Trying to find a comfortable position to sleep in when your low back is flare up can be hard. Sometimes the one that feels the best short term can be problematic if you do get a long period of sleep. Of course go see your Woodbridge, Dale City VA Chiropractor the next morning! Here are some tips on trying to sleep with low back pain.
Back pain can make it tough to get a good night’s sleep. At the same time, how you sleep may make things worse — while certain sleep positions put strain on an already aching back, others may help you find relief.
Although back pain and sleep problems are linked, the connection isn’t well understood. “There is not a lot of science behind sleep as a major cause of back pain,” says Santhosh Thomas, DO, MBA, a spine specialist with the Cleveland Clinic and associate medical director of the Richard E. Jacobs Medical Center in Avon, Ohio.
Experts do believe, however, that people with sleep problems experience more problems with back pain. “Sleep deprivation is known to affect mood and functional ability and negatively impacts perception of pain,” Dr. Thomas says. Pain in turn can affect the quality of your sleep, according to the National Sleep Foundation, leading to a lighter sleep state and more frequent waking throughout the night.
What’s more, there’s a relationship between the severity of pain, overall mood, and the ability to function — and a good night of sleep can improve all these symptoms, at least temporarily, according to a study published in the November 2016 issue of the Annals of Behavioral Medicine.
Worst Sleep Positions for Back Pain
Some sleep positions can put added pressure on your neck, shoulders, hips, lower back, knees, and even your heels, all of which can lead to pain, Thomas says. There’s no one-size-fits-all sleep position to kick back pain, but you can try a few tricks to get it under control so that you can sleep more soundly.
The most common offender? Sleeping on your stomach. “Typically, sleeping on your stomach can flatten the natural curve of your spine, putting some additional strain on your back muscles,” Thomas says.
Plus, stomach sleeping means that your neck is rotated, which can actually result in neck pain or back pain between your shoulders, says Paul Grous, a physical therapist and spine specialist with Penn Therapy & Fitness in Woodbury Heights, New Jersey.
Don’t worry about keeping your body in the same position all night. It’s normal for you to move around a bit while you sleep, and that’s a good thing because a little movement can help ease pressure on your back. “Any sleeping position has the potential to amplify back pain if you maintain it for too long,” Thomas says.
Grous adds that the real culprit may not be sleep position but your daily activity — or a lack of it.
“My opinion of the biggest causative factor for back pain in our population is the amount of time we spend sitting during waking hours,” he says. “We sit too long and we don’t sit properly — we sit slouched with our backs rounded.”
During daylight hours, try to vary your posture as much as possible, and practice good posture when standing and sitting to help ease back pain at night.
Sleep Positions That Help Relieve Back Pain
First, you’ve got to be comfortable to get a good night’s sleep. Thomas suggests making a few simple modifications to your regular sleep position to help take a load off your back:
If you’re a back sleeper: Put a pillow under your knees to allow your spine to maintain its natural curve.
If you’re a stomach sleeper: Put a pillow under your lower abdomen and pelvis to ease back strain.
If you’re a side sleeper: Draw your legs up slightly toward your chest and sleep with a pillow (a full body pillow can be comfortable) between your knees.
I see lots of headaches in my Woodbridge, Dale City VA Chiropractic office. They include migraines, tension headaches and cervicogenic headaches. One of the most common ones I see are cervicogenic headaches. This is that headache that starts at the back top of your neck and radiates into the back of your head. It sometimes makes it to the temples. This type of headache generally doesn’t respond to the common migraine medications. Patients generally notice relief from OTC pain medication but once it wears off the headache comes back. Here is some information on cervicogenic headaches and be sure to consult a chiropractor for them.
Cervicogenic headache is referred pain (pain perceived as occurring in a part of the body other than its true source) perceived in the head from a source in the neck. Cervicogenic headache is a secondary headache, which means that it is caused by another illness or physical issue. In the case of cervicogenic headache, the cause is a disorder of the cervical spine and its component bony, disc and/or soft tissue elements. Numerous pain sensitive structures exist in the cervical (upper neck) and occipital (back of head) regions. The junction of the skull and cervical vertebrae have regions that are pain generating, including the lining of the cervical spine, the joints, ligaments, cervical nerve roots, and vertebral arteries passing through the cervical vertebral bodies.
