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Consistency in Chiropractic Care: The Key to Lasting Results
Discover how consistent chiropractic care over time is essential for achieving and maintaining optimal health results, much like the gradual progress seen in regular physical fitness routines.
The Power of Consistency: Unlocking the Full Potential of Chiropractic Care
In a world that often seeks instant gratification, the true value of consistency can be overlooked, especially when it comes to health and wellness. This principle is particularly relevant in chiropractic care, where the benefits are most profound and lasting when treatments are received regularly over time.
Understanding the Cumulative Effect of Chiropractic Adjustments
Chiropractic care is not a one-off solution but a journey. Each adjustment builds upon the last, gradually improving spinal alignment, nerve function, and muscle balance. This cumulative effect is crucial for lasting relief from pain, improved mobility, and overall wellness.
The Analogy with Physical Fitness
Just as consistent exercise is essential for building and maintaining muscle strength and flexibility, regular chiropractic adjustments are necessary for sustained spinal health. No one becomes physically fit from a single workout session; similarly, lasting chiropractic benefits require ongoing care.
Long-Term Health and Chiropractic Consistency
Chiropractic care, when received consistently, can lead to significant long-term health benefits. These include reduced pain and discomfort, increased range of motion, better posture, and an enhanced ability to perform daily activities without strain.
Tailoring Frequency to Individual Needs
The frequency of chiropractic visits varies depending on individual health goals, lifestyles, and specific conditions. Some might need more frequent adjustments initially, especially if dealing with chronic pain or specific health issues, with the frequency reducing as their condition improves.
Preventative Care: A Proactive Approach
Consistent chiropractic care is also a form of preventative health care. Regular adjustments can help to preempt issues before they become problematic, maintaining overall health and potentially avoiding future pain or injury.
Conclusion: Embracing Consistency for Optimal Health
Embracing the principle of consistency in chiropractic care is embracing a commitment to one's long-term health and wellbeing. It's a proactive approach that pays dividends in the form of lasting health benefits, demonstrating that in chiropractic care, as in many areas of life, consistent effort is the key to achieving and maintaining optimal results.
Staying on Track During the Winter Months
It’s so easy to fall off track with respect to healthy routines this time of year.
The excuses come from all directions. I’m too busy. The weather is too cold. The sky is grey and they are calling for snow.
As the daylight decreases at this time of year so does the motivation to stay active.
It’s so easy to fall off track with respect to healthy routines this time of year.
The excuses come from all directions. I’m too busy. The weather is too cold. The sky is grey and they are calling for snow.
As the daylight decreases at this time of year so does the motivation to stay active.
With that said here are my top 5 tips to stay on/or get back into a good exercise routine right now.
Motivation is temporary, find your why instead - Watching an inspirational video is good but that feeling will wane. Get solid on the reason why you want to exercise. Is if for your health? To be the best at something? To run your first 10k this summer? To be able to keep up with your kids? When your purpose is clear, you won’t need motivation.
Schedule it in - The North American lifestyle doesn’t allow for much downtime, and when you do get it it’s unlikely that you will have the energy to exercise. Make sure you carve out time during your week for it. Right now, grab your phone and plan out the days and times you are going to commit. Do not compromise.
Get it out of the way - Leading in from the last point, there are distractions everywhere. Another phone call, email, housework, kids, etc. Get it done early so you can clear your mind. If not you will be telling yourself “I will work out later” which translates to not getting to it anytime soon.
Consistency is key - Commit to a schedule that is achievable. You don’t have to go 0 to 100 in a week. Build a strong foundation on a routine that you can complete and stay on track. Add on when you are following through a few weeks in a row.
Make it fun - Exercise can be fun too! Incorporate things that you like to do and look forward to. For me it’s cycling, for you it may be hiking, enrolling your dog in agility classes, or going for a skate with family or friends.
Bend With Your Knees or With Your Hips? Protecting your low back while lifting
You have definitely heard the saying “bend with your knee, not your back”. In theory, this is to keep a “flat back” which is a protected back. But practically speaking only bending with your knees may put you at a disadvantage.
You probably know someone who has “thrown out their back” while lifting something, doing a half bend, or picking something up off the floor. I can tell you that as a chiropractor I know many of these people.
Bend With Your Knees or With Your Hips? Protecting your low back while lifting
You have definitely heard the saying “bend with your knee, not your back”. In theory, this is to keep a “flat back” which is a protected back. But practically speaking only bending with your knees may put you at a disadvantage.
You probably know someone who has “thrown out their back” while lifting something, doing a half bend, or picking something up off the floor. I can tell you that as a chiropractor I know many of these people.
What this is called is sub-maximal buckling. It’s a common chiropractic complaint, and many people are perplexed why something so nominal can cause so much back pain.
The truth is this is multi-factorial and I could make this an extremely long post, speaking to the complexities of low back mechanics and muscle recruitment, but for the sake of simplicity, I will explain how to keep your back in a protected position by bending with your hips and knees while keeping your back in a flat position.
A “flat back” is usually referred to as a neutral spine or neutral low back. The easiest way to describe this is the position your low back goes into if you push your butt out behind you. essentially you are creating an arched back.
The components of your spine are able to handle the forces placed on them, and the increased forces while lifting an object if you stay in this protected position.
