Mechanotherapy

Mechanotherapy is used as term for exercise prescription to promote healing and rehabilitation. This usage is consistent with the way 'electotherapy' refers to healing using electrical modalities such as ultrasound and 'pharmacotherapy' refers to treatment with pharmaceuticals. A reference/citation for this use of the term 'mechanotherapy' is http://bjsm.bmj.com/content/43/4/247.abstract. Mechanotherapy is a useful term for exercise which is prescribed for rehabilitation (e.g. heel-drop exercises for Achilles tendon injury) because tissue repair is driven by the physiological and well-recognized process of 'mechanotransduction'.

Another, related use of the term Mechanotherapy also sometimes called Massotherapy, is the original term for therapeutic massage. It was developed as an independent branch of manual medicine in Sweden in the early 20th century. It quickly became popular in the U.S. and many chiropractic colleges in the U.S. in the first half of the 20th century also offered separate degree programs in mechanotherapy. Mechanotherapists received a Doctor of Mechanotherapy (DM) degree and were licensed to practice in many states and practiced in many more states without a license.

Today mechanotherapy (as massage) is experiencing a revival in the U.S. Although there are not any mechanotherapy professional schools in the U.S., massage therapists can obtain a Doctor of Mechanotherapy (DM) degree from any one of a number of falsely accredited, online diploma mills that sell fraudulent degrees based on the validity of the buyer's credit card, e.g. Corllins University, or Belford University.

A DM degree is a graduate professional degree that indicates proficiency in mechano or massage therapy. Mechanotherapists do not claim to be physicians or to diagnose or treat diseases.