A Key to Better Health may be the Tissue that Connects our Muscles

As experts learn more about the composition of human bodies, they are discovering that fascia is more important than previously thought. Fascia? It’s the tough, flexible tissue that surrounds and connects muscles, bones and organs like cling wrap

In recent years, the concept of fascia care to make fascia more supple has permeated fitness and wellness culture. Products claim to improve fascia agility, and yes, there’s a connection between fascia and athletic performance.

Until the early 2000s, though, doctors understood fascia to be just packaging for more important body parts. Since that time, researchers have discovered that this connective tissue is key to flexibility and range of motion. Emerging research suggests that fascia care may help treat chronic pain, improve exercise performance and overall well-being.

“We’re still at the very, very beginning” of understanding fascia, said Helene Langevin, the director of the National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health at the National Institutes of Health.

Forms of Fascia

There are 2 forms of fascia in your body: dense and loose. Each type helps to facilitate movement.

Dense fascia can give your body shape and are made of sturdy collagen fibers. It holds muscles, organs, blood vessels and nerve fibers in place. It helps your muscles contractions and stabilizes your joints.

The more slippery loose fascia allows your muscles, joints and organs to slide and glide against one another like a well-oiled machine.

What Damages Fascia?

An anatomy professor named Carla Stecco at the University of Padova in Italy found in 2007, that fascia is replete with nerve endings. This means fascia has capacity to be a source of pain. The longer it is inflamed or damaged, the more its sensitivity can increase.

Fascia can shorten, become overly rigid and congeal into place, forming adhesions that limit mobility if you’re sedentary for a long time. Inactivity over time can also lead fascia to reshape. If you spend your days bent over a keyboard, the fascia around your neck and shoulders may curve your posture.

Fascia can also become damaged, inflamed, overly rigid or stuck together from repetitive movements, chronic stress, injury or surgery. And fascia can stiffen with age.

It can be tricky to determine whether pain is coming from your fascia or your muscles and joints. Generally, muscle and joint problems tend to feel worse the more you move, while fascia pain lessens with movement.

How can you care for your fascia?

Staying active is the most effective way to keep your fascia sturdy and elastic. Experts also recommend a few things in particular.

• Resistance training keeps fascia strong, as muscle and fascia work together. Stiff or congealed fascia can’t help the muscle do its job, but when one starts improving, it can help the other.
• Exercises that involve a range of movements — like dancing, jumping jacks, tennis and swimming — also help keep the fascia lubricated, and bouncing movements that are particularly effective for fascia health. “Skipping, for example, is such a wonderful movement,” said Robert Schleip, director of the Fascia Research Group at Ulm University in Germany.
• But go slow if you have fascia damage. Dynamic stretching, which contracts the muscle while elongating it, will benefit healthy and damaged fascia alike. Consider seeing a physical therapist who can offer hands-on treatment and guide you toward the best program.
• Along with moving, experts recommend sipping water throughout the day, which can help fascia glide with ease.

Even so, simply staying active may be the best medicine.

Based on a NYTimes aretilce by Danielle Friedman "The Tissue that Connects Our Muscles May Be a Key to better Health".