The Boxed Set of Tutorials
Save a bundle on a bundle of advanced tutorials about common pain problems
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The boxed set is a bundle of all ten PainScience.com tutorials. Each is an exhaustively researched book-length guide to a common injury or pain problem. If you already know and like PainScience.com, buying the box is bit of a no-brainer: it gives you permanent access to all of the best information published here.
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Paying in your own (non-USD) currency is always cheaper! My prices are set slightly lower than current exchange rates, but most cards charge extra for conversion.
Example: as a Canadian, if I pay $19.95 USD, my credit card converts it at a high rate and charges me $26.58 CAD. But if I select Canadian dollars here, I pay only $24.95 CAD.
Why so different? If you pay in United States dollars (USD), your credit card will convert the USD price to your card’s native currency, but the card companies often charge too much for conversion — it’s a way for them to make a little extra money, of course. So I offer my customers prices converted at slightly better than the current rate.
- Regularly updated and upgraded.
- All the latest research, summarized, and explained.
- Readable enough for patients, referenced enough for pros.
- Bonus audiobooks (for two books), plus exclusive audio articles.
- 2,880 boxes sold since 2007. ?This is a tough number for anyone to audit, because my customer database is completely private and highly secure. But if a regulatory agency ever said “show us your math,” I certainly could. This count is automatically updated once every day or two, and rounded down to the nearest 10.
What’s included?
The first few sections of every tutorial are free to explore …
| Word count | |
|---|---|
 Low Back Pain
|
220,000 |
| Frozen Shoulder
|
56,000 |
| Trigger Points
|
215,000 |
| Patellofemoral Syndrome
|
117,500 |
| Plantar Fasciitis
|
77,000 |
| Headaches
|
57,000 |
| Neck Pain
|
117,500 |
| Iliotibial Band Syndrome
|
92,000 |
| Shin Splints
|
46,000 |
| Muscle Strains
|
36,000 |
| Total Word Count | 1,034,000 |
- Each book can be read online with some features and options that aren’t possible with “traditional” e-books, like superior footnotes, easy lending.
- The web version is always up-to-date, and all book updates are free forever. That’s right: all future editions are free. For life.
- You also get new books as they are released. There were two new ones in 2019, the first additions in quite a while (frozen shoulder and headaches). All past set customers automatically got access to those as soon as they were available.
- 2 audiobook versions (IT band syndrome and plantar fasciitis), plus audio versions of seven popular articles.
Web e-books are better! Read them on any device. Lend them out. New editions free forever.
Q. If I already own one two tutorials, can I pay just to complete the set?
A. Sure can—you can complete your set at any time, discounted by whatever amount you’ve already paid. The upgrade price is listed on your account page, or in the customer information section at the top of any tutorial you already own. Just login and buy the upgrade from there. (Only the full price set is available from this page.)
Also, if you purchase five tutorials individually, you will automatically get access to the remaining five (you do have to use the same email provided at purchase, so my store will recognize you and keep a running tally; if things have changed, just contact me and we’ll sort it out).
2,880 customers and counting
I’ve been selling the boxed set for 18 years now with high customer satisfaction, 2,880 set sales and only a handful of refunds ever (I think I can still count them on one hand). Patients, doctors, therapists and scientists around the world have all taken that leap of faith and become customers.
Free updates forever
One of the reasons I publish on a website is so I can make updates readily available. Health care information changes fast, and old-school publishing models — even regular e-books — just can’t keep up. When you buy my books, you have access to them for life, no matter how much they change. For instance, if you purchase now, and I add a fascinating new section to one of the books in six months, you will have access to that new content at no charge. And if you return in five years? Every single update will be waiting for you — and there will probably be quite a few of them. Once a customer, always a customer!
Usually, you have to buy new editions of books at full price … inflation included!
With my e-books you pay once … and then you get new editions free, forever!
So, who exactly would want all the tutorials?
Almost anyone, oddly enough. Although I write clearly and simply enough for patients, the tutorials tackle many challenging concepts of interest to any professional keen on the care of aches and pains. My tutorials have clear value to virtually any professional, but particularly:
- physiotherapists, occupational therapists, and chiropractors
- Registered or Licensed Massage Therapists, and bodyworkers
- personal trainers and fitness instructors
One of my customers writes:
I think your site is one of the best things that happened in the massage therapy community. I stayed up from 2 am till 6 am last night trying to read as much as I could.
name withheld, Registered Massage Therapist in Ontario, Canada
That’s an excerpt from a very nice letter that W. wrote explaining her interest in my tutorials. (See the bottom of the page for the whole thing.)
Why would a patient want all these?
I didn’t see this coming in the early days, but it turns out that patients seem to love the boxed set. One fellow wrote to me, “I only have one of the conditions the tutorials cover, but they’re just so interesting that I want them all.” I’ve also heard people say that they like having the option of giving the tutorials to friends and family. And some people say they that supporting PainScience.com is a significant additional reason for buying the set.
