You can stop thinking of that once-a-year trip to the spa as a luxury—experts agree getting massages as often as once a week can be beneficial to your health.

The Touch Research Institute in Miami, the first facility to scientifically study the effects of massage, definitively found massage reduces the stress-associated hormone cortisol in the body; increases serotonin, heals pain (including that from childbirth, chronic fatigue, and burns), and improves flexibility and circulation.

Keep up that sort of treatment on a weekly, monthly, or even a several-times-a-year basis, and you’re looking at improved overall mental and physical health.

Read the rest of this blog here.

[Originally published on Massage Williamsburg's blog.]