Cincinnati Chiropractor Advises: Get Your Balance Checked to Avoid Work Injuries
Posted by admin in work injuries on April 8th, 2010
As a Cincinnati Chiropractor I treat many older adults who suffer from balance problems. In fact, nine percent of adults, aged 65 and older, have episodes of dizziness, “wooziness,” and other balance-related challenges. Good balance is extremely important, of course, in assisting older adults to stay independent and in avoiding falls and incurring injuries that are commonly very serious or even fatal. But, would you be surprised to hear that falls are the cause of a large percentage of work injuries for workers younger than 65 years of age, including those in their twenties and thirties? That’s right! No one is “invulnerable” to balance problems, no matter how young they may be. In fact, those who work in”precarious locations” like construction workers, roofers, oil platform employees, windows cleaners, or any other place where a ladder is necessary are in danger of serious injury if their balance isn’t good.
The most important function of good balance is to help us to manage and maintain our body position, whether we are standing still or moving, and whether we are on the ground or high up on a platform. Good balance helps us to walk without staggering, arise from a sitting position without teetering, and to climb stairs without slipping. To sum it up, then, good balance is crucial to our health and well-being.
What may be disconcerting to you is that you could have a balance abnormality without realizing how significant it is. Often times an individual may be able to “shake off” a dizzy feeling and the feeling may not return for a while. However when precipetous dizziness comes about at a critical time, it is too late to shake it off and a fall is most likely inevitable.
Vertigo is the medical name for the sensation that you, or objects around you, are spinning. Close to 40% of people in the U.S. will have at least one incidence of dizziness that is acute enough to seek out a health professional, like your Chiropractor in Cincinnati. But, if you are involved in any of the activities listed above, having a chiropractor check your balance before an episode of dizziness, make corrections if necessary, and then help you to maintain good balance, may save you from serious injury or worse.
Balance disorders are dangerous at any age. If you feel as if you may have a possible balance disorder, it is extremely important for you to be examined and treated without delay. Often guidelines are helpful. Therefore, if you can answer “yes” to any of the following questions, even if the experience is seldom or infrequent, it is highly recommended that you discuss the symptom(s) with a chiropractor as soon as possible:
• Have you experienced a feeling of being “unsteady?”
• Has the room seemed to spin around you?
• Has there ever a time when you felt as if you were moving when you knew you were standing still?
• Have you lost your balance and/or fallen down?
• Have you ever felt as if you were falling?
• Has your vision ever become “blurred?”
• Have you ever felt disoriented, or lost a sense of time, place or identity?
As discussed above, balance problems are not specific to a particular age group. Our falling down is an ever-present possibility from the time we learn to walk until we take our final step If you work in a job that makes your falling down a “critical” event, you need to have your balance checked. Don’t wait until it’s too late! Call a Chiropractor today, and if you’re in the Cincinnati area, I’d love to be your Cincinnati Chiropractor!
Your San Diego Chiropractor Wants You to Know That Those Seemingly Harmless Extra Few Pounds Can Make a Big Difference in the Long Run
Posted by admin in weight loss on April 1st, 2010
As a Chiropractor in San Diego, I counsel many individuals who come to my clinic who want to lose weight. I know how hard it can be, and I also know how important it is to lose those extra pounds. Before you let out all the seams in your current wardrobe, there’s something you need to know relating to those few extra pounds you may have gained. Over time, they can add up to a large number of health problems from heart and pulmonary diseases and diabetes to back challenges and joint degeneration. Extra pounds put undue stress on organs, like the heart, as well as on joints in the low back, hips, and knees. Over half (62%) of American adults are overweight or obese, according to recent studies. That is a substantial figure and a sizable national health issue (no pun intended).
It is likely no surprise to you to learn that the human body was not intended to carry around a surfeit of weight in the form of body fat. Just 20 or 30 extra pounds can, in point of fact, overload and encumber the musculoskeletal system. Added weight in the belly, for instance, requires that the body compensate (counterbalance the weight) by tilting the pelvis forward. This angle creates compression in the joints of the low back. Joint compression restricts nerve activity and causes painful inflammation. Most people that are overweightexperience low back pain generated by an impingement of the sciatic nerve or spinal misalignments that restrict nerves due to weight-bearing stresses. If ignored, misaligned vertebra not only continue to irritate the degenerative changes that have taken place already, but can create new arthritic changes in the spine in the future.