If the tutorials are written primarily for patients, will they be too simple for brainy, well-trained professionals?
Maybe. But I work to strike a balance. It’s a real pleasure for a professional to dive into clear, readable analysis. Frequent footnotes provide depth to readers who want it, while sparing those who don’t. It’s a good set up for all kinds of readers.
Writing for patients forces a degree of clarity that everyone enjoys — even experts!
?
Paying in your own (non-USD) currency is always cheaper! My prices are set slightly lower than current exchange rates, but most cards charge extra for conversion.
Example: as a Canadian, if I pay $19.95 USD, my credit card converts it at a high rate and charges me $26.58 CAD. But if I select Canadian dollars here, I pay only $24.95 CAD.
Why so different? If you pay in United States dollars (USD), your credit card will convert the USD price to your card’s native currency, but the card companies often charge too much for conversion — it’s a way for them to make a little extra money, of course. So I offer my customers prices converted at slightly better than the current rate.
Why are these tutorials so ideal for professionals?
There are a lot of reasons, but it’s mostly about the footnotes. Footnotes are special on PainScience.com. I specifically set out to make it possible for professionals to delve.
The footnotes work well. Footnoting is clumsy at best in most web documents. On PainScience.com, footnotes just magically appear right where you need them, with a click, like this.1
Bibliographic records are also annotated. Hundreds of records have detailed notes. Even credible scientific journals tend to footnote carelessly, throwing citations around impressively but often failing to explain them properly … assuming it’s even relevant.2 Yet who would ever know that if they didn’t check carefully for themselves? This is how sketchy ideas get passed down through the years, with everyone just assuming that the last guy did his homework properly … even in well-known scientific journals.
In my writing, you can look forward to footnotes that truly add value to the text.
Finally! Someone who states the benefits (or myths) of massage and bodywork, and then backs up his assertions with peer-reviewed research. Not a common way to think or act in this profession!
Sean Slovik, BS, LMT, CNMT
You will give your patients better care
You will learn some new tricks here. I’ve spent more than a decade now studying as hard as possible and presenting it as well as possible — how could you possibly not learn something useful about how to help patients with these problems?
Although some modalities and interventions are explained, reviewed and recommended, mostly what these documents will do is teach you how to give your patients the best evidence-based advice … how to help them save themselves and not need you.
Which, of course, simply makes them want you. 😃 Empowering your patients to save themselves will dramatically increase your value to them, not decrease it.
Now hear this! Bonus audio downloads
Most of this website is free, except for the books … plus a few extras reserved just for my eboxed set customers, like seven articles in audio format, read by me, and professionally produced. They even have some original music, by Vancouver composer Phil Mahoney. I used to be a theatre and radio guy, so these were a hoot for me to record.
Each article is a reader favourite or a personal pick: basically the Greatest Hits from the last decade of publishing this website. And there’s a theme: each one is about a popular but all-too questionable idea.
- Quite a Stretch
DESCRIPTIONStretching is not a pillar of fitness: it doesn't warm you up, enhance peformance, or prevent or treat soreness, injury, or any kind of chronic pain. But it can actually backfire! It can boost flexibility, for whatever it’s worth (not much). DOWNLOAD AUDIOYou must have a boxed set or be a logged-in member to download audio versions of my articles, or email a request if you are visually impaired. Already a boxed set customer or member? Login to unlock. 40MB 50min - Does Posture Matter?
DESCRIPTIONPoor posture is a minor factor in pain and injury, but gets far too much attention in physical therapy and rehab. Many habitual postures are adaptations to anatomical quirks that can’t be changed. Most other “poor posture” is just coping with bad ergonomics. “Posturology” is mostly misguided pseudoscience. When people seem to be vulnerable to postural stresses, the vulnerability is usually the problem. DOWNLOAD AUDIOYou must have a boxed set or be a logged-in member to download audio versions of my articles, or email a request if you are visually impaired. Already a boxed set customer or member? Login to unlock. 52MB 64min - Does Epsom Salt Work?