In the video below I demonstrate how this can be achieved by locking your arms out and letting them slide down to your knees as you bend. This will keep your low back neutral, and help to protect yourself while lifting.
How to Prevent Hunchback - Only 5 Minutes a day
No one ever said when I grow up I want to stare at my shoes all day.
But for many of us, the path we are going down ends up here.
With many of repetitive daily postures in a forward seated hunched position, it forces your spine into a strained position that can cause long term tension and stretch to the ligaments of the spine.
No one ever said when I grow up I want to stare at my shoes all day.
But for many of us, the path we are going down ends up here.
With many of repetitive daily postures in a forward seated hunched position, it forces your spine into a strained position that can cause long term tension and stretch to the ligaments of the spine.
Over time the muscles in the back become long and weak, while the muscles of the chest and shoulders tighten pulling your shoulders and rounding your back.
Bad posture can lead to other problems including back pain and even compression fractures of the spine.
As a chiropractor, I see many people that complain of chronic tightness and pain through the shoulder and shoulder blade region.
Since many of the muscles holding up the spine and preventing it from slouching forward are postural muscles they need to be worked more frequently to build endurance. It is also important to stretch the tightened muscles of the chest and shoulders to allow the shoulder and back to straighten.
Check out this video that helps explain daily stretches and exercises that will help prevent the progression of a rounded hunchback.
Slipped Disc?
You have probably heard the term “slipped disc”, often it is often used very loosely.
A true slipped disc is referring to a disc bulge or disc herniation. This can happen throughout the spine but most often in the neck and low back.
Your intervertebral discs are filled in the centre with a material that can shift if the back is injured in a certain way….
You have probably heard the term “slipped disc”, often it is often used very loosely.
A true slipped disc is referring to a disc bulge or disc herniation. This can happen throughout the spine but most often in the neck and low back.
Your intervertebral discs are filled in the centre with a material that can shift if the back is injured in a certain way.
Typical physical demands will most commonly shift the center of the disc towards the back of the spine where the spinal cord and nerve roots are. (Think of squishing a jelly donut from the front, the jelly will be pushed out the back)
This can compress the nerves either directly or from the pressure resulted from inflammation. The nerves are very delicate and are reactive to the slightest changes in pressure. Since the nerve roots area are surrounded by boney canals, there is not much room for error.
This slippage of the disc will commonly cause neck pain or back pain depending on where the injury occurred in the body, and in a lot of cases the pain can be quite severe.
Not to mention the chances of pinching a nerve that can cause a shocking or searing pain into your arms and hands. Or if it’s a low back injury it could cause sciatica (low back pain that causes nerve pain down your leg).
In humans there are certain signs and symptoms that will make it easier for your chiropractor to diagnose. Before an examination you should make notes describing exactly what pain you are feeling and any limitations that you have, and during the exam cooperate during physical tests to determine the root cause..
With dogs and horses this can be harder to diagnose. A lot of time this can present as lameness, a weak leg or complete dragging of the hind end.
Chiropractic can be of great help but the healing process can be quite slow as nerve tissue healing depends on the amount of compression and the length of time it was compressed.
In humans, dogs, or horses, if there is pain or weakness and both legs as well as incontinence, this should be treated as a medical emergency and you should go to a hospital.
Are You a "Self Crack" Addict?
During my undergrad at Wilfrid Laurier, I would study in the quiet floor of the library. It was dead quiet up there even though there were hundreds of students cramming for midterms and finals.
The only sounds I would hear was someone opening a drink, clearing their throat and cracking their own necks and back.
During my undergrad at Wilfrid Laurier, I would study in the quiet floor of the library. It was dead quiet up there even though there were hundreds of students cramming for midterms and finals.
The only sounds I would hear was someone opening a drink, clearing their throat and cracking their own necks and back.
The distinctive popping/cracking sound is from air held within a capsule that surrounds the small facet joints in your spine.
This happens with their is separation from joint surfaces more than the current normal.
If you have ever been manually adjusted by me this is the same sound you hear and the same mechanism.
There is one major difference though.
When I adjust your spine, I’m looking for areas that are not moving correctly, and therefore we are attempting to increase the movement to restore proper function. These areas can be tense and sore since there is inflammation from the lack of movement. It is good when these areas are adjusted and restore motion because if a joint lacks the normal movement it will continue to stiffen up and start to deteriorate over time and your symptoms will progress. This is called osteoarthritis.
On the other hand when you “self crack” the joints in your spine, it is achieved by making large movements to that particular part of the spine. People that do this to their low back will twist around until they hear a pop. People that try with their neck will push on their chin into rotation or grab the top of their head and pull in hopes that something will give.
The way the joints work in the spine is each of them does a small amount of movement to create the large movement we see on the outside.
When a joint becomes restricted and inflammed you will feel pain and stiffness which you try to get relief from self adjusting.
I’d be lying if sometimes this didn’t seem to help, but the concern is by self cracking you will start to create more movements in the joints above and below the joint that is locked up. In other words by cranking on your neck or back you are creating joints that are hypermobile (move too much and lack stability). This without a doubt will put more stress onto the joint surfaces, wear down the cartilage and create osteoarthritis in your future.
So next time you think to “self crack” think twice.