Research, Articles & Case Studies

Massage has been used for several thousand years at least, aiming at relief in suffering and decreasing all kinds of ailments, including health problems with the cervical vertebrae. 

Craniosacral therapy is quite a new method of treatment since it was founded in the first half of the 20th century. It is different from other methods because it treats energetic changes and lessens the pathological tension in the fascia. Whereas, other methods used by physiotherapists begin working with the patient much later, after functional changes have advanced – contractures or structural degenerations, which cannot be fully removed. And the organism will not be able to come back to full efficiency. 

Pains of the cervical part of the spine occur quite often in modern societies, including the Polish one. What is more, this troubles younger and younger people. 

The results of the research conducted on two groups of twenty people, which were described by Method T – Student, proved that both the therapeutic massage and the craniosacral therapy are effective ways of treating the pain syndrome of the cranial part of the spine. 

The objective of this study is to differentiate the cerebral vascular basement membrane pathways by which fluid passes out of the brain from the pathway by which CSF enters the brain.

In the absence of conventional lymphatics, drainage of interstitial fluid and solutes from the brain parenchyma to cervical lymph nodes is along basement membranes in the walls of cerebral capillaries and tunica media of arteries. Perivascular pathways are also involved in the entry of CSF into the brain by the convective influx/ glymphatic system.

 Experiment 1: 0.5 µl of soluble biotinylated or fluorescent Aβ, or 1 µl 15 nm gold nanoparticles was injected into the mouse hippocampus and their distributions determined at 5 min by transmission electron microscopy. Aβ was distributed within the extracellular spaces of the hippocampus and within basement membranes of capillaries and tunica media of arteries. Nanoparticles did not enter capillary basement membranes from the extracellular spaces. Experiment 2: 2 µl of 15 nm nanoparticles were injected into mouse CSF. Within 5min, groups of nanoparticles were present in the pial-glial basement membrane on the outer aspect of cortical arteries between the investing layer of pia mater and the glia limitans. The results of this study and previous research suggest that cerebral vascular basement membranes form the pathways by which fluid passes into and out of the brain but that different basement membrane layers are involved. The significance of these findings for neuroimmunology, Alzheimer’s disease, drug delivery to the brain and the concept of the Virchow–Robin space are discussed.