The Purpose of TENS Machines
TENS stands for Transcutaneous Electrical Nerve Stimulation and it is a small machine
with electrodes that send stimulating pulses along nerve strands and across the skin’s surface.
These impulses help to reduce pain by encouraging the body to produce more endorphins, which
act as a natural painkiller. Electrodes are placed at specific sites on a user’s body depending on
the physical location of their pain. The current travels through electrodes and into the skin
stimulating specific nerve pathways to produce a tingling or massaging sensation that reduces the
perception of pain.
The gate-control theory suggests that there’s a neural mechanism in spinal cord that acts
as a kind of gate, shutting down or opening up the flow of signals from the periphery to the
brain. Whether the gate is open, closed or partially closed depends on what sort of signal it
receives from the brain to change the perception of pain in the user’s body. These frequencies
interfere with the transmission of pain messages at the so spinal cord level, and help block their
transmission to the brain. Another theory is called The Endorphin Release, which suggests that
electrical impulses stimulate the production of endorphins and enkaphalins in the body. These
natural morphine-like substances block pain messages from reaching the brain, in a similar
fashion to conventional drug therapy, but without the danger of dependence of other side effects.
TENS are used by hundreds of thousands of people all over the world for the relief of
physical pain. This is why hundreds of doctors, nurses, and patient technicians often recommend
that their patients use TENS for minor and major pain relief. Some common uses for TENS
treatment are: acute and chronic pain, post-op incisions and post-surgical pain, labor, and
delivery, migraine and tension headaches, acute pain from sports and other injuries, arthritis,
chronic pain from tendentious and bursitis, cancer pain, and wound healing.
If you have any questions, comments or concerns please contact us today at Comprehensive
Health Orlando.