New Year, New You: Embracing Wellness in 2024 with Chiropractic Care

As we welcome 2024, it's the perfect time to set intentions for a healthier, happier year. In the journey towards achieving our wellness goals, chiropractic care emerges as a key ally, offering support not just for pain relief, but for overall health and vitality.

A Holistic Approach to Health

Chiropractic care is rooted in the belief that a well-aligned body is the foundation of good health. Regular adjustments ensure the spine – the backbone of our nervous system – is functioning optimally, facilitating the body's natural healing processes and maintaining overall health.

Goal 1: Enhance Physical Wellbeing

For those aiming to boost physical fitness in 2024, chiropractic care can be instrumental. It helps in enhancing mobility, reducing the risk of injury, and improving athletic performance. Regular adjustments ensure that your body is in prime condition to take on new physical challenges.

Goal 2: Manage Stress Effectively

The past years have highlighted the importance of mental health, and chiropractic care can play a vital role here too. By relieving physical discomfort, chiropractic treatments can reduce stress and anxiety levels, promoting a more relaxed and focused mind.

Goal 3: Improve Posture and Ergonomics

With many still adapting to remote or hybrid work models, proper posture and ergonomics have become crucial. Chiropractic care can help correct postural imbalances and offer advice on ergonomic setups, preventing the long-term effects of poor posture.

Goal 4: Boost Immune Health

A less known benefit of chiropractic care is its potential to boost the immune system. By maintaining the health of the nervous system, chiropractic adjustments may contribute to better immune function, a crucial aspect of maintaining health and wellness.

Goal 5: Achieve Better Sleep

Quality sleep is integral to health and wellness. Chiropractic care can contribute to improved sleep by alleviating pain and discomfort that might interfere with a good night’s rest.

Conclusion: Your Wellness Partner for 2024

As we embark on this new year, consider incorporating chiropractic care into your wellness routine. Whether your goals are to stay active, manage stress, improve posture, boost immunity, or sleep better, chiropractic care offers a holistic approach to help you achieve them.

Understanding and Tackling the Health Impacts of Severe Thoracic Kyphosis

Today, we are going to delve into the world of spinal health, focusing particularly on a condition known as severe thoracic kyphosis. We'll explore its health consequences, implications for your quality of life, and effective ways to prevent kyphosis progression.

Severe thoracic kyphosis, often characterized by excessive rounding in the mid-back, has potential health implications that can significantly affect daily living. But before we get into that, it's essential to clarify what we mean by excessive or severe thoracic kyphosis.

Kyphosis naturally refers to the curvature of the spine, specifically in the thoracic region or your upper back. While a slight curve is normal, when this curve exceeds 50 degrees, we refer to this as severe or excessive thoracic kyphosis. It's worth noting that even if you don't fall under the excessive category, kyphosis tends to increase with age due to regular daily activities that encourage poor posture, such as excessive use of tech, prolonged driving, and sitting. The strain from these repetitive activities accumulates over time.

Research exploring the impact of thoracic kyphosis on physical health, particularly in older adults, has revealed significant impacts. Excessive kyphosis can lead to decreased walking speed, impaired balance, and a reduced ability to carry out daily activities. Moreover, older adults with severe thoracic kyphosis have a heightened risk of falling, underscoring the importance of early detection and intervention.

Moving beyond the physical, thoracic kyphosis can also have substantial psychological impacts. Severe kyphosis may lead to mental health conditions such as depression and anxiety, possibly linked to physical discomfort and aesthetic concerns. Participants in these studies reported lower self-esteem and decreased quality of life, shedding light on the broader effects this physical condition can have on mental wellbeing.

Finally, an often overlooked but critical aspect is the impact of severe kyphosis on respiratory function. Studies have found that severe kyphosis can compromise respiratory function, leading to reduced lung capacity and decreased forced expiratory volume. The changes in spinal alignment can affect chest wall mechanics and lung volumes, potentially increasing the risk of respiratory complications.

Given these far-reaching implications on physical, mental, and respiratory health, it's clear that severe thoracic kyphosis needs to be addressed early and adequately. So, what can you do at home to prevent kyphosis progression?

One option is using postural devices such as the Posture Medic, which wraps around the shoulders and serves as a reminder to maintain proper posture. Another approach is postural taping using stretchy kinesiology or rock tape. These methods are especially useful for those who spend long hours driving or sitting at a desk.

Regular exercise and chiropractic treatment can also help. Segmental movement through chiropractic adjustment is key, and you can supplement this at home with a foam roller or postural exercises. These activities aim to build endurance in your upper back muscles, enabling you to maintain proper posture for longer periods and relieve stress on your spine.

In conclusion, it's crucial to address thoracic kyphosis early to prevent it from becoming a significant health concern down the line. Take proactive steps today and start incorporating these preventive measures into your daily routine. Remember, when it comes to your health, prevention is better than cure!

Is Your Vagus Nerve The Solution?

The vagus nerve, named in Latin for “the wanderer”, extends from the brainstem and travels long distances throughout your body.

The vagus nerve is primarily associated with your body’s autonomic function (think automatic). Autonomic functions are non-voluntary functions of the body that you don’t need to think about to make happen. These include functions such as the beating of the head, breathing rate/depth, digestion, dilation, constriction of blood vessels, control of sweat glands, sexual arousal, and many more.