Here are the ways in which chiropractic treatment can help. Perhaps, it should go without saying that a healthy body weight is required in order for the musculoskeletal system to function in the way it is designed to. That said, in addition, chiropractic adjustments relieve nerve impingements in the spinal column and assist in getting motion back into the joints of the musculoskeletal system, such as in the low back, hips, and knees. And, of course exercise and physical activity are a lot easier, and more beneficial for the body, when the spine is in alignment and the joints have good motion. Not only will exercise help with weight reduction, but it can actually slow the potential for degenerative changes as over the years.
Healthcare professionals, like your chiropractor, can talk to you about your diet and exercise options. In addition to assisting people suffering from back pain and joint inflammation, chiropractors can provide trained suggestions on the kinds of lifestyle modifications that can help an individual to stay healthier, more energetic, and more active through the years. It isn’t a foregone conclusion that arthritis and immobility are an unavoidable part of the aging process. The human body was intended for a lifetime of pain-free movement.
So, if you’ve been throwing your weight around and all you’ve been getting in return is back and joint pain,as your San Diego chiropractor and someone who cares about your health, I can help relieve your suffering. Make an appointment today!
Drugs…Just in Case?
As a chiropractor who believes in the human body’s ability to heal itself, often with the aid of natural, non-invasive, drug-free treatment, I am always dismayed, but never surprised, at some of the pernicious claims and tenacious effrontery of drug companies when it comes to pain killers, in general, and the “treatment” of a number of conditions that don’t get any better with drugs or are made worse by them. And, as a chiropractor who has helped hundreds of headache sufferers not only get temporary, but permanent relief, when I read about a drug study for yet another pain med that will likely keep headache sufferers numbed to their pain, but in the process numb to the rest of their life as well, I feel like shouting from the rooftops: “Try chiropractic first!” But, today, when I read about a study, sponsored by Merck (who also makes the product), I really felt compelled to say that this particular study is shamefully playing to the fears of migraine sufferers when, in fact, the drug itself only offers “less severity” at best when it comes to a migraine headache.
The study, conducted by Dr. X. Henry Hu of Merck & Co.and colleagues, found that one in five migraine sufferers had “avoided” a work-related commitment because they were afraid of getting a migraine, while 27 percent reported canceling a work commitment for this reason, and round 28 percent said they had avoided or canceled social commitments due to fear of migraines.
I have treated many patients who told me how much they’d “feared” the onset of a migraine and limited their activities in life because of that fear, so I do understand how devastating the fear migraines can be. And, yet, the only “solution” this study offered?
This study is “important,” said Dr. Hu, the unpredictability of migraines could contribute to people’s anxiety and fear about them and early treatment with migraine drugs called triptans can help reduce headache severity. “Because of the lack of predictability of future migraine attacks, migraine sufferers may benefit from increased education on the importance of keeping medications available at all times,” they concluded.
My conclusion? If you suffer from migraines, give your chiropractor a call today!
SOURCE: Headache, published online March 25, 2010.
Chiropractic Masters Blog Talk Radio
The Bright Side to Supermarket Fluorescent Lighting
Does your refrigerator light stay on when you close the frig door? No? Well, new research is suggesting that perhaps it should! As a chiropractor, I’m all about “total wellness,” which means that I believe in routine chiropractic care along with a healthy lifestyle that includes good nutrition, regular exercise, drinking plenty of water, and dealing effectively with life stresses. Getting the nutrition we need from fruits and vegetables used to be a “no brainer,” i.e., just buy them fresh. But, with the current trend towards big farm over-planting that has lead to soil depletion in many areas, sadly the fruits and vegetables grown in, and pulled from, soil lacking in nutrients lack much of the health benefits they once offered. We generally need to search for fruit and veggie stands and farmers’ markets to get anything close to the natural nutrition that was once “a given” when we were children because, let’s face it, it’s hard to find healthy produce in our supermarkets anymore. So, I was pleasantly surprised and very interested in a new study that the harsh, unnatural lighting in most supermarkets — the kind of lighting that seems to have no environmental upside — apparently has a bright side: healthier fruits and vegetables.
