Amarillo Chiropractor on 'What Is Chiropractic Care?'
What is chiropractic care and how can you benefit?
Chiropractic care is a treatment that involves a proper function of your body's musculoskeletal structure without the need for medication or surgery. Chiropractic caregivers are called chiropractors or doctors of chiropractic.
A chiropractor may be described as a health care professional who focuses on the diagnosis as well as treatment of neuromusculoskeletal disorders through the use of manual adjustment, manual therapy, exercise/rehabilitation, strengthening, or manipulation of the spine.
Chiropractic care is administered to relieve pain and to improve the functionality of different joints or regions of the body. Chiropractors are not only concerned with joints of the body and proper function though. Chiropractic care also enhances the general health state of an individual. Based on research and evidence, we can say that the benefits of chiropractic care are quite numerous.
Benefits of chiropractic care·
- Chiropractic care can help you to get rid of the pain.
Pain can be quite discomforting, especially when it has lasted for a long time. Migraines, neck pain, arthritis, lower back pain, etc. are different sources of pain. Chiropractors in Amarillo can help patients to get relief from pain. The National Pain Strategy defines chronic pain as any pain experienced at least every other day for 6 months or more. Considering the duration it has lasted, chronic pain is certainly more difficult to treat. But, chiropractic care has shown effectiveness in the research literature in addressing it.
- Chiropractic care can help reduce opioid addiction and prescription medications
Several high-level studies have shown that not only citizens but even active member military and veterans treating with chiropractic care experience significant relief from pain allowing them to reduce their dependency on pain-killing pharmaceuticals.
- Chiropractic care treats the source and not just the symptoms
The use of pain medications may only treat the symptoms of the condition, but chiropractic care helps in reversing the cause of the pain. When pain is treated from the source, there is a lower risk of developing such symptoms later on. Taking pain killers rather than treating the source of the pain is like taking the battery out of the smoke alarm because you don’t like the sound. Well that’s not very smart now, is it?
- Chiropractic care is excellent in treating both chronic pain and acute pain.
As mentioned, research studies are clear that chiropractic is effective in treating chronic pain but it’s also been shown effective in treating acute pain which is pain that has been around less than three months. Acute pain can be sharp and stabbing at times and chiropractic can calm that down and get you back on your feet more rapidly. In addition, treating pain in the acute stage keeps it from turning into chronic pain, thus making it much easier and less expensive to address. Essentially, go to the chiropractor when the pain is still new. Don’t wait!! If you need anym further convincing, the American College of Physicians in 2016 updated their recommendations for treating chronic and acute back pain. The new recommendations stated that spinal manipulative therapy is a recommended first-line therapy for back pain.
- Chiropractic care can address proprioceptive and balance issues while helping your body correct abnormal movement patterns.
Many times, the main source of the problem is dysfunction in proprioceptive and sensorimotor function. Meaning, your body brings in information and makes a decision about how to move your body and with how much force based on that incoming information. Information in = information out. Sort of like a computer if you will. When the information coming in is not being processed accurately due to proprioceptive dysfunction, then the movement patterns can be aberrant and actually detrimental. Proprioceptive and balance training can help clear up this mismatch of information helping you to move in a more healthy way.
- Chiropractic care can help reduce suicides
Some people react adversely to medications, and the continuous use of medication for the treatment of stress or pain symptoms may be addictive. Chiropractic care does not involve medication because it is a hands-on treatment that involves adjustments and manipulation of the spine. One of the newest articles from the American Academy of Family Physicians cites spinal manipulative therapy as being an excellent option to reduce opioids, overdoses, and suicides. That’s HUGE!
- Chiropractic care can help patients get better sleep
One of the excellent under-reported benefits of chiropractic is that patients often report that they get much better sleep after having started treating with a chiropractor. Nervousness, anxiety, stress, and tension tend to keep us up at night. There is good evidence that chiropractic can help reduce all of those symptoms so it only makes sense that you should, ideally, sleep better as a result.
- Chiropractic care can be complemented with other treatment methods
Chiropractic care can be combined with other treatment methods to provide healing for patients. Spinal manipulation may be combined with exercise, massage, myofascial release, acupuncture, spinal decompression, low-level laser, and many other modalities to help treat patients with lower back pain.
Now is a good time to call the only Fellowship-trained chiropractic orthopedist in all of West Texas west of the I-35 corridor. Call your local evidence-based chiropractor and develop a relationship with a family chiropractor that will pay benefits for you and your family for years to come.
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Dr. Jeff Williams, DC, FIANM is a Fellowship-trained Neuromusculoskeletal specialist and chiropractor in Amarillo, TX. As an Amarillo chiropractor, Dr. Williams treats chronic pain, disc pain, low back pain, neck pain, whiplash injuries, and more. Dr. Williams is also the host of The Chiropractic Forward Podcast. Through the podcast, Dr. Williams teaches fellow chiropractors and advocates weekly for evidence-based, patient-centered practice through current and relevant research. If you have any questions for Dr. Williams, feel free to email at [email protected]
Learn more about Dr. Williams and his practice at https://www.amarillochiropractor.com. Dr. Williams's full-time Amarillo chiropractic practice is Creek Stone Integrated Care at 3501 SW 45th St., Ste. T, Amarillo, TX 79109
