Chiropractors can help with all sorts of common health problems and ailments – even the ones you probably thought we had no interest in!
When I was pondering what to talk about with you this month, it occurred to me that I have seen a lot of ‘classic cases’ recently, so I thought I’d share some of them with you. These involve areas of general health and well-being.
It’s clear that patients, GPs and other healthcare professionals are often unaware that chiropractors can get great results with these problems – as well as all the other aspects of health and fitness we deal with. So here goes…
Headaches
Let’s start with a classic problem most of us have suffered with from time to time – headaches. While we have all had a headache before, some poor patients suffer more than others. On a regular basis, patients come to see me about something completely different and only mention their headaches in passing. Many headaches, including migraines, stem from problems in the neck involving the joints, muscles and nerves. Chiropractors are very well placed to use our hands-on care, exercise prescription and daily living advice to help you reduce or even eliminate this problem. Some headaches can arise from complications with your jaw. If you suffer with headaches but also have a ‘clicky’ jaw or uneven bite, it’s possible that the two are linked and can be easily treated.
Tennis elbow
At the moment, I’m treating about five or six of these painful injuries each week. This is an extremely common condition that relates to pain in the outside of the elbow, often caused by gripping, twisting or repetitive movements like tennis or guitar playing. Often, we can help tennis elbow by simply identifying the cause and taking appropriate steps to prevent repeats in the future. However, that may not be enough to get rid of the current painful symptoms. A common treatment plan would include soft tissue work, gentle elbow manipulation, laser or shockwave therapy and kinesiotaping – which allows the free flow of blood and lymphatic fluid to cleanse and heal the inflammation – to protect the elbow between appointments. In these cases, it’s also important to check for any neck involvement.
Slipped discs and trapped nerves
Technically, health professionals would call these disc bulges, herniations or radiculopathies, although most people might refer to them as slipped discs and trapped nerves. They commonly happen in the neck, giving arm pain, or in the lower back, resulting in leg pain. Rarely, they can occur in the thoracic spine – that’s the bit where your ribs attach. The most important thing is, these need to be diagnosed correctly with a thorough history and neurological exam. Chiropractors are trained in doing this so are well placed to diagnose trapped nerves from disc injuries. When radiculopathies (trapped nerves) are suspected, an MRI scan will confirm the cause, which is often a disc injury. I have seen other rarer causes including cysts, spurs and infections, so it can be helpful to rule these out.
Disc injuries can be extremely painful especially when they trap a nerve, so we will often co-manage patients with their GP for pain relief. We would teach them how to manage at home with techniques to sleep, stand and sit without pain. Then we explain how they can self-manage their condition alongside the care we provide. The number one treatment for discs is distraction or traction of the area with follow-up treatments of laser, soft tissue work and other gentle therapies.
Patients often enjoy this treatment as it can give short-term pain relief quite quickly. It is important to understand two things with disc injuries. First, research shows that even a significant disc injury can be improved with traction, exercise and conservative care 80% of the time. Otherwise, more invasive treatments may be needed, including injections or surgery. Second, disc injuries don’t just ‘pop’ back in, they take time to heal. This can take from weeks to months but with steady, conservative treatment you will have a better chance of avoiding surgery, dramatically reducing recuperation and disability time.
Policeman’s heel
These are also known as heel bruises. They cause extremely annoying pains underneath the heel and are different to plantar fasciitis, which inflicts pain more in the arch. Policeman’s heel is often caused by inappropriate footwear, being overweight, walking barefoot on hard floor, or even a small stone in your shoe – which is what the pain then feels like! The ‘fix’ involves one of my favourite treatment techniques, where we tape the heel so tightly that it creates a clever cushion underneath to take the pressure off the site of pain. The taping normally lasts 3-5 days and, all being well, we repeat it for around 3 weeks to give the heel bruise time to recover. Then ‘voila’, the heel pain has gone!
Photo by Nachristos on Unsplash
