Archive for August 2023

It may sound like the outcome of a medieval torture tool, but we promise it is not! At our office, we focus on spinal elongation to combat the effects of spinal degeneration. As we grow older, the concepts of posture, exercise, and nutrition become as important as they are easy to ignore. Days turning into months of hard work in the office accelerate the natural process of human body degradation. In short, it is something we all share, the reality that our bodies degrade over time. However, it is within your power to limit how much your lifestyle contributes to this degradation. 

Spinal degeneration is often accelerated by a myriad of compressive forces: whether it is caused by acute injury, a condition like scoliosis, or poor posture, these antagonists synergize in their effort to create pain, nerve dysfunction, and changes in the natural curvature of the human spine. As compression effectively warps the spine, pain conditions begin to manifest with symptoms including:

• Pain and stiffness
• Numbness in the extremities
• Loss of coordination 
• Sciatica

So what are ways of preventing this? Regular exercise, maintaining a healthy weight with diet, and good posture. These three things, as with so many conditions, make up the base of what we can do with our everyday lifestyle to fight spinal compression. At our office, we help by pinpointing where the problem is happening and targeting our treatments for the individual. 

• Decompression therapy: focuses on creating negative intradiscal pressure to allow for retraction of bulging disc material. 
• Stretching: targeting specific muscle groups in the back to help elongate the spine.
• We help you learn about the condition and institute lifestyle changes that will reduce its severity. 

Elongation of the spine is a relatively simple concept as it relates to your health. We use noninvasive methods to get to the root of the problem. For people attempting to improve their suffering from conditions brought on by spinal compression, we are your ally and greatest fan. Tap into our wealth of resources today by calling our office and scheduling an appointment today. 

When it comes to strengthening the spine, food is one of your most formidable allies. Nutrition is fun because you can apply it to whatever scale you are thinking about: as chiropractors, we find nutrition to be particularly helpful in managing the health of joints. Joint aching and pain is generally thought of as a problem for the elderly. Recent studies show that it is much more prolific: arthritis, which is a blanket term to include all kinds of conditions that cause joint pain and stiffness, can affect people of all ages. When eating to keep your joints healthy, the focus should be on consuming anti-inflammatory ingredients which strengthen the bones and boost the immune system. This gives you your best shot at keeping your joints healthy into old age.

Joint-friendly foods: what to eat and what to avoid to harness the power of nutrition for your well-being. 

Thumbs-up

• Fish oil, derived from fatty fish. Omega-3 fatty acids are great at fighting inflammation that keeps you stiff and sore. 
• Low-fat milk helps to fortify bones that grow brittle with age.
• Olive oil lowers the amount of inflammatory enzymes in the body.

Thumbs-down

• Soda
• Foods high in saturated fat actually conduce inflammation. Sorry, bacon.
• Trans-fat and processed sugars contribute to weight gain and inflammation

Also keep in mind, the more you move the less joints will hurt. This can be rather difficult because pain often prevents you from moving, but give our a call and find out how we can reduce the pain you experience and get you moving again to create a positive feedback loop.