Your hips are a masterpiece of engineering that chiropractic can keep balanced and in alignment. Your pelvis is connected directly to the spine through a triangular bone at the bottom of the spine called the sacrum. When there is a subluxation in this region—a distortion or locking of your body structure that pinches your nerves—low back pain and/or leg pain may result.  Why does this happen? When your hips are uneven, your legs can become uneven.  You may even notice that one leg is longer than the other.

Sacroiliac and lower back problems may have their origins in childhood.  Each of your hip bones were originally three separate bones that fused during puberty.  Naturally, childhood is a very physical time and often full of injuries.  Sometimes these injuries can cause damage that lead to sacroiliac and lower back problems as an adult.    Another vulnerable time in our lives is during pregnancy when hormones relax joints to make delivery easier.  Adults that experience major falls or serious accidents can also cause significant damage to the hips.  It is therefore important, that chiropractic check-ups are a part of your regular health regimen at any age.

If your chiropractor determines that there is a sacroiliac joint problem or if you suffer from low back pain, several gentle approaches can be used. These may include stretching, respiratory-assisted adjusting, specialized adjustment tables, or the use of an adjusting tool called an activator. The advantages of seeking chiropractic help for these issues are that there are very few serious side effects and the treatments are non-invasive.  Many patients notice a significant difference in their overall wellbeing and lifestyle with regular adjustments.

Sources:

“Hip, Sacroiliac & Leg Problems,” Tedd Koren, D.C., Koren Publications Inc.

Spine-health.com, “Sacroiliac Joint Dysfunction,” Steven G. Yeomans, DC, 02 November 2010

What is scoliosis?

Your spine is made up of 24 bones called vertebrae that stack up one on top of the other to form a straight line when viewed from front to back.  Scoliosis is when there is a curvature of the spine causing it to have the shape of an “S” or a “C.”  Doctors measure the degree of the curve and determine its severity from an x-ray.  Depending on the severity, or degree of the curve, doctors will advise treatments.

What causes scoliosis?

While people of all ages can have scoliosis, it is most common in children, particularly girls, ages 10 to 12 and in their early teens.  This is because they are growing fast. In cases of children and adults, the spinal curve is caused by conditions such as tumor, infection, cerebral palsy, muscular dystrophy, a birth deformity or disc problems. However, in most cases the cause is unknown.

How is scoliosis treated?

Most people with scoliosis can lead normal lives, never even knowing that they have the condition. Still, a healthy, balanced spine helps you live life to its fullest.

For years it has been debated if chiropractic care can help reduce spinal curvatures.  A study by Charles “Skip” Lantz, DC, PhD, director of research of Life Chiropractic College West, and his associates found that “children with mild scoliosis treated with chiropractic adjustments have shown a reduction in their spinal curvature.” The study, which was conducted over a three-year period, noted that the medical community does not offer treatment for spinal curves of less than 20 degrees and that chiropractic appears to offer an advantage in the management and monitoring of the early stages of scoliosis.

Chiropractic adjustments can help with severe scoliosis as well. Several cases have been publicized as having been improved by chiropractic care. One notable case study was that of a 10-year-old girl with a severe scoliosis of 48 degrees. After ten chiropractic adjustments her mother reported a happier child, and her scoliosis reduced to 12 degrees.

If you, your child, or a loved one is suffering from scoliosis, make an appointment with one of our chiropractors to learn more about your treatment options. Surgery isn’t always the answer.

Sources:

DynamicChiropractor.com, “Study on Chiropractic Care for Adolescent Scoliosis is Encouraging,” Editorial Staff, 27 January 1997

niams.nih.gov, “What is scoliosis?” March 2009

What is Spinal Degeneration?

Spinal degeneration is usually caused by years of long-standing vertebral subluxations in your spine. A subluxation is when one or more vertebrae are misaligned causing pressure on spinal nerves. These subluxations can cause a multitude of health issues including neck or back pain. Spinal degeneration occurs when your spinal bones begin to deform; your discs swell, then shrink; and your ligaments, tendons and muscles begin to harden and weaken. In addition to spinal damage, your nerves, body chemistry and internal organs can also be affected.

What causes spinal degeneration?

While aging is the most common cause of spinal degeneration, factors including smoking cigarettes, being overweight, and regularly doing strenuous physical work can accelerate the process. As noted by Dr. Stephen Knuff in his article entitled, “Spinal Degeneration: Not Just a Problem for the Elderly,” studies have shown that by 75% of the population shows evidence of spinal degeneration by the age of 50.

Can spinal degeneration be cured?

Yes, chiropractic adjustments can reduce, halt and even reverse spinal degeneration. The earlier the degeneration process is identified, the better chance the patient has for its arrest and reversal. We recommend seeing your chiropractor regularly to keep your spine free from subluxations and free from spinal degeneration.

Sources:

MDNews.com, “Spinal Degeneration: Not Just a Problem for the Elderly,” Dr. Stephen Knuff, 25 December 2011

Webmd.com, “Degenerative Disc Disease,” 21 July 2010

How does chiropractic care work? Your chiropractor balances your spinal column and relieves stress on your muscles, ligaments, tendons and nerves.  These adjustments have been found to make a significant impact on athletic performance.