The term cervicogenic headache is commonly misued and does not simply apply to a headache associated with neck pain; many headache disorders, including migraine and tension-type headache, can have associated neck pain/tension. Rather there must be evidence of a disorder or lesion within the cervical spine or soft tissues of the neck, known to be able to cause headache. Such disorders include tumours, fractures, infections and rheumatoid arthritis of the upper cervical spine. There is debate as to whether cervical spondylosis (age-related wear and tear affecting the spinal disks in your neck) can cause cervicogenic headache.
People with cervicogenic headache often have reduced range of motion of their neck and worsening of their headache with certain movements of their neck or pressure applied to certain spots on their neck. The headaches are often side-locked (on one side only) and the pain may radiate from their neck/back of the head up and to the front of the head or behind the eye. The headache may or may not be associated with neck pain.
People suspected of having cervicogenic headache should be carefully assessed by their doctor to exclude other primary (migraine, tension-type) or secondary (vessel dissection, posterior fossa lesions) causes of headaches.
Nerve blocks are used both for diagnostic and treatment purposes. If numbing the cervical structures abolishes the headache that can confirm the diagnosis of cervicogenic headache and also provide relief from the pain.
Treatment for cervicogenic headache should target the cause of the pain in the neck, and varies depending upon what works best for the individual patient. A very successful type of treatment is chiropractic care. A chiropractor can properly diagnose and treat this type of headache.
I get tons of patients in my Woodbridge, Dale City VA Chiropractic office with neck and upper back pain. The crazy thing is a lot of the time it is coming from their chest muscles being too tight. Stretching the chest muscle can sometimes take the pressure off the upper back and allow those muscles to rest and decrease their waste production. That usually cuts down on the numb spot or that burning spot in the upper back area. Here is some great information from Kenneth Miller MS on upper cross syndrome.
If you’re like the millions of people who use electronic tools such as a cell phone, tablet, laptop or desk computer, you’ve probably spent hours upon hours looking at the screen with your head jutted forward. Other situations that might have you holding your head forward of your shoulders include reading books, significant time behind the steering wheel or watching TV. Whatever the cause, the migration of your head to this forward position can ultimately lead to overactive muscles and a complementing set of underactive muscles. This postural distortion pattern, known as upper crossed syndrome (UCS), can result in imbalances of muscle tone or timing, often leading to poor movement patterns, and in this tech heavy society, increased stress on the head, neck and shoulder joints.
Poor posture at any level may lead to muscle imbalances. This can have a trickle-down effect into the rest of the body, not just in the local areas of the neck and shoulders. An associated sequence of muscle imbalances in the hip region, referred to as lower crossed syndrome, can oftentimes be observed in conjunction with upper crossed syndrome. When looking for long-term success in relieving UCS, identifying and addressing postural issues that could exist elsewhere in the body will also be needed. This total-body approach will relieve tensions through the entire kinetic chain, while also enhancing desired results.
Crossed and Countercrossed
The “crossed” in upper crossed syndrome refers to the crossing pattern of the overactive muscles with the countercrossing of the underactive muscles. When viewed from the side, an X pattern can be drawn for these two sets of muscles. The overactive muscles form a diagonal pattern from the posterior neck with the upper trapezius and levators down and across to the anterior neck and shoulder with the sternocleidomastoid (SCM) and pectoralis major. The other side of the X now depicts the underactive muscles, with the deep cervical flexors down toward the mid/lower trapezius, rhomboids and serratus anterior. As we continually assume the seated, forward head postures driven by electronic devices or poor exercise selection and technique, this X pattern of muscle imbalances will increase.
Identify Imbalances
When working with clients or performing your own workout routine, attaining and maintaining ideal posture is paramount to a safe and effective program. In order to address postural or movement imbalances, the less-than-ideal posture has to be identified and a corrective exercise strategy developed. This corrective program can have two applications. First, it can serve as a stand-alone phase of training that will help the client achieve better postural control and endurance. Second, it can be applied as the movement preparation for a workout. In the first application, the client may be in a post-rehabilitation situation and need a program that incorporates flexibility with local and integrated strengthening. The second application will most likely be for the client looking to move better and improve coordination before applying speed and increased force during their workout session.
