If you think of a chiropractor, you tend to think of a specialist in back or neck pain, or even a glorified masseur, but in fact there is so much more to chiropractic care, and it could improve the wellbeing of the whole family. According to Thomas Edison, ‘The doctor of the future will give no medicine, but will instruct his patient in the care of the human frame, in diet and in the cause and prevention of disease’. This is the wellness goal of chiropractic care – it’s not anti-medicine, but rather aims to help your family to live a lifestyle where you rarely require it.
A family wellness chiropractor doesn’t give medicine, but instead advises you on how to care for your body and recognise that you have all you need to thrive already within you. Chiropractors are actually the originators of the wellness movement, because they are the only healthcare professionals who recognise that the body has a natural ability to heal itself. Through proper nutrition, exercise and routine chiropractic care, your body can perform at maximum efficiency. And this is true for the whole family, whether it’s you, your teenager who plays a lot of sports, or your toddler who falls down often – everyone could use a dose of spinal wellness.
Your body consists of muscles, organs and glands, which are controlled by the nervous system (made up of your brain, spinal cord and nerves). Your brain tells communicates with your spine and nerves, and they in turn tell your heart to beat, your lungs to breathe, and so on. Therefore, if your spine is even slightly misaligned, this can create nerve interference known as subluxation, which is what leads to loss of function and symptoms of illness. Unlike mainstream medicine, chiropractic care recognises these symptoms as alerts from the body that there’s something amiss, and seeks to eliminate the cause rather than mask it with symptom-treating medications.
To find where the problem lies, your chiropractor will analyse your spine using X-rays to actually look at the vertebra themselves, surface electromyography to measure your nerve signals and look for interference, a nervoscope to detect and measure heat that occurs due to subluxations irritating the nerves, static or motion palpation to feel for tenderness or a lack of motion in your vertebral joint, and/or a check of your posture or legs to see if anything is misaligned. He or she will then go over where your back is subluxated, if at all, and what course of treatment they would suggest to bring you relief.
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