This significant text was the first to offer both the European and American methods within the same volume.
In 1996, a landmark event for American NMT occurred when NMT American version™ was overviewed in Leon Chaitow’s Modern Neuromuscular Techniques, as contributed by Judith DeLany. Both versions emphasize the need to develop a home-care program and encourage the client’s participation in the recovery process. They also have a slightly different emphasis on the method of application of ischemic compression when treating trigger points. In the exploration to uncover contracted bands or muscular nodules, American-style neuromuscular therapy uses a medium-paced (thumb or finger) gliding stroke whereas European-style neuromuscular techniques use a slow-paced, thumb-drag method of discovery. With two decades of success in a variety of schools across the country as well as in coast-to-coast seminar trainings, NMT American version™ grew to be a well-established method for addressing myofascial pain and dysfunction.Įuropean and American versions of NMT have similar theoretical platforms, yet subtle differences developed within their hands-on application. It was immediately recognized that the school format allowed for a slower pace for the program, more continual access to the instructors and more repetition of the protocols than the seminar format, which allowed students to graduate with clinical skills for integration into almost any health care setting. In the mid-1990s, NMT American version™ was piloted as a school program, taught within the curriculum of three massage schools and delivered by school instructors. John certified NMTs continue to use it as the foundation of their work. Although the new owner no longer teaches the method, many St. DeLany continues to teach the NMT American version™, which has evolved significantly, as discussed below. Both systems retained a strong focus on Nimmo’s original protocols, although each developer significantly influenced his or her own particular foundations and teaching methodology with unique insights and new techniques.
John Method and NMT American version™, respectively. John and DeLany separated their work into two styles, NMT St. John for five years (1984-89), where she assisted in the development of NMT techniques and protocols for massage therapy application. DeLany (then Judith Walker) worked with St. John’s first additional instructor of his method of neuromuscular therapy. In the mid-1980’s, Judith (Walker) DeLany became St. John, who began teaching his own system in the late 70’s.
Travell and Simons’ two volume set of textbooks, Myofascial Pain and Dysfunction: The Trigger Point Manual (upper body published in 1983 and lower body in 1992) impacted the medical, dental, physical therapy, massage and other therapeutic communities with documentation, research and references for a whole new field of study – myofascial trigger points.Įventually, several of Nimmo’s students began teaching their own treatment protocols, based on Nimmo’s work. Over the next several decades, a step-by-step system began to emerge, supported by the writings of Janet Travell and David Simons.
Leon Chaitow has also made significant contributions as the author of dozens of books and textbooks that feature detailed application of NMT, particularly the European version.Ī few years after neuromuscular techniques first emerged in Europe, across the ocean in America, Raymond Nimmo and James Vannerson published their newsletter, Receptor Tonus Techniques, where they wrote of their experiences with what they termed ‘noxious nodules’.
Although this was the first undergraduate degree setting to include NMT, it is now commonly taught in osteopathic and sports massage settings in Britain. In the 1990s a program developed (in part) by Leon Chaitow, DO formed an elective module as part of a Bachelor of Science (BSc(Hons)) degree at the Complementary Health Sciences at the University of Westminster, London. Many osteopaths, naturopaths and practitioners from other fields, including Peter Lief, Brian Youngs, Terry Moule, Leon Chaitow (nephew of Boris), John Sharkey and others, have taken part in the evolution and development of European neuromuscular techniques. Their practice of NMT was set in Lief’s world-famous health resort, Champneys, at Tring in Hertfordshire, England where they were presented with a wide variety of conditions on which to test their theories and methods. These cousins, trained in chiropractic and naturopathy, studied with teachers like Dewanchand Varma and Bernard Macfadden and integrated solid concepts of assessment and treatment steps for soft tissue dysfunction. Between the mid-1930s and early 1940’s, European-style neuromuscular techniques (as NMT is called in Europe) first emerged, developed by the skillful hands of Stanley Lief and Boris Chaitow.