DESCRIPTIONEpsom salt in your bath makes bath water feel “silkier,” but that’s probably all: it’s unlikely to be biologically relevant to aches and pains, and it may not even make it through the skin (osmosis is not even relevant, and it cannot “detox” anything). DOWNLOAD AUDIOYou must have a boxed set or be a logged-in member to download audio versions of my articles, or email a request if you are visually impaired. Already a boxed set customer or member? Login to unlock. 45MB 91min - Your Back Is Not Out of Alignment
DESCRIPTION“Structuralism” is the excessive focus on causes of pain like crookedness and biomechanical problems. It’s an old and inadequate view of how pain works, but it persists because it offers comforting, marketable simplicity that is the mainstay of entire styles of therapy. DOWNLOAD AUDIOYou must have a boxed set or be a logged-in member to download audio versions of my articles, or email a request if you are visually impaired. Already a boxed set customer or member? Login to unlock. 44MB 112min - Trigger Point Doubts
DESCRIPTIONPeople have muscle pain and sensitive spots in muscle tissue — “muscle knots” — and they can be severe. What’s going on? The main theory is that a trigger point is an isolated spasm, but it’s just a theory, trigger point science is half-baked and controversial, and it’s not even clear that it’s a “muscle” problem. I sell a book about trigger points, so it’s an ethical necessity for me to question the validity of the idea. DOWNLOAD AUDIOYou must have a boxed set or be a logged-in member to download audio versions of my articles, or email a request if you are visually impaired. Already a boxed set customer or member? Login to unlock. 34MB 68min - Pain is Weird
DESCRIPTIONModern pain science shows that pain is an extremely unpredictable sensation, heavily tuned by the brain and jostled by complex variables — not the relatively simple response to tissue insult that we tend to assume, and that most treatment is based on. DOWNLOAD AUDIOYou must have a boxed set or be a logged-in member to download audio versions of my articles, or email a request if you are visually impaired. Already a boxed set customer or member? Login to unlock. 34MB 41min - A Stretching Experiment
DESCRIPTIONWhat happens when you stretch your hamstrings intensely for several minutes a day in a steam room? The results of a thorough, careful personal experiment. Your mileage may vary! DOWNLOAD AUDIOYou must have a boxed set or be a logged-in member to download audio versions of my articles, or email a request if you are visually impaired. Already a boxed set customer or member? Login to unlock. 15MB 29min
Thank you!
Thanks in advance for your purchase … assuming you decide to go for it! I know it takes faith to give your credit card number to a stranger, and I appreciate it. Your personal information is safe with me. Don’t hesitate to call or write if you have any concerns about your purchase, or just call to make sure that I am “real.” I am!
| company | PainScience.com |
|---|---|
| owner | Paul Ingraham |
| contact | 778-968-0930 |
| refunds | 100%, no time limit +Customers are welcome to ask for a refund months after purchase — I understand that it can take time to decide if information like this was worth the price for you. |
| more info | policies page ❐ |
| payments |  |
?
Paying in your own (non-USD) currency is always cheaper! My prices are set slightly lower than current exchange rates, but most cards charge extra for conversion.
Example: as a Canadian, if I pay $19.95 USD, my credit card converts it at a high rate and charges me $26.58 CAD. But if I select Canadian dollars here, I pay only $24.95 CAD.
Why so different? If you pay in United States dollars (USD), your credit card will convert the USD price to your card’s native currency, but the card companies often charge too much for conversion — it’s a way for them to make a little extra money, of course. So I offer my customers prices converted at slightly better than the current rate.
Some kind words about my boxed set …
I have purchased some of your very excellent materials and followed your website for years. Thank you for all your really thoughtful, smart work.
Carrie Findlay, Sonoma California, USA
It’s been a few months since I first read a few of your books. You’ve dramatically changed how I think about pain and injury, and I can’t always stop myself from giving unsolicited recommendations of self-massage and your work in particular whenever I hear someone talking about pain that could be related to trigger points. Life-changing stuff.
Rex Trujillo
I just wanted to personally email you and thank you for all the great content that you have been putting out. It has really changed the way I think about things and improved my practice. I have quickly learned that healthcare is filled with misinformation, and I truly appreciate having someone like you to cut through it all and get to the actual evidence and research.
Bea Mcdonnell, physical therapist
I appreciate all of the effort you put into your website and tutorials, and your customer service is beyond exceptional. I always refer people to your site and I will continue to do so indefinitely. Thanks again!
Kiri Cartwright
Buying your “bundle” a while back was one of the better decisions of my life, as a 63-year-old runner and amateur athlete. I refer to them for different issues as they crop up, and I like also to be able to pass them on to friends.
Daniyal Terry, Nurse Practitioner
I am always looking for material to add to my knowledge base. I have a firm understanding of trigger point therapy, so some of your information isn’t new to me. But I like that you think outside the box. If I can learn just one new thing from your material, then I’m ahead, right? And, I’m sure that I’ll learn much more than one thing. Thanks for being innovative!