The first step to improving any postural distortion pattern is being able to identify the condition. Upper crossed syndrome can be observed from different vantage points with different motions. Some basic assessments that can be implemented to identify distortion patterns are gait observations, overhead squat, pushing and pulling motions, and static posture analysis. With any postural assessment—static, dynamic or transitional—UCS can be observed by watching head position relative to the shoulders, and the arms and shoulder blades relative to the ribs.
By using the landmarks of the ears, shoulders and the glenohumeral (GH) joint, a static posture assessment can identify UCS by observing if the ears are forward of the shoulder. You might even say that this person is slouching.
Observations for the shoulder blade and the upper arm can be seen from the front and side views with the overhead squat, pushing (pushup) and pulling (cable row) motions. The movements to note during an overhead squat assessment for possible signs of UCS include
Arms falling forward or to side during the descent
Head migrating forward
Elevating or elevated shoulder blades
Elbows flexed or challenged in keeping arms straight
Depending on the extent of the distortion, someone may exhibit one or more of the listed movement compensations. Combining the different assessments can also confirm findings. This helps in prioritizing the corrective strategies during program design. Call Doroski Chiropractic to have this problem evaluated and to get some possible home exercises to help it go away.
Most times when we hurt our backs the actual mechanism of injury blows your mind. As your Chiropractor in the Woodbridge, Dale City VA area I am here to reassure you that sneeze didn’t blow out your back! The best way to prevent those types of injuries is having a good posture. Good posture is key because it keeps us balanced and keeps the muscles relaxed. Here is some pretty good information and tips to help keep you neutral.
Good posture helps us stand, walk, sit, and lie in positions that place the least strain on supporting muscles and ligaments during movement and weight-bearing activities. Correct posture:
Helps us keep bones and joints in correct alignment so that our muscles are used correctly, decreasing the abnormal wearing of joint surfaces that could result in degenerative arthritis and joint pain.
Reduces the stress on the ligaments holding the spinal joints together, minimizing the likelihood of injury.
Allows muscles to work more efficiently, allowing the body to use less energy and, therefore, preventing muscle fatigue.
Helps prevent muscle strain, overuse disorders, and even back and muscular pain.
Several factors contribute to poor posture-most commonly, stress, obesity, pregnancy, weak postural muscles, abnormally tight muscles, and high-heeled shoes. In addition, decreased flexibility, a poor work environment, incorrect working posture, and unhealthy sitting and standing habits can also contribute to poor body positioning.
How do I sit properly?
Keep your feet on the floor or on a footrest, if they don’t reach the floor.
Don’t cross your legs. Your ankles should be in front of your knees.
Keep a small gap between the back of your knees and the front of your seat.
Your knees should be at or below the level of your hips.
Adjust the backrest of your chair to support your low- and mid-back or use a back support.
Relax your shoulders and keep your forearms parallel to the ground.
Avoid sitting in the same position for long periods of time.
How do I stand properly?
Bear your weight primarily on the balls of your feet.
Keep your knees slightly bent.
Keep your feet about shoulder-width apart.
Let your arms hang naturally down the sides of the body.
Stand straight and tall with your shoulders pulled backward.
Tuck your stomach in.
Keep your head level-your earlobes should be in line with your shoulders. Do not push your head forward, backward, or to the side.
Shift your weight from your toes to your heels, or one foot to the other, if you have to stand for a long time.
What is the proper lying position?
Find the mattress that is right for you. While a firm mattress is generally recommended, some people find that softer mattresses reduce their back pain. Your comfort is important.
Sleep with a pillow. Special pillows are available to help with postural problems resulting from a poor sleeping position.
Avoid sleeping on your stomach.
Sleeping on your side or back is more often helpful for back pain.
If you sleep on your side, place a pillow between your legs.
If you sleep on your back, keep a pillow under your knees.