Can you spot the Vagus nerve?

When the vagus nerve is not functioning correctly, this can lead to an increased frequency and duration of your body in fight or flight mode, the opposite mode of which proper vagal nerve tone produces, rest, and digest.

Here are some common issues that can arise when your vagus nerve is not functioning properly

1. Dysfunctional breathing

2. Dysfunctional digestion

3. Chronic inflammation and immune activation

4. Dysfunctional microbiome

5. Dysfunctional heart rate

6. Dysfunctional liver function

7. Chronic stress

8. Poor sleep and circadian rhythm

You may be thinking, I have a few of the items mentioned above, how can I test the function of my Vagus Nerve? Luckily, there is an easy way. It’s called Heart Rate Variability (HRV) and it is a measure that I have been using for years to test if I’m overtraining or not.

HRV looks at the time variability between heartbeats. The more active your vagus nerve is, you will have increased heart rate variability, a lower heartbeat, and a healthier cardiovascular system. HRV is most accurate in a lab setting, however, there are a lot of apps that offer the ability to do this from your own home. Most will require a heart rate strap, however, there are some rudimentary versions built into smartwatches and sensors.

Understanding the function of your vagus nerve is paramount to understanding how your body is functioning. It will provide you with an inventory of the quality of your body’s autopilot, and let you know whether or not your lifestyle is causing your body to redline or not. If you are in fact “red-lining” it may be your chance to give your body what it deserves and activate your vagus nerve and put your body into a better state of health.

In the next article, I will discuss how you can activate your vagus nerve.

Correcting Rounded Shoulders with Postural Devices

Mid-back tightness is very common and this is most likely caused by repetitive strain of bad posture.

Bad posture of this nature is characterized by hunching forward and having a rounded upper back with the head forward. Unfortunately, we are prone to this developing because so many tasks we do encourage bad posture.

There are different ways you can improve your upper back posture, and one of these is utilizing posture correction devices. In this video, Dr. Adam will demonstrate how to use a specific thoracic postural correction device to improve back posture. Dr. Adam will also show you how to use a foam roller to improve the rounded upper back.

Low Back Pain Compression & How to Ease it

Low back pain is the most common mechanical type pain in all of North America. Low back pain symptoms usually cause stiffness, aches and generalized fatigue, but there are many different reasons why you can get these symptoms.

One of the main causes of this discomfort is repetitive strain for a rounded low back. This rounding of your low back makes it susceptible to injury and you guessed it, low back pain.

If you are suffering from low back pain with acute onset then it’s important to know what type of injury it is and what you exercises and stretches you can do and which ones you should avoid.

In the video below I discuss how you can identify if the low back pain you are experiencing is getting irritated with compression, as well as three exercises which you can start today to help get relief.

Wry Neck - What it is & how to fix it.

Nothing is worse than starting your day with a pain in the neck. Even worse sometimes it can lock up and leave you with a very limited range of motion.

Sometimes this happens while you sleep and you wake up like this. Other times you just move your head and something lets go in your neck and you instantly feel the pain and stiffness.

Wry neck is characterized by some common symptoms like pain, stiffness, limited neck motion, muscle spasm, and sometimes referred pain into the head, shoulder, or upper back.

One symptom that is usually not related to this is consistent shooting nerve pain down into your arm, hand, and fingers. If this is what you are experiencing it is more likely that you are suffering from a pinched nerve.

Although wry neck can cause very sharp pain it should not travel past your elbow.

There are many different conditions that can cause wry neck, but if this is something new to you, it’s most likely that you have acute facet syndrome.

Your spine is lined with facet joints on the left and the right and allows for smooth motion. Sometimes they can become acutely irritated, and due to their high sensitivity, they can cause severe pain.

The natural course of healing for this type of neck pain usually is around 14-21 days. In really bad cases and with re-aggravation you may look at closer to a month.

I personally love using chiropractic for treating this as I can decompress your neck to the point where it alleviates the pressure and spasm around the joint. Also, the adjustment and other techniques can help considerably with regaining movement in your neck. It may not go back to 100% right away but you should have more range of motion.

Deep massage and heat are two things that you want to avoid in the first few days, as this will increase the inflammation and make the condition more drawn out.

In the meantime, before you can get in and see your chiropractor, try these few things that I talk about in the video below.

Better Seated Posture - Do This One Thing

Low back pain, shoulder pain, neck pain, headaches, muscle strain, spasms, and more are all the consequence of bad posture. Bad posture isn’t the main problem, it’s a bi-product of sitting for long hours each day.

The average American sits on average for 6.5 hours per day. YIKES! Not only are the effects of sitting bad for your general health due to inactivity, it’s terrible for your posture.

When we sit everything is out in front of us and it causes us to round our backs, drop our heads and reach in front of our body. This is compounded by the fact that gravity is also pulling us down the entire time.

When we think about correcting our posture, intuitively we think to roll our shoulders back to relieve some of the strain that is consistently happening. This may help with the strain in that specific area but it negates the fact that there is an underlying problem that we must correct first.

That problem is the foundation of your spine. By setting up a good foundation at the base of your spine while sitting you will improve your posture drastically by giving integrity to the structures above, therefore reducing postural strain and the back pain and stiffness associated with it.

Check out the video below for a quick explanation on what setting a strong foundation for your spine looks like.

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.

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.