If you experience jaw pain on a frequent basis, you might be suffering from TMJ. TMJ is short for the temporomandibular joint (TMJ) which you may think of it as your upper and lower jaws.
Yet medical professionals usually refer to discomfort here as a “disorder” or TMD for short.
The National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research (NIDCR) estimates that 10 million Americans have TMD. It’s a disorder of the temporomandibular joint, hence temporomandibular disorder. If you suffer from TMD and want to find a way to manage the pain, visiting a Dentist Sewell (if you live in and around this area of New Jersey) could help you find ways in dealing with this a lot better than before. It is best to seek professional advice, just to be on the safe side.
“The temporomandibular joint is one of the most complex joints in your body. It’s a sliding hinge that lets your jaw move up and down, side to side, and back to front. In addition to the bones and muscles, there’s also a small piece of cartilage (firm tissue) that acts like a shock absorber and protects your bones from wear and tear.”
Clearly, it plays an important role and there are multiple ways it can “go awry.” No wonder so many people experience discomfort from time to time.
There are many reasons why you may experience TMJ/TMD including teeth grinding in your sleep and stress. Other factors include past jaw injury and certain types of arthritis. Regardless of the causes, it is still important for you to visit someone similar to this Dentist in Vista if you find that you have teeth-grinding so they may be able to help you correct this.
So you might be wondering, “How can chiropractic care help relieve TMJ/TMD symptoms?”
Chiropractic care is a “holistic” modality – meaning it looks at your entire body and seeks to heal the source rather than simply putting a “band aid” on a symptom.
Here’s how it works in relation to TMJ/TMD.
First, your practitioner will assess your symptoms and medical history. Here at McQuaite Chiropractic, we often use an x-ray to see what’s below the surface for a complete picture.
Next, you’ll receive an “adjustment.” If you’re familiar with chiropractic care, you know that’s a series of spinal manipulations that realigns your bones and tissues. This adjustment serves two purposes: 1) To “put back into place” bones/nerves that can creep into neighboring territory — due to poor posture or injury.
2) Improve communication between your brain and nerves so your jaw functions as it should. It also boosts your immune system so you stay healthier.
TMJ (the joint) is one of the most complex joints in the body. Controlled by your central nervous system, both sides of your jaw need to work in unison to chew food or make various facial expressions.
Your chiropractic treatment for TMJ/TMD will focus on realigning your neck and shoulders to reduce pressure on certain tissues and help your jaw to stay in working order. TMJ/TMD affects everyone differently — some people have trouble chewing, while others have severe teeth grinding.
If you’re experiencing discomfort in any way, you’ll want to see a medical professional so you can feel better again.
If you’re in the Doylestown area, you can make an appointment with us for a free consultation.
If you have painful joints, it could be bursitis. As you may know, the joints are common areas to feel pain in – tendonitis, arthritis, and bursitis — these are all typical conditions.
Each can cause swelling and they certainly cause pain.
Bursitis refers specifically to small, fluid-filled sacs designed to provide a slippery surface between your muscles and bones. Their entire purpose is to absorb the friction that occurs during this movement. Imagine dragging your feet over a carpeted area again and again. You’ll feel the friction in your feet and it may not feel good. On the other hand, if you drag your feet over a tile floor, it’s smooth.
That’s what happens with bursitis. Those little sacs provide the smooth surface initially, but eventually, they’re full of friction. Bursitis can happen all over your body and you can get shoulder, elbow, hip, or foot bursitis.
It’s made worse by repetitive movements like your shoulders, knees, and hips.
What Causes Bursitis?
One cause is poor posture. Since many of us spend so much time slouched at the computer, this can take its toll on our health in the form of pain. To prevent this, you’ll want to ensure your workstation ergonomically supports you and limit working from beds, chairs, and couches.
It’s also a good idea to check your posture while at the computer throughout the day. Sit up tall and pull your shoulders back and down. Those slumped shoulders are not going to help you to feel better at the end of the day.
