Massage Styles: Russian Massage - Part 1

Welcome to post #6 in my series of different types of massages. If you have a specific style you'd like to see covered or have a question about any style I cover, feel free to leave a comment and I will address it for you!

Since Russian massage is what I consider to be my main specialty, I feel that I would like to present more in-depth information on it - history as well as a description of how it works. In part 1 I'd like to recap the details of how Russian massage developed. I find it to be quite fascinating in conjunction with the history of Russia itself. I hope you do as well!

Russian massage is a series of specialized and highly developed massage strokes that have been researched and used in Russia as early as the 1800s. Massage was first used at the Navy Medical Academy in St. Petersburg for the recovery of warfare wounds and has since become mandatory training for physicians and nurses to aid their patients.

Not until 1882 did a Russian physician named Zabludovsky even start using massage on healthy people to prevent them from being patients. At the time, everyone thought it was a silly idea that massage should be used on people who are not sick. Zabludovsky was ostracized and moved to Germany to do more studies on the effects of massage. After combining sports massage with regular massage, he created the title of "Russian Massage."

In the early 1900s, Russia started integrating massage into their medical schools and began a lot of research on massage. In 1944, the Research Institute of Physical Education started to develop new strokes and specific protocols based on this research that were designed to give very specific results with muscle rehabilitation. This research enabled therapists to know exactly what the affects and outcome of a massage would be.

Massage is now considered a scientific practice in Russia and is required for every coach, physician, nurse, trainer, and physiotherapist (physical therapist) as part of their training and has been integrated into the medical field, working hand-in-hand with traditional medicine.