This depends on how chronic (length of time) your condition is and how severe it is as well as other things that we can talk about. Many patients will feel relief after the first treatment. Most patients will need 5-8 treatments and others up to 12, but again this depends on your specific condition.

Treatments are done 5-7 days apart depending on the patient’s tolerance and their tissue response.

Class IV Laser Therapy also helps accelerates tissue repair and when used in conjunction with Shock Wave Therapy, patients often see much faster recovery times.

You may experience some mild discomfort but that usually goes away fairly quickly. Also, the intensity can be adjusted throughout the treatment for patient comfort.

Most patients will experience some pain relief following the treatment. However, within 2–4 hours after the treatment, they may experience some soreness in the treated area. This soreness has been reported as tolerable and not limiting and goes away.

It is recommended that patients reduce or refrain from the activity that caused the problem.

Shockwave therapy accelerates healing, tissue repair, cell growth, decreases pain and increases range of motion through the following…

1. New Blood Vessel Formation – The application of acoustic waves create capillary micro ruptures in soft tissue. Due to these micro ruptures the expression of growth factors such as eNOS, VEGF, PCNS and BMP is significantly increased, which helps to improve a nutrient rich blood supply and more oxygen (oxygenation) to the injured area, thus allowing for faster healing of soft tissues.

2. Reversal of Chronic Inflammation – Chronic inflammation occurs when the inflammatory response is not completely halted. It can damage healthy tissue and results in chronic pain. Mast cells are one of the key components of the inflammatory process. Their activity may be increased by using pervasive acoustic waves. Mast cell activation is followed by the production of chemokines and cytokines. These pro-inflammatory compounds first enhance the inflammatory process and in the next step help restore normal healing and regenerative processes.

3. Stimulation of Collagen Production – The production of a sufficient amount of collagen is a necessary precondition for the repair processes of the damaged myoskeletal and ligamentous structures. Shockwave therapy accelerates procollagen synthesis. The therapy forces the newly created collagen fibers into a longitudinal structure which makes the newly formed tendon fibers more dense and stiff and creates a firmer structure.

4. Mediator “Substance P” Substance P is a neurotransmitter that mediates pain information through C-fibers. This neuropeptide is generally associated with intense, persistent and chronic pain. It relays pain messages to the central nervous system. Lowering the concentration of Substance P reduces the stimulation of afferent nociceptive fibers and thus reduces the pain. Decreasing Substance P, histamines and other nociceptive metabolites also helps inhibit development of inflammatory edema. Acoustic waves generated by Shockwave therapy lower the Substance P concentration and trigger pain relief.

5. Release of Trigger Points Trigger points are the principal cause of pain in the back, neck, shoulder and limbs. They are associated with palpable nodules in taut bands of muscle fibers and have extremely contracted sarcomeres. The dysfunctional sarcomeres contract so tightly that they begin to cut off their own blood supply. This causes the waste products to build up. Waste product build-up irritates the sensory nerve endings which then causes even more contraction. This vicious cycle is referred to as “metabolic crisis”. The assumed mechanism of action is that the delivered acoustic energy unblocks the calcium pump and thus reverses the metabolic crisis in the myofilaments and releases the trigger points.