student for which she commutes and spends a large portion of time commuting to work and to university. Whenever my client is not sat in a car, lecture or at her desk, she trains 3 nights a week in the gym doing her own personal workouts, 2 nights a week doing land training for rowing which includes technique work on a static rowing machine and strength/conditioning work and a further one night a week out on the sea as part of the rowing club. Due to the number of times she trains and the type of exercise she is performing, it is not surprising that she is experiencing tightness and muscle soreness in the back shoulders and neck. For the first 2 sessions that I had massaged this client, the pain remained static, the massage was not worsening or improving for this client and therefore I decided for the first 30 minutes of this session I sat down with my client to find out the above information and thus recommended stretches that she can be doing in between lectures and how to stop herself stiffening while sitting. I have suggested that she try to correct her posture when sitting at her desk to ensure she is sat up straight and not hunching/rounding her shoulders over her desk this can be achieved by placing a pillow behind her lower back. I then suggested that she allow me to tape her shoulders into the ‘ideal’ positions to help with her posture to see if that will help her and for her to come into the clinic whenever she could increase the amount of time she is massaged per week. I then continued to massage my client for 25 minutes using effleurage and petrissage techniques to help relieve some pain and tension in her upper back and shoulders moving on the cleaning the client down and using kinesiology tape to correct their posture until the next massage session in 48 hours with another massage therapist. I also wrote down all recommendations, stretches, taping techniques and massage techniques that were discussed or used during this session so that the other therapist was aware of the plan for future massage treatment of this client was.

Areas for improvement:

Expand your knowledge: General knowledge is sound, however knowing a variety of stretches and exercises that you can give to your client as aftercare something they can be doing to help their back pain over the duration of the week before the next massage would be good. Not only the same exercises that you give them all the time but new ones to help keep them focused and motivated.

Once again organisation needs to be kept in check to allow the smooth running of the session.

Punctuality: I was running late to this session due to being in a lecture and therefore I need to book my clients in with enough time to get to the clinic from my lectures so that I am not late.