Massage therapy effects

Massage therapy is older than recorded time, and rubbing was the primary fo rm of medicine until the pharmaceutical revolution of the 1940s. Popularize d again as part of the alternative medicine movement, massage therapy has r ecently received empirical support for facilitating growth, reducing pain, increasing alertness, diminishing depression, and enhancing immune function . In this article studies are reviewed that document these effects, and mod els are proposed for potential underlying mechanisms.