Summer…you may have visions of outdoor BBQ’s, and maybe, moving your exercise program outdoors. Kayaking, golfing, biking, running…these are popular summer activities around Doylestown. However, as a chiropractor, I see frequent summer sports injuries.
They’re usually caused by an overly zealous exercise program.
If you’ve spend the past several months watching Game of Thrones rather than at the gym, take it easy at first. You’re better off with shorter exercise sessions than one mammoth one that will leave you exhausted, sore and possibly hurt.
You also want to make sure you have the proper form in whatever you’re doing. Take golfing for instance, some weekend golfers hunch their shoulders when they hit the ball rather than bending from the waist. The “hunched shoulder” technique puts a lot of strain on your neck. Plus, swinging a golf club a hundred times or more in a round of golf can lead to a sore rotator cuff and lower back. The same goes for tennis players; a really common injury for you is twisted ankles as a result of not positioning yourself correctly in readiness to receive the ball. Your main line of thought might be ‘what is my tennis rating‘ but your health should come first, and an injury could also cause some serious damage to your future in the sport.
Practice proper form and be careful when you lift your golf club bag.
If you’re a runner, you know there’s a difference between running on a treadmill and running outside. For example, you may hit dirt or gravel trails or you may run on pavement. Each of these surfaces require hundreds of micro-adjustments with every step.
In daily life and in sports, your body develops certain habits which affect your posture and pull your body out of alignment. When you’re misaligned, you may be more injury-prone.
How Chiropractic Care Can Protect
Your Body From Summer Sports Injuries
If you’ve never been to a chiropractor before, you may not be aware of how the process works or how it can benefit more than your back.
In simple terms, daily life puts stresses on your body. You may spend hours a day sitting hunched over a computer. Such posture strains your upper back, shoulders and neck and creates misalignment in your body called “subluxation.”
A chiropractic treatment realigns your body. When your bones and muscles are in alignment with one another you experience pain relief because your bone isn’t pushing on a nerve. You can also have better form on the playing field and perform better.
Famous athletes from Tiger Woods to Arnold Schwarzenegger have relied on regular chiropractic treatments to give them an advantage. So have many Olympic gold medalists. You can track their progress on social media sites like Instagram and Facebook. If you’re thinking about trying to win a gold medal, you may want to do the same, set up an Instagram account to get things started and, gain a fan base! You could also look at getting some free followers in sites similar to socialfollow.
Just as star athletes protect their bodies by taking care of it, you can too. Regular chiropractic adjustments keep your body in alignment, and help protect you from injury.
Enjoy your summer and take a extra care to prevent summer sports injuries. If you need chiropractic care and you’re in the Doylestown area, give us a call at 267-247-7000. We offer a free consultation.
Have you ever felt sore after doing seasonal yard work? Have you ever pulled a muscle dragging those fallen leaves to the curb?
Unfortunately, spring cleaning injuries are pretty common. In fact, every year more than 21 million people end up in the emergency room.
Sprains, tendonitis, serious cuts and even fractures are common during seasonal cleanups. So, what’s a homeowner to do? Well, you can certainly hire out seasonal yard work and inside cleaning jobs. But if you’re a do-it-yourselfer, there are a few ways you can protect yourself so that you don’t end up in pain or in the emergency room.
Here’s The Number One Way to Prevent Spring Cleaning Injuries
Take it small bits at a time rather than embarking on a mammoth clean up all at once. Anyone who spends 5-8 hours on a weekend day raking, scrubbing and doing all the other tasks that go along with seasonal cleaning is risking injury – unless you’re already a highly active person.
Think about it, if you’re like most Americans, you drive to work, you sit at a computer and you drive home and sit some more in front of the TV or on your tablet. Even if you get the daily recommended 30 minutes a day of exercise, that’s still a lot of sitting.
So to go from a sedentary life to a day of active cleaning is kind of like lacing up your shoes to run a 10K the first time you take up running.
It’s far better to do break up your spring cleaning into 30-60 minutes stretches over several days if you can.
And of course, before you get started make sure you do a few warm up stretches. Bend over and touch your toes. Reach your hands to the sky and do a few bends from side to side. Put your hands on your waist and twist a few times. Spend 10-15 minutes warming up gently and you’ll be at less risk for spring cleaning injuries.
It’s also critical to enlist help for bigger projects. Whether you need to move heavy items or climb ladders a helper can reduce the strain on your body and help prevent falls. It turns out that falls are a serious source of spring cleaning injuries. Bissell offer cordless vacuum cleaners, reducing the chance of tripping and causing injury.
So, enlist help, do less in smaller bits and warm up before attempting active clean ups.
If you do feel sore or have tweaked your back a good massage or your chiropractor may be able to help you feel better again.
What will you do to prevent spring cleanup injuries this season?
Every pregnant mother notices physical and emotional changes during pregnancy. One of those changes is in your posture. It’s not a surprise that you find yourself sitting or standing differently to accommodate your growing belly. However, you may be surprised by the accompanying aches and pains.