A 1991 study by Lauro A and Mouch B, published in Chiropractic: The Journal of Chiropractic Research and Clinical Investigation found that athletes demonstrated at 30% improvement in performance after 12 weeks of chiropractic treatment.  The athletes were tested on kinesthetic perception, power, reaction time, agility, and balance. The same study followed a group of athletes for 6 weeks. The group that received chiropractic care showed an 18% increase in performance, while the group that did not receive treatment showed a 1% increase in performance.

Many top athletes including Michael Jordan, Jerry Rice, Joe Montana, Lance Armstrong, Mia Hamm, and Aaron Rodgers have spoken out about the benefits of chiropractic care. Even professional sports teams such as the Detroit Lions make chiropractic adjustments a part of their everyday health efforts.

While chiropractors can assist hardcore athletes with athletic performance, they can also help individuals who workout just for fitness benefits and even those who play in pick-up games with friends. Americans suffer from millions of sports related injuries each year and everyone with such an injury needs regular chiropractic spinal checkups. Why? A small injury today, unless corrected, could cause major problems in the future.

In addition, regular chiropractic adjustments can provide a wide array of health benefits including improved posture, improved focus, a stronger immune system, increased range of motion, reduced stress, and reduced joint pain.

Source:

Locateadoc.com, “Chiropractic Treatment Benefits for Athletes,” 10 July 2009

What is narcotic drug dependence?

Narcotics change your response to sensations. Narcotics also produce mood changes, unconsciousness, or deep sleep. The primary medical use of these drugs is to reduce pain. Sometimes people become dependent on narcotics that are prescribed for pain and continue to use and abuse them when they are no longer needed to manage pain.

Examples of narcotics are:

Narcotics may make you dependent or addicted when you take them over time to reduce pain or for the pleasant, drowsy, floating feeling they give. Also, if you take these drugs repeatedly you may develop a tolerance to them. Tolerance means you need to take even higher doses of the drug to produce the same effects.

If you are dependent on a drug, you feel a need for the drug when it is stopped. If you crave the drug, or feel distressed without it, you are psychologically dependent. If you have bodily changes such as hot and cold flashes or tremors when the drug is stopped, you are physically dependent.

The factors that increase the risk of dependency include:

• Personality (such as low self-esteem, and being easily frustrated)
• Environment (such as people, places, or objects associated with drug use)
• Psychological factors (such as anxiety, stress, depression, or loneliness)
• Chronic pain-specifically from any type of injury
• It runs in the family
• Sensitivity of body to drugs
• The addictive qualities of narcotic drugs
• Easy access to narcotic drugs

How is it treated?

How can chiropractic care help?

Most people see a chiropractor because they are in pain. Our patients consult us because they have a grabbing painful back, neck, arms, legs, knees, shoulders, and head that is keeping them from enjoying life to the fullest. Chronic pain is ongoing pain which, may affect your daily activities. All pain has the potential to become chronic. As conservative practitioners who do not treat organic disease (cancer or infection), we focus on functional medicine (non-progressive diseases). Pain disorder has been considered “functional,” a disturbance which is not a progressive disease, but a disturbance of function. County Line’s doctors are trained and equipped to treat PAIN. Contact us for more information.

To get the full benefit of regularly visiting a Chiropractor one should truly begin going at birth. True, we have no control over what happens to us at the time that we are born, but we do have control over our own children. Seriously consider this fact, think about the physical trauma that a baby goes through as it makes it’s way into this world. The squeezing, the twisting, the pulling, of course a baby could benefit from seeing it’s first Chiropractor only days, if not hours, after birth. On the flip side of this, a mother should see a Chiropractor as soon as possible after delivering a baby whether from a caesarean section or a vaginal delivery. From spending the better part of the year being pregnant and forcing the hips, back, and feet to support all of that added weight, a new mother is going to have everything out of her place from her neck down to her feet.

Of course one does not have to be a new mother or newborn baby to benefit from regular chiropractic care. Everyone, with no exceptions, could genuinely benefit from seeing a Chiropractor on a weekly, if not more than once weekly, basis. Simple everyday stress produces a cause and affect on our human bodies. We get stressed out when our bodies are not perfectly in sync, or when all of our bones are not where they should be. Many people are unaware that regular visits to a Doctor of Chiropractic can “fix” everything from a sinus infection, to a twisted pelvis, to uneven legs. Yes, not having proper care can cause your legs to be uneven lengths thus throwing your pelvis, back, and essentially entire body out from where it should be.

A sad fact of health care is that many insurance providers will not pay for the insured person(s) to visit a Chiropractor. It is not always viewed the same as seeing a Medical Doctor, or Dermatologist, or even an Orthopedic Surgeon. It is very sad that many people feel restricted from regularly seeing a Chiropractor due to their insurance company’s unwillingness to cover this service. To think that major insurance companies are willing to fork out an unlimited amount of money to other types of doctors such as the ones listed above, along with many others, but will not pay for a member to see the one kind of doctor out their whose healing abilities have the potential to eliminate the need for any, and all, of these other doctors.