Rose Bowen, LMT, director of a massage college, workshop instructor
I have been using your tutorials for a couple of years now and thought it was high time that I said an enormous thank you. I am a massage therapist in the UK. I started with the good old swedish/holistic in 2000 then over the last 3 or 4 years have been taking courses and working with a couple of fantastic therapists over here to learn sports and remedial skills. In that time I have waded through endless books and articles and info on the net and it never ceases to amaze me how many differing opinions there are when it comes to all things muscular/physiological/medical etc. I seem to find one “fact” in one place then the complete opposite “fact” somewhere else!Then I found you! Someone who has the time and patience to wade through it all and make some sense of it. Your tutorials are fabulously well researched and give me all the up to date info in one easy-to-understand document. For someone like me who just doesn't have the time to gather all the opinions and make sense of them, your website and tutorials are a god-send! I don't always agree with absolutely everything — I think that's a good thing — but overall your tutorials have taught me more than any other source. So thank you once again, and keep up the fantastic work, it really is appreciated. And remember for every one email you get like this there are probably thousands of silent people who are just as grateful - you are making a difference!
Alax Deterding, massage therapist, Kent, UK
I love what you do, I read your site often, and I recommend it to friends. I bought the boxed set because I read the studies you linked to, because I decided since my back hurts and so does everyone else’s in my family, I want it all. Plus my best friend has wicked iliotibial band syndrome, so I figured I’d pass along that info to him. Anyways, dude, you rock socks off, keep on fighting the woo woo, you’ve made a reader for life! Thanks more than you know.
Dave Falloon, Systems Administrator, Winfield, Canada
After about six weeks of solid reading I haven’t even scratched the surface of the information. There’s so much good information I’m overloaded — but in a good way, and all for such a low price. It is more than a good value for the money.
Hannah Jarvis, Hannah Jarvis, UK
Thanks for your amazing site, Paul! I have been an RMT for over 10 years now, and I am always looking for great articles to review and learn from. I appreciate your dedication to the profession! I can't believe the amount of time you have put into research!
Denise Mackinnon, Registered Massage Therapist, Nanaimo, Canada
A wealth of information.
anonymous reader
I’ve been reading and studying your brilliant website after being told about it by a fellow therapist. Congratulations on your accomplishments in the world of bodywork! I am inspired ...
Tjasa Torres, Licensed Massage Therapist, Florida
It is hard to figure what sources on the Internet are trustworthy. Your sources are all clearly cited, which gives me a lot more confidence. Your site is like 'Wikipedia + MythBusters' for musculoskeletal health care!
name withheld, Registered Massage Therapist, Ontario, Canada
Dear Paul,
I am so pleased to have found your site online. I am an RMT in Toronto, but since I only graduated last year and started practising in the fall. I have encountered a few challenges and generated lots of questions in my mind during my practice in the past few months.
As you know, in Ontario, our schooling for massage therapy is around 2200 hours only, [Note: she says “only” because 2200 is less than the 3000-hour program in BC, but 2200 is still much more training than most places. — Paul] but, depending on the school you go to, the instructors, and the curriculum, students may graduate with varying degrees of knowledge. I have so many questions it is ridiculous. Your articles and tutorials are so easy to understand that they answer many of my questions and relieve my self-doubts. I feel I can more easily explain things to my clients now.
When I saw that you have been a pioneer out there, that you have already created all these tutorials, I stayed up from 2am till 6am last night trying to read as much as I could. Of course today my eyes are extremely tired. The reason I am so desperate is because I have a client that came to me on Saturday saying that she does erging (rowing) and has ‘jumper’s knee’ (self-diagnosed), but it sounded to me more like PFPS, so I was trying to search for information on the Internet after I exhausted the sources from my textbooks.
I think your site is one of the best things that has happened in the massage therapy community.
It is hard to figure what sources on the Internet are trustworthy. Your sources are all clearly cited, which gives me a lot more confidence. Right now, I am using your site as a resource to equip myself professionally and to understand all those blurry concepts better. Your site is like 'Wikipedia + MythBusters' for musculoskeletal health care.
I found you using Google. I was searching for what was the best way to stretch Vastus Lateralis, and I found your article ‘Massage Therapy for Your Quads.’ Then I found that you actually have so many other interesting topics available that I have been hooked since then.
Have a wonderful day!
Regards,
W-----
Ontario, Canada
?
Paying in your own (non-USD) currency is always cheaper! My prices are set slightly lower than current exchange rates, but most cards charge extra for conversion.
Example: as a Canadian, if I pay $19.95 USD, my credit card converts it at a high rate and charges me $26.58 CAD. But if I select Canadian dollars here, I pay only $24.95 CAD.
Why so different? If you pay in United States dollars (USD), your credit card will convert the USD price to your card’s native currency, but the card companies often charge too much for conversion — it’s a way for them to make a little extra money, of course. So I offer my customers prices converted at slightly better than the current rate.
Notes
- If you want more detail, it’s right there. Direct links to the original research are provided, which make it effortless to check my work or learn more. It works so well that it’s almost fun.
- It’s amazing how often references to scientific literature are used to support a point when they aren’t even really correct or relevant. See 14 Kinds of Bogus Citations: Classic ways to self-servingly screw up references to science, like “the sneaky reach” or “the uncheckable”.