27 Jun Injury Recovery in Broken Arrow – Eastern Oklahoma Chiropractic
Unless you have medical training, it’s difficult to know what the best treatment for injuries is without going to a doctor. While this won’t apply to all possible treatments for injuries, this is the protocol I use in my Broken Arrow chiropractic office. Also, you should always consult a doctor to have your injury properly diagnosed before following a course of treatment for injuries.
The first question is always, how did you injure yourself? If your injury was traumatic like a car accident, fall or sudden impact, there is always a chance something is broken. At that point, we recommend examination and X-rays before beginning treatment. Most patients who come into my Broken Arrow chiropractic office for treatment for injuries aren’t in this situation. A lot of time it is something that built slowly over time or “just happened”. In these cases, we still undergo the examination and X-rays in order to properly diagnose the problem and the diagnostic tests allow us to rule out more serious pathophysiology in most cases.
In the case of your back, we need to do a thorough exam to see how your posture is influencing your problem. In today’s world where people can’t pull their eyes away from a screen, it’s important to evaluate if a forward head posture is putting pressure on your skeleton in ways that it shouldn’t. Your head weighs between 12-15 lbs so if it is sitting forward on your skeleton an inch or four inches in some circumstances, it won’t just cause neck pain. It often causes problems all the way up and down your skeleton.
When you seek treatment for injuries in our chiropractic office, we also evaluate how your lifestyle is contributing to your back problem. Are you a mostly sedentary person? Do you sit for work, commute an hour each way and then come home and sit more? Regular exercise and movement throughout the day are critical to feeling good and maintaining health.
As far as an actual treatment for injuries, I typically set people up on a regular adjustment program until we can make changes in how the spine moves and change how the bones articulate with each other. Once we see what changes from that, I can make better recommendations involving stretches and exercises. In the beginning phase of a back injury, I typically recommend a lot of ice/heat contrast therapy along with walking to remain active. Oftentimes, it’s appropriate to take a break and/or modify the excessive activity you are doing in order to allow the injury to health completely and rapidly although I am not a proponent of eliminating activity totally in most cases.
The good news, if my patients adhere to the treatment plan we set up, especially the first month of it, we see great results. We say “we’ll have you doing cartwheels in no time.” Unless of course, you were never able to do a cartwheel in which case, I wouldn’t advise attempting them :-). If you have questions on whether or not, chiropractic can help your injuries, call our office and set up your first visit. We are easily reached at 918-940-4630 or you can find us online at www.easternoklahomachiropractic.com. Thank you for allowing us to be your chiropractor.