Health & Fitness: Massage Comes Out of the Parlor

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Practitioners are successfully digging in at malls. Bob Watt opened Massage Works just six months ago in a plaza in Plantation, Fla., near Fort Lauderdale. Nestled between a VCR repair store and a restaurant, the shop is so busy Watt has had to hire three more therapists. Airports are another new arena. At the Phoenix and Dallas-Fort Worth terminals, tense travelers can drop into the Air Vita health club and get a relaxing massage. One satisfied customer, Dr. Steven Jacobson of Madison, Wis., says massage could figure in his future flight plans: "It might be a reason to have a six-hour layover instead of an hour one."

Such enthusiasm gratifies therapists, who five years ago were mumbling the answer when asked what they did for a living. Attitudes began shifting with the fitness boom and with growing recognition of the importance of massage in high-caliber sports. Professional athletes, as well as dancers, have long sworn by its revitalizing effects. Shortly after New York Giant Running Back Joe Morris began getting regular massages this season to relieve hyperventilation, he started to cut loose on his way to a record year. By stimulating blood circulation and oxygen flow through the muscles, therapists explain, massage helps lower blood pressure, speed up healing of injured tissue and aid in keeping muscles supple. But, they caution, it is not a panacea, and it is not recommended for those with circulatory ailments. One thing massage will not do, myths to the contrary, is rub away excess weight.

Different folks can choose different strokes or a combination. Swedish massage, the most familiar technique, uses oils to reduce friction and employs long full strokes, along with kneading and pounding motions. In newly popular Japanese Shiatsu and Chinese acupressure, fingers are pressed along defined paths on the body in order to release chi, or trapped energy. Other techniques include deep-tissue or structural massage, and reflexology, which focuses on the foot and hand.

With the stigma lifting and demand growing, massage therapy has become an entrepreneur's dream. Schools are proliferating; there are now about 300. Many therapists are concerned, however, about the lack of uniform training standards: the American Massage Therapy Association has approved only 51 schools. Moreover, the field is poorly regulated by outside authorities. Just 13 states have licensing requirements, and their criteria vary widely. Florida, for example, requires therapists to complete 500 hours of training, while Ohio calls for half that.

Better credentials would certainly add tighter tone. Still, there is no doubt that massage has shed its shady image, even deep in the Bible Belt South. Five years ago, when Therapist Michele Marie Balliet arrived in Murfreesboro, Tenn., "they pictured the places beside I-40 that say MASSAGE," she recalls. Today, though, it seems as if the whole town is beating a path to her table. Not just the doctors, lawyers and bankers, but the factory workers, farmers and handicrafters. Balliet takes cash for her services but occasionally accepts other down-home forms of payment: six dozen eggs, handwoven baskets, clothing. "Massage," she says, "has become a necessary part of their lives."