How do you know when you need a chiropractic adjustment?
Many patients will say “when I hurt” of course!
While adjustments for physical discomfort are important, getting checked out in other situations may prove helpful as well and may even avoid surgery or medications.
Take Emily, whose parents were told after her birth that she failed her hearing test and needed to repeat it in a month.
They followed up at that time only to be told that Emily needed to go to a hospital in Orlando for a specialized evaluation that would require surgery.
Her Mom had been a patient of mine since she was a young girl and she wanted a different kind of opinion. They called the office and we got Emily in for an adjustment. The following day, Emily’s parents took her in for the evaluation and were told there must be some mistake, her hearing was perfect!
Chiropractic for Constipation a Real Solution?
This same patient would occasionally come in for an upset tummy. Her Mom would relate that she was unable to have a bowel movement for almost a week. After an adjustment her mom said they would have to stop at a gas station as she couldn’t make it home without going to the bathroom.
Another fascinating case was a woman who came in after a severe car accident that required neck and back surgery but still had persistent pain. She didn’t mention in the initial history that she would be constipated for almost a month at a time since the accident and her gastroenterology team could find no reason for it.
After her first adjustment she was relieved that day. This prompted a call from her pain management team to ask what I had given her.
They were quite surprised to learn it was from the adjustment. This was a problem they dealt with every day due to their heavy reliance on opiod medication for pain relief. Her gastroenterologists were so impressed, they wrote in their notes to the insurance carrier that the patient needed regular (no pun intended) Chiropractic care for her condition which was directly related to her car accident.
Chiropractors and structural therapists (osteopaths, cranial practitioners, etc) all over the world report these kind of cases all the time. It is not some specific kind of adjustment that gets the result. It is the inherent unlimited healing potential within each of us. It just needs to be nourished and allowed to flow.
Many other non pain related syndromes present to Chiropractors all the time. Dizziness is very common. GI complaints like GERD in adults and colic in children are very common. Frequently patients will tell me, my knee (hand,elbow etc) acts up and when you adjust my spine, it gets better. Many patients complain of stuffy ears that respond well to adjustments.
Chiropractic for Constipation Releases Energy Blockages
Why you ask, do these complaints respond to Chiropractic care?
Chiropractors find dysfunctions that they call subluxation complexes. Essentially these are energy blockages. Chiropractic care on a structural level is about optimizing the neurological functioning of the body and removing these vertebral subluxation complexes.
The nervous system can be looked upon as the electrical system of the body.
The brain’s job is too gather sensory information, assess and then transmit a proper response.
Initially Chiropractic was thought to be affecting local areas such as just the back or neck. As neurological research went on, it was found that joints and muscles provide a huge stimulus to affect how the brain works and to target certain desired neurological results.
Problems to the muscles and joints occur due to structural stressors like gravity, trauma, toxicity and repetitive strain disorders. None of us can escape gravity. It is the one common stressor for all of us.
You will notice a common pattern in older patients. As time goes on they develop a head forward posture and forward rounded shoulders. This is not just osteoporosis-this is losing the battle with gravity. When joints and muscles are not moving properly they give off altered signals which go into the brain in the sensory department and eventually effect the motor and autonomic (heart rate,digestion,etc) programs coming from the brain.
This is why when you strain your back, frequently it’s accompanied by a limp (altered motor programs). These altered motor programs can also affect smooth muscles such as the eustachian tube in your ear or the smooth muscle in your bowels. This can cause stuffy ears or constipation or vasoconstriction leading to high blood pressure. Essentially any symptom can result from a nervous system not functioning properly.
Past Pointing Test to Assess Nervous System Health
I like to use in office tests that show subtle dysfunction of the nervous system in the patient’s ability to recieve and transmit information. A simple neurological test I use to test these functions is called the past pointing test.
Have the patient stand, feet very close together, and close their eyes. Some patients will start to fall with just this part of the test.
Why?
You are removing the eyes which help tell us where we are in space and the patient is just relying on joint and muscle information going to the brain.