Fortunately, chiropractic care during pregnancy can make a world of difference in the way you feel. Because the whole point of chiropractic care is to accommodate your body and realign your spine, it’s especially helpful for pregnant women.
For example, you know how you start standing differently when you’re pregnant? You probably support your lower back with your hands. That new posture affects your whole body and can lead to a slightly raised hip or tension in your shoulder. Pregnancy causes your pelvis to tilt too which causes other alignment issues in your body.
All of these changes can wreak havoc on your spinal column, create pressure on nerve endings (painful!), and block your body’s communication system.
Why Does Chiropractic Care During Pregnancy Make Such a Difference?
You probably know your nervous system is a collection of nerves and cells. The cells carry messages from one part of your body to another. Imagine a highway with smooth flowing traffic vs. a traffic jam. That’s what your body is like. When everything is going well, then your cells carry messages back and forth. But when the communication channels are blocked, then you can feel pain and inflammation.
As your body stretches and adjusts to accommodate your new baby, it likely is thrown out of alignment. This partial dislocation– called subluxation in the chiropractor world—is the reason why you’re having lower back pain. The misalignment can cause inflammation throughout your body.
Plus, this dislocation blocks communication coming and going from your central nervous system. This is a problem because your brain tells every part of your body what to do. If there’s a blockage, your reflexes may be slower, you’re more forgetful and you may not be able to plan as well.
In other words, your brain slows down.
That’s the “pregnancy brain” at work. Now, a pregnancy chiropractor may not be able to restore your normal brain functioning entirely, but it may help.
A prenatal chiropractor adjustment “puts everything back” the way it needs to be. Imagine your spine, neck, and pelvis in their proper alignment. You don’t have any pinched nerves and your brain and body are communicating well. This keeps your “control center” in good working order and reduces inflammation and stress. You may find your pregnancy back pain disappears.
Plus, chiropractic care during pregnancy can reduce symptoms of morning sickness, headaches, and other common elements of pregnancy.
Chiropractic care is all-natural so you don’t have to worry about drugs interfering with the growth of your child. While you always want to check with your doctor before seeing a prenatal chiropractor, for most pregnant women, it’s very safe. Your doctor may also be able to recommend some stretches to relieve pain too.
Prenatal Chiropractor Might Benefit Your Baby
Chances are, you’re taking prenatal vitamins, and reading up on various techniques to help you have a safe pregnancy.
You might be doing a little prenatal yoga or adapting other exercises to your changing body. A pregnancy chiropractor can add to your health regimen by keeping your body properly aligned. Most of all, regular adjustments can help your pelvis remain in the right position for giving birth.
When your pelvis is in the right position, your baby has room to grow and move into the birth canal in the best way possible. It can even help your labor to go smoothly and speedier.
If you’re pregnant, your body is going through many changes, help it adapt by considering chiropractic care during pregnancy. If you’re in Doylestown, PA, contact us for a consultation. Let us help you make your pregnancy more comfortable.
Do you pop Tylenol for your lower back pain? A new study shows it doesn’t work. Trying an alternative method to managing your back pain could be worthwhile, especially if it affecting you doing simple daily tasks. Plus, you could always look here for more information on how you could effectivly manage your back pain.
The study followed 1600 people for four weeks and it was released in The Lancet, a respected medical journal.
The group was divided into thirds with one third taking acetaminophen, the ingredient in Tylenol on an as needed basis. Another group took it three times a day and the third group took a placebo. None of the participants knew which group they were in.
Both groups tracked their pain daily on a scale of 1-10 for the duration of the study. Here’s the shocker: Each group reported roughly the same amount of pain daily throughout the four weeks.
No matter if they were taking sugar pills or a thrice daily recommendation of acetaminophen the pain was the same.
Three Months Later
Three months later, approximately 85% of the participants were pain free no matter which group they’d been in.
So, is the upshot that acetaminophen doesn’t work? While further studies will be conducted, this could be a surprising finding for most patients and doctors alike.
Lower back pain is one of the most common complaints and is notoriously difficult to treat because there can be so many variables. Lower back pain can contribute to a diminished quality of life. If your back pain has been caused by a fall you may want to speak to a Pittsburgh slip and fall lawyer about any legal action you would like to pursue.
What Does Help Lower Back Pain?
Alternative therapies like massage therapy, gentle yoga and chiropractic can relieve lower back pain effectively and quickly.
Massage therapy
Another study on lower back pain assigned patients a weekly massage for 10 weeks. The results were promising.
After 10 weeks, 36% and 39% of patients who received the weekly massages said their pain was gone or nearly gone. Around 4% of those who had not received massage could say the same.
Yoga
Practicing a few gentle yoga stretches can alleviate lower back pain. For example, lie on the floor on your back and draw your knees to your chest. Next, rotate your knees to the left and stretch your arms out so you make a “T” shape. Then, turn your head so you’re looking in the opposite direction.
Repeat on the other side.
