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The Perrin Technique

MeSci

ME/CFS since 1995; activity level 6?
Messages
8,231
Location
Cornwall, UK
I'm surprised that there is no thread on this already (maybe there is and I missed it).

I had fourteen weeks of this therapy last year, it was said to help a lot of people so I was hopeful. In the end it did nothing for me. Full account of my treatment here...

http://thedamnchronicsituation.blogspot.ie/2013/05/the-perrin-technique.html

and here...

http://thedamnchronicsituation.blogspot.ie/2013/05/the-perrin-technique-ctnd.html

I wonder if anyone else has had experience of this?

I did a quick site search for 'Perrin' and there are many threads that discuss it. (Ignore the one where I am talking about the Reginald Perrin series!) I haven't tried it but would guess that it could relieve symptoms if your lymph ducts are blocked/sluggish. Lymph is normally moved along the ducts and into the bloodstream by skeletal muscle contraction, so inactivity could lead to a build-up, and in ME we probably produce rather a lot as well.

I doubt whether it would be a cure, and I don't think this is claimed, is it? It might perhaps help as part of a natural treatment regime.
 
I did a quick site search for 'Perrin' and there are many threads that discuss it. (Ignore the one where I am talking about the Reginald Perrin series!) I haven't tried it but would guess that it could relieve symptoms if your lymph ducts are blocked/sluggish. Lymph is normally moved along the ducts and into the bloodstream by skeletal muscle contraction, so inactivity could lead to a build-up, and in ME we probably produce rather a lot as well.

I doubt whether it would be a cure, and I don't think this is claimed, is it? It might perhaps help as part of a natural treatment regime.

Yeah, there are a few threads that discuss it, but no dedicated thread, as far as I can see, which was what surprised me.

They generally do make fairly large claims for their therapy. I was told that I should expect a full recovery within twelve to eighteen months. That, needless to say, did not happen.
 

ukxmrv

Senior Member
Messages
4,413
Location
London
There don't tend to me threads on things unless a few people are trying a therapy at the same time. Seem the Perrin technique discussed on other CFS groups and the discussion tends to die out fairly quickly as not many people are interested.

Several of my UK ME friends have tried this but I've yet to meet anyone cured or helped in such a way that it was worth the time and money. I think that if it was as high as 50% of people helped then we would hear more from his happy patients on the groups and in person.
 

John H Wolfe

Senior Member
Messages
220
Location
London
Sorry to hear it was a big waste of time/money for you OP, I guess not everyone with ME/CFS has problems with lymph transit (assuming that's why you saw no real impact either way from the treatment)

I've been receiving PT on and off since April last year, and consistently since last summer/autumn. Along with adhering to my leaky gut protocol (not always terribly strictly) since around that time, the improvements seen over the period (impossible to say for sure whether they are coincidental or not of course), and arguably attributable (at least in part) to the PT specifically are:

Positive Observations:

• Improved congestion/inflammation of the cerebrospinal region (particularly upper back 'crankiness')

• Improved cognitive functioning (there's no way I would have been able to even begin to get my teeth into my research this time last year)

Drawbacks:

• Am pretty messed up by the impact of the body having to deal with processing the lymph for a good few days after each session with a practitioner (currently only monthly)

• Am a bit messed up for a couple of days if I do the full routine myself/with home help (usually just do everything except the back part, which I find to be the most exacerbatory)

• Precludes anything but very mild exercise * and I get the impression my POTS has worsened in this time. Can also interrupt sleep in the context of OI/POTS if you take on too much water as you detox and need to go pee in the night

• Worsens BACNE (spots on your back, as the toxins try to escape through the skin when you 'force the issue')

• Cost (£40 per session)

* They tell you not to do anything that stimulates the sympathetic nervous system. I am (or was) a sports addict and hadn't played sport in quite a while as my health had been deteriorating so I was really missing my tennis (as I am atm!). I decided to go to my tennis club and attempt social tennis not once, but twice in the same week, when I had only just commenced doing PT properly/regularly and with a practitioner

Needless to say my body didn't like it, exercise that would normally leave me feeling all beat up for a few days totally floored me - I had my first full blown PENE relapse and was bedbound for the first time (outside of bouts of acute viral infection and salmonella) in my life for about a week

From a theoretical perspective: if the improvements described are attributable to PT then it's also fair to say that it may be part lymph drainage improvement, part inadvertent improved neuromuscular tension ~ reduced neural sensitisation