That’s right! A recent study found that spinach actually gained nutritional value as it sat for days under fluorescent lights! And, not just “minor” value gains. Some vitamins doubled their concentrations. Apparently, fluorescent supermarket lights mimic the spectrum of natural sunlight, and some supermarkets keep them on all the time, 24-hours a day. Continuous light exposure allows plants to maintain photosynthesis and, of course, photosynthesis produces nutrients.
The study’s author, Gene Lester, is a research plant physiologist at the United States Department of Agriculture in Beltsville, MD. He and his colleagues chose to study spinach because it is one of the most nutritionally complete vegetables commonly available, with significant concentrations of vitamins C, A, K, E and folate.
You can read about how the research was done in the Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry or by going to discovery.com
Bottom line: To boost the nutritional content of spinach and other produce, researchers suggest (counter-intuitively) that consumers select packages from the front of display cases that are kept under continuous light.
Old Adages and New Ones
You probably know that “An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure,” but did you know that “A pound of fat equals 3,500 calories”? As a chiropractor who believes that a healthy lifestyle includes a healthy weight, I believe that the latter equation is just as important as the former when it comes to your health. So does First Lady, Michelle Obama. In announcing a national plan to counter childhood obesity, she indicated that weight loss doesn’t have include an unnatural “minus” intake of food, but slight lifestyle changes, such as replacing soda pop with water or walking to school, are “small changes that add up.” The formula seems simple enough: reducing calorie intake by just 100 calories a day, or burning up that amount, would equal losing a pound every 35 days, or as much as 10 pounds or more a year. And, though individual losses might vary and educating children (and their parents) about nutrition is still very necessary, in my opinion making “small changes” is a healthy place to start for many kids.
Unfortunately, there are those who find such equations “misleading,” like the health blog at NYTimes.com . In it Tara Parker-Pope states that “numerous scientific studies show that small caloric changes have almost no long-term effect on weight. When we skip a cookie or exercise a little more, the body’s biological and behavioral adaptations kick in, significantly reducing the caloric benefits of our effort.”
The question the article poses is “Can small changes in diet and exercise at least keep children from gaining weight?” And it goes on to say that “While some obesity experts think so, mathematical models suggest otherwise.”
To read the blog in its entirety, click the link above. Then you can reach your own conclusions.
Old Adages and New Ones
You probably know that “An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure,” but did you know that “A pound of fat equals 3,500 calories”? As a chiropractor who believes that a healthy lifestyle includes a healthy weight, I believe that the latter equation is just as important as the former when it comes to your health. So does First Lady, Michelle Obama. In announcing a national plan to counter childhood obesity, she indicated that weight loss doesn’t have include an unnatural “minus” intake of food, but slight lifestyle changes, such as replacing soda pop with water or walking to school, are “small changes that add up.” The formula seems simple enough: reducing calorie intake by just 100 calories a day, or burning up that amount, would equal losing a pound every 35 days, or as much as 10 pounds or more a year. And, though individual losses might vary and educating children (and their parents) about nutrition is still very necessary, in my opinion making “small changes” is a healthy place to start for many kids.
Unfortunately, there are those who find such equations “misleading,” like the health blog at NYTimes.com . In it Tara Parker-Pope states that “numerous scientific studies show that small caloric changes have almost no long-term effect on weight. When we skip a cookie or exercise a little more, the body’s biological and behavioral adaptations kick in, significantly reducing the caloric benefits of our effort.”
The question the article poses is “Can small changes in diet and exercise at least keep children from gaining weight?” And it goes on to say that “While some obesity experts think so, mathematical models suggest otherwise.”
To read the blog in its entirety, click the link above. Then you can reach your own conclusions.
Wichita Chiropractor Wants You to Know That Chiropractic Treatment Can Relieve Your Sciatic Pain
As a Wichita Chiropractor for over twenty years, I have helped a significant number of people suffering from sciatic pain, therefore, I’m genuinely aware from experience just how disabling the pain from sciatica can be. Sciatica sufferers are sadly all too familiar with the kind of deep pain that often radiates through the lower part of their body, persists during the day and inhibits almost all of their daily activities.