Other causes for bursitis include misaligned joints and irritated nerves.
All of these can be helped with regular chiropractic treatments because the purpose of chiropractic care is to re-align your body. Imagine a sliding glass door off the track, you know how hard it is to open and close. Yet, when it’s on the track, it slides smoothly.
Now imagine your body. The bursa (singular) has absorbed all that sliding back and forth and now it’s irritated which forces your muscles and nerves “off the track.”
No wonder you’re in pain!
Chiropractic Care Puts Your Body “Back on Track”
The entire purpose of chiropractic care is to re-align your spine which helps the rest of your body return to where it’s supposed to be. When everything is on the right track, you don’t feel chronic pain. Regular chiropractic treatments help you stay in alignment.
Icing the painful area and resting it will also help. But sometimes that’s not practical. Like when it’s in your shoulder and you work at a desk most days.
Diagnosing Shoulder Bursitis
Your healthcare practitioner may recommend an MRI or X-ray to see what’s happening inside your body.
At McQuaite Chiropractic, we will X-ray the area and create a treatment plan for you.
According to Spine-Health.com, “spinal stenosis is an abnormal narrowing of a body channel.” That may sound odd but hopefully, it will make more sense in just a moment.
Imagine your spinal column running from your brain to your lumbar (lower back) region. As you probably know, your spine comprises a series of discs and bones. The bones are called vertebrae and together, they provide protection for your spinal cord. However, an accident could result in paralysis caused by injury to the spinal cord.
For those with spinal stenosis, this spinal channel narrows over time which can pinch your spinal cord or the surrounding nerves causing numbness, tingling, or pain. Other common symptoms include back pain, stiffness, weakness, or even sciatica.
In other words, it can be painful.
Now you might wonder how your spinal channel can narrow in the first place.
There are a few reasons for this. Sometimes it’s genetic and for other cases, it may occur due to a tumor. For most people, it’s a degenerative condition related to arthritis or a herniated disc and it occurs in adults over 50.
In the case of arthritis, imagine that the cartilage wears away between your spinal joints. When this happens, the bone rubs against bone and with nothing to support it, ouch!
Treatment for Spinal Stenosis
Your health care practitioner will work with you on a treatment plan likely to include certain types of exercises and modifications to help rebuild strength and/or for pain relief.
Other typical treatments include epidural injections and anti-inflammatories like ibuprofen.
These may work, and chiropractic care can also be a great choice for effective pain relief.
As you may know, chiropractic care reduces nerve pressure because it restores your spine and ligaments to their rightful places. This means, if you’re feeling pressure due to a bone pressing on a nerve ending – which often happens during spinal stenosis – then you’ll feel relief.
By removing that pressure, your range of motion may be restored because it no longer hurts to move your body in certain positions.
For example, many people with spinal stenosis find it’s painful to stand up straight but they feel back pain relief when they lean over. For example, leaning on a grocery store shopping cart can take the pressure off your lower back nerve endings and thereby find pain relief.
Like many health concerns, regular chiropractic treatments can help you feel better. Here at McQuaite Chiropractic, we’re committed to helping our patients feels their best.
As you probably know, ADHD is a topic of ongoing clinical trials. One 2019 study found some evidence that chiropractic care helped participating children with ADHD. You can see it here. Specifically, this particular trial focused on seeing if chiropractor care helped these children improve their reading. Many kids with ADHD have reading problems due to their inability to focus.
Chiropractic care can soothe the nervous system. While that may seem unrelated to ADHD and reading, it’s not. According to the study, “ADHD is a neurodevelopmental disorder that is associated with significant alterations in brain development and function.”
So, by soothing the nervous system, the brain can send and receive messages easier. And when the brain communicates with the body well, this can enhance motor skills and focus.
ADHD, also known as attention deficit disorder with hyperactivity, mostly affects boys between the ages of 4 and 17. (Source.)
You’re probably familiar with medications like Adderall and Ritalin. You may even know these are stimulates that can affect your child’s sleep, mood, and even growth patterns. Yet, chiropractic care may be able to help naturally.
