07/01/2026
🧠Fibromyalgia is often spoken about like a muscle, fascia and joint problem. The newest large genetics work points in a different direction, the nervous system.
🔬 When researchers looked at genetic risk across millions of people, the strongest signals were linked to brain related biology, not to patterns you would expect from inflamed tissues.
📍 The practical meaning is simple. Fibromyalgia is more likely driven by sensitised circuits and adaptive regulation, rather than local tissue damage that hands can “fix”.
🤲 For manual therapy, that changes the aim. Touch can still be valuable, not as a tissue correction, but as a way to support safety, comfort, and symptom management.
🧩 The bigger clinical wins usually sit outside the technique, pacing, sleep, stress load, gentle strength and aerobic progress, and language that reduces threat rather than reinforcing a fragile body story.
⚠️ Keep your claims tight. Genetics supports a nervous system dominant framework, but it does not mean symptoms are imagined, and it does not make manual therapy a cure.
Read the earth.com article here - https://www.earth.com/news/fibromyalgia-pain-scientists-may-have-finally-solved-the-mystery/
