Monday, August 26, 2019

Posture Proof


In the past, I’ve discussed the importance of regarding your posture and maintaining the proper position of the neck.  I’ve also warned of habits such as texting, gaming, sewing, and even reading with head bent forward and how this can lead to numerous problems.  While I hope this makes some common sense, part of me presumes you would expect this kind of advice from one of those crazy chiropractors much in the same way those crazy dentists are always hounding us about flossing our teeth.  But just why is neck posture so important?

Beyond the painful symptoms of neck pain, shoulder problems and tension headaches, proper position and curvature of the neck relates to some very real and critical health functions.  For example, multiple research studies show a loss of the normal curvature of the neck will reduce lung capacity by up to 30%.  Calliet, M.D. reported that decreased spinal curves and position affect the heart, lungs, and digestive systems.  In 1979, Korr displayed that faulty posture of the neck weakens the immune system and increases sensitivity to pain.  In a 2001 edition of Neurology India, it was reported that upper neck problems often result in disturbances in gait, dizziness, and loss of balance.  In 1974, Reich, M.D. reported that the decreased blood from abnormal posture is a major factor in all disease including cancer.  Dr. Freeman reported in 1997 that posture deviations result in overall poor health and quality of life as well as shortened lifespan.  Similar findings were reported in the Journal of Bone and Joint Surgery in 1981 stating that loss of spinal curves increase mortality and can take up to 14 years off your life.

So don’t just take my word for it!  Maintain proper posture with good habits, exercise, chiropractic and massage.  Impress upon your kids that this is so important because like everything else, the mistakes they make now will be paid for later in life.  Look better, feel better and minimize these health problems simply by taking pride in your posture!  Oh, and keep flossing those teeth as well.

Monday, August 19, 2019

Two Studies


As a chiropractor, I’ve always considered it my job to help people age gracefully and deal with any health concerns without taking a bunch of drugs.  Obviously, this objective is a more holistic view focused on overall health.  Unfortunately, due to the branding of the profession through the 70’s and 80’s the chiropractor became known merely as a lower cost treatment for neck pain, back pain, and headaches.  While there’s certainly value in this to the person in pain, it doesn’t have much to do with overall health.  With this in mind, I wanted to look for studies that showed a correlation between chiropractic care and improved health and wellness.  I quickly found two similar studies that were published in recent years.

In the first study, the researchers looked at individuals over 75 years of age and they compared those who were chiropractic patients to those who had not seen a chiropractor for any health concern.  The individuals in the chiropractic group reported, “Better overall health, fewer prescription drugs, and more activity.”  Even more impressively, the chiropractic group on average had 21% less time in hospitals over the three year period prior to the study.

In the second study, they looked at senior citizens over the age of 65.  But in this study, they wanted to look only at those individuals who had been under regular chiropractic or “maintenance care” at a frequency of at least once per month for five years or longer.  In this study, they found that the chiropractic group had 50% fewer medical provider visits and 95.8% of those surveyed found their chiropractic care to be “considerably” or “extremely” valuable.

How can this be?  It starts by recognizing that health is an inside job.  Our bodies are designed to be self-healing and self-regulating.  The brain and nervous system control all the functions of the body through the nerve signals that travel down through the bones of the spine.  When, from various lifestyle stresses, those bones of the spine should become misaligned, they will place tension and pressure on the delicate nerves causing interference or a lack of communication between the brain and the body.  A chiropractor’s job is to detect and correct these misalignments so that the nervous system can function as it was designed and the body can better express its full potential.  While both of these studies cited were looking at individuals over 65, please recognize that what’s true for an older population who likely has more accumulated life stresses and health problems, will be every bit as true for younger populations as well.

Monday, August 12, 2019

Starting a Program


You’ve likely heard by now that sitting is considered the new smoking; meaning that the health detriments of prolonged sitting day in and day out are just as dangerous if not worse than smoking cigarettes.  I recently read a report that two hours of continuous sitting will undo the benefits of 20 minutes of exercise.  This is just more evidence that we need to get up and get moving and get out of our seats at home and at the office.  Obviously any form of exercise is better than none at all, but what type of exercise should you be doing to gain the greatest return on investment for you overall health and wellness?