According to a study in Explore, children aged 9-13 diagnosed with ADHD, experienced relief with regular chiropractic care. The best part of this study is that these young children were able to not use psychotropic drugs on their developing brains.
Why would chiropractic care help kids with ADHD?
Here’s one theory. During your child’s birth, he or she suffers a spinal trauma. This happens to roughly 5% of children. These spinal injuries may not be noticed at the time because they aren’t obvious. This means the children grow up with a slight imbalance that can become more significant later in life.
The other thing that can happen is active kids may experience a spinal injury via a fall or rough play.
In either case, the spine is out of alignment. If the spine tilts to the left or the right (and it can be the tiniest bit “off”) this affects the head and neck alignment. That misalignment affects the Central Nervous System in that communications don’t flow as smoothly from the brain through the body because there is interference in the communications channel.
Chiropractors, as you may know, are specialists in the Central Nervous System. They do far more than relieving back pain. They align the entire body which takes the pressure off nerves and allows for improved communication between the brain and the body. Improving that communication can provide a world of healthy benefits.
One study dating all the way back to 1989 reported, “Following chiropractic care, 57% showed an improvement in chiropractic radiographic findings; 71.4% showed a reduction in overt behavior activity; 57% showed improvement in the level of autonomic activity, and 57% showed improvement in parental ratings of hyperactivity.”
Some parents have been able to reduce or end their reliance on medication that controls their child’s behavior. If your child has been diagnosed with ADHD and you’re in Doylestown, Pa, why not schedule a visit to McQuaite Chiropractic?
Side effects of chiropractic care include a stronger immune system and the potential to prevent injuries. Why not try a healthy, natural solution for ADHD?
Sinusitis is another word for a classic sinus infection. Fever, chills, headache, all the classic cold symptoms that can accompany it can make you feel miserable.
You probably know it’s due to a bacteria, virus, or other irritants that get through your nasal passages.
Your nose is stuffy due to inflamed tissues inside your sinus cavities.
These are the 8 hollow areas in your nose, face, and forehead. It’s the job of the sinuses to act as filters to keep dirt, dust, and pollen out of your body.
Yet, sometimes bacteria, viruses, and other irritants DO get through and when they do, you may find yourself with a stuffy nose or cold systems.
A 2012 study discussed in the Journal of Manipulative and Physiological Therapeutics found participants who received chiropractic care felt better, the adjustment helped open up their nasal passages so they could find relief.
Why Chiropractic Care is Good for Sinusitis
A chiropractic adjustment can remove obstructions from long periods of sitting and realign your neck and sinus cavities which can help you breathe easier.
When your chiropractor adjusts your neck, you may feel immediate relief since neck tension is released right away. This can also release any tension on your lymph nodes and cause them to start draining right away if you’re feeling stuffed up.
Chiropractic care works whether you’re suffering from seasonal allergies or chronic sinusitis. The re-alignment benefits are the same because in both cases you’re experiencing aggravated sinuses.
The other thing you may find interesting is that chiropractic care boosts your immune system because it regulates your nervous system (spine, nerves, brain) which takes care of your whole body. It reduces inflammation throughout because it re-aligns you from the crown of your head to your feet.
In my Doylestown practice, I’ve seen everyone from children to grandparent’s experience sinus relief from chiropractic care. Sometimes, it only takes one visit to open those sinus passages.
Other Ways You Can Treat Sinus Troubles Naturally
Acupuncture can help clear your sinuses too. Your acupuncturist will determine the proper placement of needles and pop them in, then you’ll sit quietly for anywhere from 15-45 minutes depending on the severity of your symptoms.
Steam helps too.
You’re probably familiar with a steamy shower opening your nasal passages. But you may not have thought about adding a few drops of eucalyptus essential oil to your shower to help open and soothe your sinuses. Boiling water on the stove works too, just hover your face in the steam to find sinus relief.
What’s your experience with chiropractic care for your sinusitis?
