Fibromyalgia was a condition first noticed and described in the early 1900’s by Sir William Gowers.  Over the next seven decades more physicians were noticing similar findings and in 1987 a diagnostic code for Fibromyalgia Syndrome (FMS) was instituted along with a consensus of diagnostic criteria to meet that diagnosis.

The consensus was that 11 out of an agreed upon 18 diagnostic points would be tender to less than approximately 2 lbs. of finger pressure.  These bilateral points were the inner knee, hips, gluteus muscles, trapezius muscles, lower cervical vertebra, lateral epicondyle, second rib anteriorly, occiput bone, and supraspinatus muscles.