What you don’t know about scar tissue
By Rick Williams
It is important to note that the technology of surgery and skill of the modern surgeon has helped many ailments and
saved many lives. People used to just die from a gallstone, ectopic pregnancy, or appendicitis. A reconstructed knee
has returned many athletes back to top performance. We would like to think that a month or so after a surgery that the
body has healed and is as good as new, however, this is unfortunately not the case. Other practitioners and I, that
work with the biomechanics and structure of the body, have found that surgery creates a disruption in the connective
tissue that propagates and increases over time.
It is important for anyone who is looking at having surgery, or has had surgery, to know how the procedure may affect
the rest of the body. Surgery is a one-way street in that you cannot undo its effects.
Surgical scar tissue is different than natural scar tissue in that natural scar tissue does not usually disrupt the
connective tissue of the body, whereas, surgical scar tissue creates tethers, barriers, and adhesions that pull
peripherally throughout the body and can pull bones, organs and other structures out of place.
The following are four ways, and their resulting effects, that scar tissue is different from natural scar tissue:
A) Tethers: First, we need to understand that one type of connective tissue in the body is called fascia. It is arranged
in planes and envelopes and is essentially the guide wire and pulley system within the body. The next time you eat
chicken (or an orange for vegetarians), notice that there are sheets of opaque tough planes of tissue that organize
and hold the muscles and organs together (pulp in the case of an orange).
The fascia is what the body uses to create its shape and structure. Without fascia we would be puddles of goo on the
floor. When this fascia is torn or cut, it acts much like a tablecloth spread out on a table. If something accidentally
dropped a heavy object on the cloth and ripped a hole in it, you could put a patch over the hole. This would be much
like natural scar tissue in that the tablecloth would continue to lie flat if the patch was sewn on properly. People will
think you are a little nutty if you try this experiment out at your next Thanksgiving dinner, but if you take a very sharp
knife (…or scalpel) and cut a two inch slice in the center of the table cloth, then with needle and thread (…or suture),
sew the hole back together. In order to make this repair, the thread pulls the two sides together to close the gap. The
problem with this method is: that resulting pinch creates wrinkled lines that radiate out from the cut to the edge of the
table. These are tension lines, and the tablecloth will never lie even and flat again. In the body these tension lines
create tether-like pulls on other organs and joints throughout the body, sometimes very far from the surgical location. It
is the nature of scar tissue to slowly pull the tissue toward itself. These tether-like pulls deteriorate the biomechanics of
how the body moves and functions. A typical effect that I find, is where a hysterectomy or c-section scar slowly pulls
over a 3-6 month period up through a line of tissues called the central chain, and painfully tugs the lower neck bones
forward and out of place. The clients are surprised to find that when I work on their belly scar, the misalignment and
resulting pain in their neck subsides. I have seen this same surgery pull all the way down to the feet, causing changes
in the arch and bone alignment, resulting in flat feet. Because it takes three months to a year before the tether-pulls
slowly build up tension as they migrate away from the scar. The person and their doctor have no idea that the reason
for slow onset frozen shoulder was from a gallbladder surgery eight months prior. Sometimes, you can feel the effects
of these tethers yourself. If you have a painful or restricted area, try gently placing your hand on your various scar
tissue and see if the sharpness or range of motion changes a few seconds later. If it does, you might have a tether,
however, don’t try to release the tethers on your own as there are specific techniques to work with scar tissue and
adhesion resulting from surgery.
B) Biological Barrier: Another difference between surgical and natural scar is that surgical scar tissue creates a
barrier in which the body cannot penetrate and apply its reconstructive mechanisms to dissipate the scar tissue over
time, after it has served its purpose to close a wound. If you where like me when I was a kid, I had endless scrapes and
cuts on my knees. Upon inspection, I was surprised to find that I have no scar tissue on my knees anymore. In fact, all
of the cuts, tears and scrapes that I have incurred over the years have dissipated over time except for my surgical
scars. On inspection, a scar (from when I accidentally sliced myself with an exact-o blade while building a model
airplane when I was 13) was still quite visible and puckered just as it was some decades ago. The exact-o blade is as
sharp as a scalpel and the resulting cut required eight stitches. The sharpness of the exact-o blade that penetrated
half an inch into my palm created such a clean cut that the body had no way of penetrating through the scar tissue
after healing. If you have ever transplanted a root bound plant from a small pot to a bigger pot, the rule of thumb is to
roughen up and pull apart the roots before putting it into the bigger pot. If you don’t, the roots create their own barrier
and will stay root bound even though there is open soil around them instead of the wall of the smaller pot. The body’s
tissues work in a similar way: In a non-surgical tearing of the skin, the tissues are usually somewhat shredded and
ragged. When healing is completed, the blood and lymphatic vessels can grow with the resulting scar tissue, and wind
their way through the discontinuous irregular scar tissue. Eventually, the scar tissue is absorbed and replaced with the
more elastic and subtle tissue that should be there. The surgical scar tissue is so clean that it creates an impenetrable
wall which the vascular vessels cannot penetrate. The body was not designed for sharpness and precision of the
scalpel, it simply does not know how to deal with it. The result is a scar that is permanent or dissipates very slowly over
time. The inelasticity and pulls from the scar strain and inhibit the body from functioning properly. One gentleman came
to me for treatment with some 10 different surgical scars at various locations on his torso. The surgeries saved his life
but the result created a radical scoliosis, a twisting and curving of the spine from the restrictions and pulls of the scars.
This client had no idea that the distortions and resulting aches and pains in his back came from all his surgeries in the
front of his body. I have seen some research on creating a jagged line scar to more mimic the healthy results of natural
scar tissue.
C) Ties and adhesions of the fascial layers are other effects of surgical intervention. There are many layers of fascial
planes (remember the chicken or the orange) from the skin to the muscle layers and down through all the organs.
These layers need to slide over each other in specific ways to enable the body to move properly without restriction.
One way to think of the body is like a marionette with all the strings and pulley systems to support and move the body
in all the magnificent ways that are possible. The more variety of motions that are desired in a marionette, the more
strings are required. The body has so many varieties of movements, that it is impossible to identify all the directions of
pulls and tension lines that run through all the multitude of layers and envelopes of fascial planes. Even though we
have mapped out many of the main pulley systems of the body, the subtle tension lines through the fascial planes are
increasingly complex. When surgery cuts through with sutures, adhesions are formed — the ropes and pulleys of the
body are not free to slide over one another and the body’s mechanics are affected. Even though natural scar tissue
can also bind these marionette strings together, the body can usually work the restrictions apart over time. The
sutures of the surgery create such a solid adhesion of the layers, that the body has a very difficult time releasing the
resultant knot. The shift in mechanics and restriction of the ropes and pulleys of the body can have widely varied and
unpredictable effects. One client had an interesting side effect from a belly scar that shifted the inner and outer
tension of her right leg. Six months after the surgery, her second and third toe started to separate with a large gap in
between them as the inside of her leg was pulling one way and the outside was pulling another all the way down to the
toes.
Surgery is a one-way street in that you cannot undo its effects. If the surgery is a success… great; if it fails or causes
problems, you will be left with the consequences. I suggest that it be the last option when finding a solution to a
particular issue in the body. It may be the only option and the only one that puts you back on your feet, but remember
that it has a big impact on the body and may create subsequent effects and problems down the line. If you do have
surgery, I have found that people that follow up with therapy are less affected by scar tissue and adhesions.
Copyright©2006 - Rick Williams
(non-physician)