Chiropractic Care
As a chiropractor, I start any treatment plan with Xrays and your medical history so we can have a baseline. We need to know what the symptoms are and what your body shows.
Then, I adjust your spine, shoulder, neck so everything is in alignment.
It only takes a few minutes and it doesn’t hurt. If you have a desk job, you likely sit with your head and shoulders hunched forward for hours at a time. This posture affects your whole body and can cause lower back pain. Old sports injuries, the way you’re sleeping, car accidents and other facts of life may also cause lower back pain. Some people might use liposomal cbd broad spectrum hemp extract and there has been people saying that this approach has been helpful.
The Xrays will give some idea of the problem so we can develop a treatment plan that works for you. It may include some physical therapy type exercises and regular chiropractic adjustments. You may even feel relief within the first visit.
If you’ve been getting cortisone shots for back pain and you don’t feel pain relief, it may not be your imagination.
A recent study presented at the International Spine Invention Society Annual Meeting found that only about 34% of patients who receive these injections feel any relief.
Also called epidural steroid injections (ESIs), these shots are commonly used to reduce inflammation caused by sciatica and herniated discs but they don’t work in the majority of patients.
The reason they don’t work is unclear. Plus, The Department of Orthopedic Surgery says using corticosteroid injections can weaken bones and reduce your calcium levels.
A recent study found even more shocking news.
If you’re having the injections in the lumbar area rather than the cervical spine region, they can increase your risk for vertebrae fracture by 21%. That’s 21% every time you get an injection!
That’s a high risk for something that has such a low rate of benefit.
What Are Cortisone Shots Anyway?
Your body naturally produces cortisone when you’re stressed. Back injuries, which are most often caused by trip and fall accidents amazingly, always result in a lot of inflammation. Your spine is an incredibly important part of your anatomy so these natural reactions are designed to protect it. Cortisone is a natural steroid that reduces this inflammation so you’re in less pain. Ideally, the injections reduce inflammation thereby reducing your pain.
Many people suffering with back pain have multiple shots and don’t feel relief at all or only feel relief for a few weeks. They’re an expensive option for something that may not work and that may have dangerous side effects. Additionally, studies show if they do work in the short-term, you may only find relief for a few weeks or months.
You deserve better.
Alternative Treatments
Your goal is be pain free. By reducing inflammation naturally through a series of chiropractic adjustments, we can help you reach that goal.
Chiropractic care helps reduce inflammation because we re-align your spine which is the life line of your body. Your spine has 31 pairs of nerves in it. If you’re suffering with sciatica or a herniated disc, your spine can be putting pressure on one or more of those nerves which causes pain and inflammation. When we re-align your spine, we take the pressure off. Basically, it’s a natural way to reduce inflammation.
If you’re in the Central Bucks region, give us a call. We can re-align your spine and help you find pain relief. Conveniently located in Doylestown, Pa. we have a new patient special.
Are you looking for natural back pain treatment? 80% of Americans experience back pain at some point in their lives. Many of you live with chronic back pain and lose tens of hours of your lives hurting.
For many patients, natural back pain treatment can be a combination of:
1 Adjusting your workspace – Are your shoulders perpetually hunched over a computer? Many Americans are taking on the appearance of a modern-day hunchback. Shoulders rolled forward, a chair that’s not the right height, your computer monitor being too low—all of these can contribute to neck and back pain.
Ideally, your monitor is at eye level. Your arms, wrists and backs are supported by your chair. You may need an ergonomic keyboard or a back support in your chair. If any of these are set-up incorrectly, you might want to look at moving your desk and its components around. Alternatively you could also look into purchasing some new products that can help you sit with a more comfortable posture, such as this 32 inch computer monitor to make viewing easier, for example.
2 Massage – Regular massage can help relieve back pain and when used in conjunction with chiropractic care, it can make a huge difference. The reason is simple; chiropractic adjustments manipulate your joints while massage manipulates your muscles. One complements the other.
3 Regular chiropractic care – Chiropractic adjustments are natural back pain treatment. It’s common for bones to be out of alignment. When they are, they can cause pressure on nerves or organs which can lead to back pain. When your chiropractor adjusts your spine everything is back into place.
Of course, most people’s bodies have adjusted to the “out of place” bones and they’ll creep back. Massage helps your muscles re-adjust to their “rightful” place.
Dr. Jeff McQuaite always welcomes new patients with an X-ray to see where the problems lie. Then, he usually offers a treatment plan that includes hot and cold therapy plus electric muscle treatment (lying on the table with the electric sensors delivering steady buzzing feeling on your sore muscles.)
Most patients enjoy the stem cell treatment and find it relaxes them.
You deserve natural back pain treatment. If you’re in the Central Bucks County area, try Dr. McQuaite and feel relief. Crawl-ins are always accepted.
Summer…you may have visions of outdoor BBQ’s, and maybe, moving your exercise program outdoors. Kayaking, golfing, biking, running…these are popular summer activities around Doylestown. However, as a chiropractor, I see frequent summer sports injuries.