As I’ve reported before, the best exercise programs include dimensions for strength, cardiovascular, as well as balance, coordination, and flexibility.  Most people simply don’t do this.  The weight lifters are often lacking the flexibility and cardiovascular components.  The walkers/runners are often lacking the strength and flexibility.  The yoga enthusiasts could do better with strength and cardio.  Again, this is not to downplay any of these forms of exercise as they’re all equally great in their own right; they’re simply incomplete by themselves.  The standard recommendations that are most widely accepted are to do strength training twice per week where you work on all the major muscle groups at least once each week.  Try to make your strength training as “functional” as possible where you are performing common, real-life movements with resistance rather than isolated muscle training.  A personal trainer can help you with this.  In addition to strength, cardiovascular training three times per week is the most commonly accepted schedule.  In order to get the greatest health benefits and weight loss out of your cardio work, practice what is referred to as HIIT or high intensity interval training.  This type of training is so important on many levels and it is where I’d recommend getting started if you’re just getting back into exercise.  The advantages of this training include insulin regulation, maximized growth hormone, but also time management.  Through HIIT training you can get a better workout in just 20 minutes than what you would otherwise do in an hour on a treadmill or bike with a steady heart rate.  Again, a trainer can provide different options for HIIT.  In regard to flexibility and coordination, it’s a good practice to include 10 minutes of this at the end of every workout.  This practice will relieve stress off your muscles and joints that can lead to injury but more importantly, working on balance will help prevent dangerous falls as we age.

What I’ve just described is the type of workouts provided in our wellness program.  This program was designed using the latest science and research.  In addition to this, our trainers focus on core strength and posture to retrain the posture patterns that cause much of the back and hip as well as neck and shoulder problems that people suffer from.  We have three trainers in the office doing this work and they’re eager to help. Contact us to get started with your personal wellness program and let us help you reach your goals.

Monday, August 5, 2019

Sleep Soundly


I had someone come into the office without physical complaints, but rather to be checked to see if something was going on with his nervous system that would keep him from sleeping.  He reported to me that he had not slept normally in over a year!  This case alerted me to what a big problem insomnia and other sleep disorders are to people and how important it is to have some strategies to get the necessary rest for proper health.

Nearly two-thirds of Americans suffer from occasional sleeplessness.  Of those polled, 40% said they wake throughout the night and more 25% reported that they don’t fall asleep or wake too early.  Improper sleep causes numerous problems including poor memory, confusion, poor immune function and healing response, increased stress response, low mental and physical energy, difficulty losing weight, coordination problems, moodiness, depression, and hormonal imbalances amongst other things.  A recent study showed that just one night of low sleep reduced your ability to function the next day by 30%. 

Barring those who have breathing problems, sleeping problems are almost always related to hormonal imbalances as a result of chronic stress.  As I’ve said numerous times, stress is a learned response.  We experience stress, and then we practice it until we get really good at it.  By this time, adrenal, thyroid and pituitary hormones are out of whack and the brain begins to respond in a manner of stress physiology.  Within a stress response, lack of sleep is perfectly normal.  When this is the case, the only way to increase sleep is to decrease the stress.  Exercise is very important for this, but 10 minutes of meditation per day is what I have found to be the most effective.  Eliminating caffeine, nicotine, sugar and white flour from the diet can be very important for some people as well.  I also advocate the habit of writing in a gratitude journal right before bed.  You cannot be in a state of gratitude and stress at the same time.  If you’re waking at the same time every night about 4-5 hours after you go to bed, this is a sign of liver toxicity and a detoxification can be enormously helpful.  Eating foods high in tryptophan such as turkey or consuming something with fat in it like milk or cheese can be helpful before bed.  When all these suggestions fail, I recommend supplementing with melatonin. This is a chemical released in the brain to stimulate sleep, but it gets out of balance due to stress and irregular sleep habits.  Melatonin will not make you drowsy the next day and many times it only needs to be taken for a short while. Benesom, from Metagenics, is a sleep supplement we carry that has melatonin as an active ingredient. In addition to melatonin, CBD oil has been shown to improve sleep. For more information on CBD oil, please contact our office.

Either way, adequate and sound sleep is critical for health.  If you’re one of the two-thirds of Americans that suffer, try some of these strategies to break the cycle.  As for the young man who came to the office, fortunately for him, after just a couple easy adjustments to remove pressure off the nerves in his upper neck, he is sleeping soundly.