Tuesday, October 12, 2010

WHY CHIROPRACTIC CARE IS SO IMPORTANT TO THE HUMAN BODY

In my opinion and not because I am a Doctor of  Chiropractic, the profession of Chiropractic should be seeing 90% at least of the population.  My reason for being so bold would be that the spinal column and the nervous system is the life line of the human body.  There is not one function in the human body that can work without 100% of nerve energy.  Yes I know there are functions that the body can do with some limited nerve energy to that part of the body, but in turn you also get limited function of that part of the body if the nerve tissue is working with limited impulse.  One of the main reasons a nerve will work with limited impulse is because the nerve is being pinch and not working 100% so thus the part of the body the nerve goes to works with limited ability.  As mentioned in previous writings it was the father of medicine that said look well to the spine for disease.  He understood that the body functions had to have 100% of nerve energy to function to 100% capacity.  It is really amazing that for some reason they got away from that philosophy.  I should really be happy about that, but then again if they would have stayed with that philosophy we may not have as many sick people in the world today.  I do see the thinking of the the people changing and more and more people are starting to look at a more natural way of health, but there is a long way to go.

I know there is a need for some medications so do not get me wrong.  There are some health conditions that need medications besides Chiropractic care.  However I do believe if the people of the world would start their children out right away with Chiropractic care their children would grow up with a more normally functioning nervous system then what we did due to the lack of proper care of our own nervous systems with Chiropractic care.  You see Chiropractic is one of the main and only health care systems that treat pinched nerves in the spine that are causing our bodies health to decrease in it's abilities to function to 100%.

See our bodies are not much different then our own cars, the car has an electrical system that keeps everything working as long as the battery and the wires in the car are in good working condition.  Our bodies are the same as long as the nervous system is working to 100% the body part that the nerve goes to is functioning at 100%, however if a nerve becomes pinched in the spine then that nerve will not function at 100% and that part of the body will not work AT 100%.  You can see by this that it only makes sense to keep the spinal system balanced so the nerves are not being pinched and start to malfunction.

In my practice of Chiropractic I will treat a patient on a series of visits to get the spine balanced and free the nerves and once this has been done I will talk with the patient and try to help them understand how important check ups are to keep the spine correct and the nervous system from being pinched.  Why get your spine corrected and then let everything start to fall apart because if some of the things we do on a daily bases that can cause a spine to go out of balance and then wait until the pain takes over or for an organ to start to malfunction.  This does not make a lot of sense to live life that way.

We spend time sometimes taking better care of our cars then we do with our own body.  We make a point of getting the car serviced so it keeps working at 100% but we spend very little time taking care of our bodies unless we develop pain or some other health condition, at that time we may think why did I let this happen.  Most of the time if we just listen to what our bodies are telling us most of the health problems could be avoided.  We have to remember that most of our health problems start with a pinched nerve that is not allowing our body parts or organs to work at 100% and if left go long enough then disease will set in then the medications and surgeries are very necessary to have.  We also need to remember that pain tablets and simple medications are like frosting on a bad looking cake, they simple kill the message to the brain that there is a problem and when we stop the medication most of the time the condition comes back but much worse then it was at first.

So as the father of medicine once said look well to the spine for the source of disease.

Tuesday, October 5, 2010

Sciatica

Let us talk about a very common condition called Sciatica.  It seems to be a condition that can scare a lot of patients when you tell them what they are suffering from.  There are times when I can see how patients can get very worried about this condition.  Most patients that have come to my office for this condition, have been dealing with the pain of sciatica for some time.  As I start to question them on their pain and how it started there have been may different explanations on the type or severity of their pain, and at the same time many different ways they have told me how they developed their condition.  After treating hundreds of these type of patients you still find a very common thing that seems to evident.  I would have to say that about 90% of the patients that I have treated with the condition of sciatica have all noticed after several questions that they have had lower back pain for months that would come and go.  After a period of time though this low back pain started to be and every day thing but not severe in nature but more of an achy feeling every time they would sit for a period of time and then go to get up, or maybe they had this achy feeling and stiffness when ever they bent over to lift or pick things up from the floor and they would just think that it was sore muscles and take some tablets for pain or get some muscle relaxers to help them.  Then one morning they got out of bed and started to feel pain into the buttocks and then later in the day it was moving into the upper leg and then evendually down to the lower leg and the whole leg was starting to ache and became constant.

After talking with them the average patient would say that they woke up with this and they did nothing to cause this pain down into the leg.  They forgot that their body was trying to tell them that things were not working right and they were just covering their condition up with the tablets that they have been eating like candy so they would not feel the pain.  The average case of sciatica starts with pain in the low back and then as time goes on and not having proper treatment it starts ti spread to the leg and down the leg to the toes.  Sciatica does most generally start due to spinal subluxations in the lower spine and this is causing compression of the main nerve roots that make up the sciatic nerve, which is the largest and longest nerve of the human body.  This being said should help patients understand why it takes a series of treatments to get this condition under control and healed.  To help patients understand the way this condition starts and progresses and later heals I use a very simple explanation that helps patients make some sense out of the condition and that is to think of a hose attached to a fire hydrant.  When the hydrant is turned on and has full power, that is like a normal nerve, it is nice and thick and has a 100% of power going through it.  Once you turn the power down on the hydrant it causes the part of the hose that is attached to the hydrant to start to shrink in size and as the water pressure is decreased then the hose starts to shrink in size down the length of the hose.  This is the same thing that happens in the nervous system when a vertebrae is subluxated and pinching the nerve it starts to cut the power in the nerve and the nerve then starts to atrophy or shrink, or you might say it is starting to die out.  This then causes the pain or inflammation at the top of the nerve to spread down the length of the nerve.  When you start to get this condition treated by correcting the subluxation of the vertebrae and relieving the pressure on the root of the sciatic nerve then the nerve has to start to regenerate from top down.  Depending on how severe the nerve was affected will depend on how long it will take the nerve to heal all the way down.

What the patient has to understand is first how long they have been having this condition prior to starting their treatment, then on how sever the pain is.  Once they understand these things then they can understand why it takes time to heal from this condition.  There is one other thing the patient has to understand and that is to stay with their treatment until the whole nerve has heeled and the subluxations in the spine are completely corrected and balanced with the vertebrae above and below the vertebrae that was causing the condition to start.  If the patient stops their treatment before that then the condition will return and be even worse if you thing that could be possible.  This condition needs to be check regularly while the nerve is healing all the way down to the end of the nerve to avoid the condition from returning.  In way what is taking place is the sciatic nerve is healing from above down, or you might say from inside out.  The pain will leave the back and then the hip and then the upper part of the leg and then the lower part of the leg and then out of the foot like it is going to just blow out the toes.  Like mentioned this condition can take time to heel, the patient will need to understand this from the doctor and the doctor is going to have to reinforce this with the patient, this is like a lot of different health conditions they take both the doctor and the patient working together to get the results that are needed, there will be things the patient needs to do and proper ways to do the things that need to be done for the heeling to take place.  This is where good communication with the doctor and the patient is very important, and if done there can be great success and other problems then can be avoided.