Your doctor of chiropractic can assist you with proper posture, including recommending exercises to strengthen your core postural muscles. He or she can also assist you with choosing proper postures during your activities, helping reduce your risk of injury.
Here we go! Golf, Softball, lose that 10 lbs and the never-ending yard work that seems to always need to be done. Most of these sound like easy things and just get out there and get them done! The problem is you are a year older and a year tighter. We need to warm up before prolonged activities. As your Chiropractor in the Woodbridge, Dale City VA area I have some great low tech tips to help keep you from getting injured.
Whether your workout plan is a bodyweight routine in the park or a 5K, warming up should be the first thing on the to-do list (after that pre-workout snack). But what’s the ideal way to warm up? Experts agree a warm-up should heat and loosen the body, and prepare the mind for action. But there are a few moves you should avoid too.
The Need-to-Know
When it comes to strength training and a variety of sports, coaches often think of their warm-ups as training preparation—using techniques such as foam rolling and movement practice to get the gears aligned.
We perform optimally and better avoid injury after a warm-up that does what its name promises: warm us up. And while a marathoner doesn’t warm up like a powerlifter (the same way an opera singer doesn’t warm up like a modern dancer), there could be some similarities.
For endurance or cardio routines, research shows a dynamic approach, including dynamic stretching—active range of motion movements that tend to be similar to what you’ll do in your workout, can improve performance. Some experts even suggest performing a few short intervals of the planned exercise at a lower intensity (for example: brisk walking before running, or bodyweight squats before adding weight).
As for static stretching, leave it for the cool-down. Numerous studies have shown that it can hinder performance and increase the risk of injury.
Your Action Plan
Every warm-up will be different, depending on your fitness level and the goal of your workout. But as a jumping off point, start with these four basic goals for every warm-up, as outlined by the National Strength and Conditioning Association.
Loosen up.
Warm your joints, muscles, and prep your body for exercise with mobility movements. If you’ve got one, now is also a great time for foam rolling. Start by rolling your back, then hit every section of the legs, glutes, and hip flexors.
Get your heart pumping.
Increased heart thumping warms up your muscles and switches on your nervous system. Jog, slowly row, or ride a bike on low resistance. Just be sure you’re able to converse with your workout buddy (or sing along to your Spotify playlist).
Do some dynamic stretches.
Stretch your warm muscles, but don’t hold it. Remember: Static stretching during a warm-up can actually hinder your performance. Instead, do dynamic stretching, which involves continuously moving through a range of motion. For instance, you can make big arm circles in both directions, kick your legs forward, or simply touch your toes and then reach for the sky. The key is to not hold in any position.
Practice.
Move through the exercises planned for that day’s workout at a lower intensity. Have a long, hard run ahead? Warm up with a few technique drills. Back squats? Start with bodyweight squats or by holding an empty bar. Practicing the movement patterns teaches muscle memory (a.k.a. neuromuscular adaptation) and continues to prepare your body for action.
Find an enjoyable warm-up and remember to listen to your body’s cues. Your warm-up should not fatigue you. After all, it’s only one aspect of the workout. And don’t forget to cool down at the end.
As your chiropractor in the Woodbridge, Dale City VA area I want to share this article with you. It is also fitting since I watched Sidney Crosby and the Pittsburgh Penguins make it to the Stanley Cup finals last night. This is a great article called Rebuilding Sidney Crosby’s brain by Cathy Gulli. It is about the comeback of Sidney Crosby from a brain injury. Dr Carrick is head of the Carrick Institute which is the school I got my Diplomate in Neurology.
Ted Carrick is listening to Sidney Crosby’s heart. The NHL superstar is strapped into a computerized rotating chair that has just spun him like a merry-go-round. It is, as Carrick likes to tell people who visit his lab at Life University near Atlanta, one of only three “whole-body gyroscopes” in the world, and it’s integral to his work as the founding father of “chiropractic neurology.” He uses it to stimulate certain injured and diseased brains.
Crosby, who plays for the Pittsburgh Penguins and has been famously sidelined with a concussion since January, is Carrick’s newest patient, and this day in August is the first time they’ve met. Carrick leans in close, his balding, tanned head looming inches from Crosby’s face, and rests the stethoscope on his chest. “Let’s make sure you’re not dead.”