Could your low back pain be generated by sciatica? You are more than likely suffering from sciatica if your pain radiates from your low back, through your buttock(s), down the large sciatic nerve in the back of one or both legs, and possibly penetrates into your knee(s). Moreover, not just activity, but even sitting can be painful. Frequently lying down will reduce, or perhaps even temporarily eliminate the pain. Even so, it’s important for you to know that sciatica cannot be corrected without appropriate care.
Radiculopathy
A radiculopathy is a medical term that describes a condition where a disc has protruded from its natural position in the spine and is putting pressure on the radicular nerve (nerve root) that forms part of the sciatic nerve in the lower back. Such pressure can generate excruciating pain.
Added pressure on the intervertebral discs, as well as imbalances in the muscles encasing the spine, can take place during and after long periods of sitting, especially with bad posture. More often than not, a particular event or injury doesn’t cause sciatica, but rather sciatica is likely to evolve over time as a consequence of everyday wear and tear on the vertebrae of the lower spine. Over the course of time the lower spine can lose its ability to function normally during ordinary stresses.
If this occurs, the intervertebral disc undergoes small fissures or cracks that then permit the soft nucleus to protrude the disc outward. If the disc pushes on sensitive tissues, it produces the pain that is commonly called a ruptured, or slipped, disc. Sciatica is the result of the disc pressing on the spinal nerve. Fortunately, most disc challenges, including sciatica, can be totally alleviated with chiropractic manipulation and therapy that usually includes postural exercises.
Periformis Syndrome
Periformis syndrome is another cause of sciatic pain. Periformis syndrome develops when the periformis muscle, which is superficial to the sciatic nerve, goes into spasm and irritates the nerve. Along with chiropractic manipulation, this particular sciatica can be significantly relieved by sciatica stretches that your chiropractor can recommend.
It is essential for you to seek chiropractic attention if you are experiencing sciatic pain. If you are in the Wichita area, as your Wichita Chiropractor, I look forward to helping you to get out of pain and get your life back!
Pick Your Poison, Choose Your Beer
Let's face it, if you like beer, you're going to look for a good reason to drink it, whether it's a tailgate party, as a pizza accompaniment, or to help built strong and healthy bones. Say what? Up until I heard the recent news reports and read an article that appeared recently on the HealthDay News blog, I wouldn't have listed that last reason on the "pro" side of any health list I was making. But according to a new study published in Journal of the Science of Food and Agriculture beer, or at least some beer high in barley and hops contain dietary silicon,contributes to bone mineral density. I'm a chiropractor, so naturally anything that helps to build bone density is good in my book. And, though there are foods, such as bananas, that also contain dietary silicon, if you like beer, this study is good news!
Beer for the Bones? (HealthDay News) — Beer may help keep bones strong because it's a rich source of dietary silicon, which contributes to bone mineral density, a new study reports. But the amount of silicon apparently varies by the type of beer. "The factors in brewing that influence silicon levels in beer have not been extensively studied," study author Charles Bamforth, a professor in the food science and technology department at the University of California, Davis, said in a news release from the Journal of the Science of Food and Agriculture. The study is published in the journal's February issue. "We have examined a wide range of beer styles for their silicon content and have also studied the impact of raw materials and the brewing process on the quantities of silicon that enter wort and beer," Bamforth said. Wort is liquid extracted from the mashing process during the brewing of beer. The researchers tested 100 commercial beers and found that their silicon content ranged from 6.4 to 56.5 milligrams per liter. "Beers containing high levels of malted barley and hops are richest in silicon," Bamforth said. "Wheat contains less silicon than barley because it is the husk of the barley that is rich in this element. While most of the silicon remains in the husk during brewing, significant quantities of silicon nonetheless are extracted into wort, and much of this survives into beer."More information
The U.S. National Institute of Arthritis and Musculoskeletal and Skin Diseases has more about bone health.
SOURCE: Journal of the Science of Food and Agriculture, news release, Feb. 7, 2010