Massage Therapy Journal Fall 2025

80 • Massage Therapy Journal

IMTRC 2025 Continues to Bridge the Research/Practice Gap in the Massage Therapy Field

By Niki Munk PhD, LMT

T he massage therapy field has historically experienced a disconnect between general research and applicable massage therapy related research. Research/practice disconnects within massage therapy are multidirectional, with the research to practice disconnect “direction” perhaps the easiest to articulate: Massage therapy clinicians unaware of, uninterested in, and/or unwilling to engage with related or emerging research or knowledge generation within the field.

Other disconnects, often in the “direction” of practice to research, include types of research designs and/or comparison controls used to examine massage techniques or intervention application, study settings and intervention providers that do not reflect the massage therapy field, and massage therapy experts not consulted or involved in study development. The research/practice disconnect (or gap) is not unique to massage therapy and can be seen in other health- and wellness-related applied disciplines such as nursing, medicine, occupational therapy, physical therapy, exercise science, rehabilitation, nursing and public health. 1,2

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