Neck, Back, and Joint Pain
Pain of any kind is a sign something is wrong. Some people silence pain by using drugs. This would be like removing the battery to quiet the smoke detector!
Back Pain: The nerve-rich facet joints on the back side of each spinal bone are a common cause of back pain. The pain can be a sign these interlocking “fingers” aren’t moving right. The discs between spinal bones can be involved. Trauma can cause the soft, pulpy material in the middle to bulge, putting pressure on nearby nerves. Specific chiropractic adjustments can help the spine “right itself.” By restoring the way your spine works, nerve involvement is reduced, pain eases and the body can heal.
Neck Pain: Imagine balancing a 12 lb. (5.5 kg.) bowling ball on the tips of your fingers. All day long! That’s just one of many things your neck must do. Your neck and shoulders work hard. Even the smallest deviation in the relationships of the seven bones of your cervical spine (neck) can cause pain and reduced head and neck mobility. Generally, we see two types of neck pain cases. Minor neck and shoulder pain involve sensations of discomfort, stiffness or soreness. If these symptoms last for more than a day or so, occur frequently or were preceded by an accident or some type of injury, we consider it major. Physical, emotional or chemical stress can affect the frequency and severity of neck pain. For many of us, the neck and shoulders are the “weakest link in the chain” and so stress shows up here. Often, emotional stress is the overlooked culprit. Ever hear of something being a “pain in the neck”? Fear, anger or frustration can trigger the tightening of our neck muscles without our even being conscious. In time, chronic muscle spasms set in. Which can lead to headaches. Some over-the-counter pain reliever might dull the pain, but it ignores the underlying cause!
Extremity Joint Pain: We tend to push our bodies beyond what they were intended to withstand. Therefore we have sore joints due to this. Joints are the way our bodies are allowed to move, work, play and have hobbies. With extremity adjusting and therapy to joints we can improve the quality of the joint and the quality of our lives. Chiropractic care is not limited to the spine. We look at the body as a whole and treat it accordingly. Whether it be a chronic condition such as arthritis, tendonitis, or bursitis, or a new injury such as a sprained ankle chiropractors have the ability to treat this joint and promote healing in it and make changes to it to improve its quality. Untreated joint pains tend to heal eventually leaving scar tissue and chronic problems that continue to get worse overtime.
Migraines and Headaches
Headaches are common, but they're not normal. While convenient, drugs that numb your nervous system have side effects, such as kidney failure or liver damage. Worse, they don’t actually correct the underlying cause of the headache. A common cause of headaches is from spinal bones in the neck that aren’t supporting the head properly. You might not notice your reduced ability to turn your head. But these subluxations affect nerves, muscles and even the blood supply to your head. Our thorough examination detects subluxation patterns that could be causing your headaches. If subluxations are present, you’re likely to benefit from chiropractic care.
Pediatrics and Prenatal
Chiropractic care is very safe during pregnancy and for pediatrics.
Pregnancy: There are several benefits to both the mother and the baby if the mother is chiropractically cared for throughout her pregnancy. Babies who are born to mothers who were adjusted during pregnancy tend to be more alert, more easily feed, less complications and score very high on the APGAR test. There are techniques that allow proper alignment of the pelvis and uterus, thus giving room for a breech baby to turn into proper positioning. Pregnancy makes several biomechanical changes on a mother’s body and leads to aches and pains. Chiropractic can help a pregnant mother manage these discomforts and prepare her body for delivery.
Pediatrics: Many people wonder why in the world would a baby need to be adjusted. Unfortunately as perfect of a spot the womb is for a baby to grow is has it’s confinements. Often times a baby in the last trimester is confined to a very small space and ends up in awkward positions for long periods of time. This leads to muscle imbalances and slight rotations in the spine. The bones in a baby’s head overlap each other as they go through the birth process and often times need some assistance. I know you’ve seen those babies and toddlers who heads have formed and are still misshapen. It could have been fixed. Adjusting a baby is not the same as adjusting an adult. There is no force needed to make corrections. All that is used is pressure. No more pressure than you would use pushing on your eye without it hurting. Also babies and children benefit from chiropractic care in a wellness manner just as an adult would. Children fall, they are in motor vehicle accidents, they should be checked out every once in awhile. Children hold adjustment much better than adults, so they tend to need less care. Chiropractic care also helps with colic, ear infections, and bedwetting. See below for more information on those specifically.
Sprain/Strain Injuries
Sprain/Strain injuries occur to all parts of the body. You might have been in a car wreck, or had a bad fall or just turned your ankle. Chiropractic care alongside of physiotherapy can help facilitate healing faster and leave less scar tissue and long-term side effects.
Bowel/Bladder/Sexual Dysfunction
Nerves go to every inch of your body and control every function in your body. Everyone of these nerves originates somewhere from the spine. If there are spinal subluxations of the low back, pelvis, and sacral areas they can affect bowel, bladder, and sexual functions. Having those vertebral areas functioning properly, one might notice changes in bowel, bladder and sexual functions. For instance gastrointestinal (GI) issue may resolve, one who “can’t” get pregnant does, menstrual symptoms reduced, incontinence resolved…the list goes on!
Ear Infections
As parents, it makes us feel so helpless. Our child is suffering but there seems little that we can do. No wonder reoccurring ear infections (otitis media) account for a huge number of pediatrician visits. The traditional approaches include: Antibiotic therapy. This may be effective for acute bacterial infections, but many cases are viral, for which antibiotics are useless. Tubes in the ears. Surgical implantation of artificial drainage tubes require the administration of a risky anesthesia and then, they often come out! However, more and more parents are choosing a more thoughtful approach: Chiropractic care. A thorough examination to locate, and adjustments to reduce, nerve disturbances that may make the ears prone to infection. Ear infections aren’t the result of a drug shortage or deformed eustachian tubes! Our bodies have an incredible capacity to fight infection. When that ability is impaired, it means something else is going on.
Bedwetting
Bedwetting takes a tremendous toll on children. Embarrassment. Alarms. No sleepovers. Plastic mattress covers. Frustration. Unable to fit in diapers. Up to the age of four or five, most children have poor bladder control at night. But after that, the inability to stay dry at night is a sign of an underlying problem. While chiropractic is not a treatment for bedwetting (nocturnal enuresis), countless children have been helped with safe and natural chiropractic care. Two key muscles control the emptying of the bladder. Their technical names are the detrusor and trigone muscles. Nerves that exit the spinal column in the lower back and sacrum control these muscles.
During the early years of life, the sacrum has five separate segments. Later, they fuse together to form the triangular-shaped bone that adults have at the base of the spine. If these segments misalign (falling, learning to walk, ride a bike, etc.) they can compromise nerves that are responsible for bladder function.
We look for these sometimes subtle misalignments during our examination. When these misalignments are reduced with safe and natural chiropractic adjustments, nervous system control and regulation of the bladder can be restored.
Arthritis
Herniated Disc
Muscle Spasm
Sciatica
Asthma
Scoliosis
Colic
