Chiropractic is a safe and natural
approach
to health care.
It involves no drugs or surgery.
Chiropractic is a specialized type of
health
care, which consists of small, precise manual adjustments.
Chiropractic literally means, to
practice
with your hands.
Throughout your daily life, your spine
is
supposed to be able to move around freely without any pain.
However the bones in your back, called
vertebrae,
can become misaligned.
This misalignment is called a
subluxation.
Let's first look at a normal vertebra
and
then a subluxated vertebra.
Normally, your vertebrae are in
a straight
line.
This allows pain free motion
in your spine.
This also allows the tissues
(muscles and
ligaments) which surround the spine to work correctly.
This misalignment is a
subluxation.
This causes abnormal stress on
pain sensitive
joints in the spine.
It also causes unnatural stress
in the muscles,
ligaments, and nerves around the spine.
Should we care about subluxations?
Absolutely!
Since every single cell in our body is
under
the control of the nerves, they must be kept free of abnormal stress.
When no subluxation is present, proper
nerve
flow occurs and your body functions normally.
However if the nerve is irritated, the
nervous
system does not work properly.
Notice the irritated nerve on
the right.
Subluxation causes decreased
nerve flow.
This may cause pain, general
fatigue, or even
disease!
Many other things are affected
by subluxation
Along with nerves being
effected, many muscles
are attached throughout the spine.
They can become spastic and
knotted up causing
pain and discomfort.
How do you tell if you have a
subluxation?
If you have pain, achy soreness, and
tight
muscles in your neck and back, you may have subluxations.
A chiropractor can tell you if you
have any
subluxations.
The chiropractor will perform a
comprehensive
exam.
This exam will help the doctor locate
any
subluxations, weak or injured muscles, and any other problems.
Subluxations can be like early cavities,
painless
and you may not even know you have one, until your doctor explores the
area and finds one.
Also like early cavities, subluxations
left
unfixed can progress to cause inflammation, pain, and possible serious
degeneration problems in the future.
One would like to have a cavity fixed
in it's
earliest stages, before it causes any pain or problems.
You should feel the same about
subluxations
in your spine.
Have them looked at and fixed before
you begin
noticing them as pain and headaches.
Won't medicine fix the subluxation, like
it
fixes the pain?
Chances are no.
Medicine is a chemical that covers up
pain
in the body.
However pain is a crucial warning sign
that
something is wrong.
Any pain is very important to have
checked
out.
Even headaches, shoulder pain, knee
pains,
in fact all pains!
A chiropractor can evaluate all
those pains
Pain is a sensation created by your body
to
protect itself from further injury.
It is your body's way of telling you
something
is wrong.
Most pain is caused by swelling or
inflammation,
which can be caused by subluxation.
The inflammation can be reduced with
several
things.
First, the pain can be reduced with
medications.
Tylenol
Aspirin
Ibuprofen
Prescriptions
Secondly, we can use therapies in the
office
to help decrease the pain.
Ice
Heat
Muscle massage
Electric modalities
Ultrasound
EMS (Electro Muscle
Stimulation)
These are all great, they may decrease
the
pain, however the pain usually comes back after the swelling increases.
This is because none of them actually
fix
the problem which is causing the pain!
The culprit is usually a subluxation!
So how do we fix the problem?
We adjust it!
Adjustments can be given many
different ways,
on backs, stomachs, or even sitting.
But they all do the same thing, they
remove
the problem so proper natural healing can take place.