I then ask them to touch the tip of their index finger to the tip of their nose. Then repeat with the other hand. Frequently they will miss with one hand or it will be more difficult. I also will have them march in place with their eyes closed. Without realizing, many will spin 90 to 180 degrees within 50 steps!
This is important information to determine optimal functioning of the nervous system. Some people will recognize this test as one of the tests police officers give for DUI testing. The muscle coordination center of the brain, the cerebellum is very sensitive to many toxins, alcohol being one of the worst.
Many auto-immune patients will have this finding as well because the cerebellum is one of the most common tissues to be affected by auto-immunity second only to the thyroid.
Nutrition is critically important to the optimal functioning of the brain, but that is the subject of another article.
In the meantime realize that motion is life. Get adjusted, do exercise that you love, nourish your body and develop loving relationships.
More Information
Can Squatty Potty Fix America’s Toilet Issues?
CHIROPRACTIC CARE/ADJUSTMENTS WORK FOR NEARLY ALL PROBLEMS THAT MANIFEST IN THE BODY…IT IS AMAZING BUT MOST PEOPLE DONT BELIEVE IT CAUSE THEY NEVER TRY IT…TWO EXCELLENT CHIROPRACTERS IN NYC DR. MICHAEL SMATT 41ST BTWN MADISON AND PARK (best male chiropracter in nyc) AND DR. LILA WOLFE WALL STREET (best female chiropracter in nyc)….
I can vouch for this..my son has ASD from vaccine injury- and it has helped him tremendously with digestive issues..we have only been going for about two months
Nice. I appreciate this getting to read about this point of view. Thanks for including him as a guest contributor today, Sarah.
As someone recently said to me in a discussion about various coping mechanisms, dietary measures, treatment methods, “You don’t always know what is driving what…” But it is always good to have a lot of stuff in your personal bag of tricks and be ever striving for more information and a wiser point of view on how to care for ourselves, and the more natural (or the fewer side effects) the better.
What other ‘odd’ things have people successfully treated with chiropractic?
our family has seen great results of chiro with colds, allergies, the onset of flu symptoms, food sensitivies and eczema. i’ve heard of people having success in helping with infertility. with one of my pregnancies, adjustments encouraged my baby to flip from the breech position into the proper position (actually, chiropractic adjustments have a higher success rate at this than the typical manual version that they do at the OB office), and a special type of adjustment is just what my body needed to encourage me to go into labor. we have had really great success with our chiropractor for pretty much everything!
in my family: eczema, sinus infection, migraines, all through pregnancy to eliminate normal aches and pains, colds, sore throat, damage done forceps delivery etc (our chiro does cranial work as well)….
If anyone is looking for an AMAZING chiropractor in Los Angeles (Hollywood area), Dr. Christine Andersson is the BEST. She the whole family and she specializes in newborn to pregnant women and everyone in between. http://www.kidchiropractic.com. She has changed our lives.
i just started see one for this issue & many others. 🙂
Our baby too failed the hearing test at birth, and 2 months afterwards. At three months we were noticing that she was not moving her head correctly. Regular doctor did not see a problem just thought the muscles were developing at different rates. That did not sound right and we sought out chiropractic care. One adjustment and she was moving her head freely. We never did a follow up test to see about her hearing. When I asked the chiropractor if the nerve being pinched was the cause he said he really thought that it was. Our little one is 11 and a half months old now and she definately does not have a hearing problem of any kind! Praise the Lord and thank you chiropractors!!
Some of my family members will become nauseous if they have a certain misalignment in their back. This also has an causes bathroom problems. It is amazing how everything is connected to the spine.
still not addressing the root of the issue with chiropractic treatments. A little too reminiscent of the allopathic approach in my humble opinion
YUP!!!
Also, for ear infections. I didn’t have an infection, but had terrible pressure in my ears. The chiro told me he could fix it and sure enough the adjustment did! He then told me about how it can help with ear infections.