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Low back pain, if severe enough, can devastate a person's life. It robs them of doing activities that most of us take for granted. Imagine having trouble tying your shoes, having trouble putting your pants on, and having your once active lifestyle taken from you.
Back pain affects nearly 40 million Americans and robs many of them of their quality of life. In this article, we will discuss how the upper cervical spine can be the root cause of low back problems and tell one of our patient's stories about how he avoided low back disc surgery by receiving Blair Upper Cervical Care in our office.
Conventional mainstream health care typically uses painkillers, muscle relaxers, or cortisone shots as treatment. If the problem is severe enough the last resort is surgery. Upper Cervical care has helped thousands of low back pain sufferers regain their health usually following mainstream medical care.
Thousands of others have avoided low back disc surgeries, cortisone shots, and long-term pain-killing medications by undergoing upper cervical care. And yet thousands of others continue with long-term upper cervical maintenance care to keep their bodies functioning at their best so they never get back pain in the first place!
One Story About a Man Who Avoided Low Back Surgery in Our Office
Karol started care years ago in our office. He could hardly walk, tie his shoes, nor put his own pants on in the morning. He was told that his only option was low back disc surgery. Karol didn’t want invasive surgery and went out on a limb and opted to try Blair Upper Cervical Chiropractic Care in our office.
He was skeptical like almost all new patients who step foot in our office. Skepticism is a normal reaction to a new idea. Almost all new patients are skeptical of upper cervical care because they have never heard about it and it’s a totally different slant on health care that they have been indoctrinated with. Furthermore, upper cervical care corrects structural misalignments located in the neck.
A new patient suffering from severe low back pain has a hard time understanding how their neck is connected to their low back problem. Let us explain.
Postural muscle tone is controlled and regulated in the brain stem which is housed by the skull, the atlas (c-1), and the axis (c-2). If the brainstem functions without interference normal symmetry in postural muscle tone follows.
Most low back pain is the result of imbalances in muscle tone which causes the spine to lose its normal curvature. Short-term imbalances in muscle tone can cause musculoskeletal pain in the low back and other parts of the body.
Long-term imbalances in muscle tone can lead to the weakening of the low back discs which eventually can lead to disc bulge. Upper cervical spine misalignment that results from prior neck trauma is at the root of most low back problems.
As Karol describes in the video in this article, precision correction of the upper cervical spine can not only reduce low back pain but in many cases can allow the body to correct low back surgical disc cases. Karol now lives pain-free, drug-free, and helped him avoid surgery. As a side benefit, his high blood pressure has also reduced due to the reduction in pain levels.
Why the Upper Cervical Spine is Important in Low Back Pain Recovery and General Health
The upper cervical spine houses the most vital centers of the central nervous system, the brain stem. In fact, the brain stem is so important to your survival that it runs regulates, and controls almost all functions in your body that you are not consciously aware of.
Dr. Mike Flanagan in his 17-page article titled “The role of the craniocervical junction in craniospinal hydrodynamics” eloquently and scientifically describes the cascade of devastating effects upper neck misalignment can have on human physiology.
The brain stem controls muscle tone regulation, blood pressure, cardiac function, respiration, balance (vestibular nucleus) and many other vital functions of the body. Because the head weighs 10-12 pounds and sits on the atlas (c-1) which weighs 2 ounces, acceleration-deceleration injuries that cause neck Injury damage the soft tissue, ligaments, and muscles that give neck stability.
Injuries to the joint capsules of the neck cause spinal misalignment at the skull neck junction which irritates and interferes with normal nervous system function. Ignoring this vital area of human physiology is a big mistake, especially with low back pain. Usually, patients aren’t ignoring their necks they just do not have the awareness that it can be at the root of their suffering.
Mainstream medicine has zero awareness of the vital role that upper cervical spine misalignment plays in low back pain conditions so don’t expect to hear about it from your conventional medical doctor.
What Does a Blair Upper Cervical Chiropractor Do?
Blair Upper Cervical doctors are specially trained to find spinal misalignments in the upper cervical spine. This is determined by running the prospective patient through a battery of neurological tests that locate the spinal segments that have been injured and misaligned by a prior neck injury.
Once located, precision imaging in the form of digital x-ray or cone-beam computed tomography (Cbct) is used to precisely determine which joint has misaligned and the angulation of the offending joint. Each person’s anatomy is different and therefore imaging is used to uncover the blueprint to be used to correct each patient’s individual misalignment pattern. Once this information is gleaned, a gentle, light correction is made without twisting, popping, or pulling.
The patient is then monitored overtime to ensure that the correction is holding. If the testing indicates the need for another correction, then it is performed. However, the goal of Blair Upper Cervical Care is for the patient to stay in “adjustment”. It isn’t the correction that produces healing. It is the removal of nerve irritation and the adjustment “holding” in its normal position that allows the body to function better and proceed through a healing process.
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