Satisfied, Carrick turns to the others in this cramped blue room, who include Crosby’s agent Pat Brisson, trainer Andy O’Brien and several chiropractic neurologists or studentsin- training wearing white lab coats. “He’s fine,” Carrick says. “It’s going to be good.”
Nodding to his colleague Derek Barton, who usually operates the lab equipment, Carrick signals to restart the gyroscope—with one difference. This time Crosby will be turned upside-down while he is also spun around. He hasn’t experienced this dual action yet.
Barton and Carrick discuss the appropriate speed setting the gyroscope. Then Barton enters Carrick’s directions into a computer that controls the gyroscope (chiropractic neurology uses no drugs or surgery), and tells Crosby to keep his head pressed against the back of the black cushioned seat. Crosby, wearing a grey T-shirt, black shorts and white ankle socks, scans the crowd on the other side of the clear plastic cylinder surrounding the machine. The door clangs shut. Above it, a stack of red, yellow and green lights shines while 10 high-pitched beeps signal the gyroscope is about to start. Ding! Ding! Ding! Ding! Ding! Ding! Ding! Ding! Ding! Ding!
A low hum floods the room as the gyroscope begins its 20-second “montage” of rotations. With each flip, Crosby grips the black handles flanking his thighs, his face reddens and his jaw clenches. Before long, the gyroscope, called GyroStim, winds down. “Perfect,” Carrick concludes.
As the chair returns to its starting position, Carrick approaches the gyroscope, opens the door, steps in and stands in front of his patient. 6 2 “Still there?” he asks, as he plugs the stethoscope back into his ears. He listens to Crosby’s heart again, and checks his eye movements. “That’s much better,” Carrick informs Crosby. “Just sit there for a sec. Relax for a bit.” Carrick asks him a few questions, and then surmises, “That’s good. That’s good!”
Inside the Pittsburgh hockey arena, known as the Consol Energy Center, Sidney Crosby is sitting behind a long table littered with microphones and audio recorders. His name is typed in bold black letters on a white sign. But Crosby needs no introduction. On this day, Sept. 7, nearly 100 journalists, camera operators, publicists, agents and team executives have convened for a rare press conference updating his health status. Ray Shero, the Penguins’ general manager, sits to his left. On the end, farthest from Crosby, is Michael Collins, a neuropsychologist who has been treating him for months. And at Crosby’s right hand is Ted Carrick.
It’s only been weeks since they were in Georgia together, and 249 days since Crosby sustained the first of two head shots that caused his concussion. That hit, which happened during the annual Winter Classic on New Year’s Day, was a blow unlike any the hockey world had ever experienced: the best player since Wayne Gretzky was suddenly knocked out of the game indefinitely because of an invisible injury: no blood on the ice, no cracks on any X-rays and no way to know how bad was the damage done.
And yet Crosby has turned concussion into the most highly visible of sports injuries. Since January, Google searches of “Crosby” and “concussion” have moved in tandem as hockey fans in Canada, the United States and as far away as Finland, Sweden, Germany and the United Kingdom try to make sense of what has happened to their favourite player. Scientists, doctors and equipment makers have used Crosby as a talking point to raise awareness and as a case study in the complexity of concussion. One group at the University of Ottawa has gone so far as to reconstruct Crosby’s first head shot to see the link between hits, helmets and brain-tissue stress. The NHL is embroiled in a polarizing debate over fighting in hockey—how to keep it in, but make it safe?—and whether it contributed to the deaths of three players in the past six months. And nervous hockey parents everywhere are reconsidering whether their children should keep playing. How Crosby recovers will help them decide.
Maclean’s obtained exclusive access to the lab where Crosby saw Carrick, and learned about his unique methods of treating brain injuries. While the details of Crosby’s personal health data remain private, over the course of two days, the magazine was granted access to a range of information about the treatments used on patients, including him. During that time in late September and early October, an astonishing assortment of patients came through the clinic. A wealthy businessman and his son. A prominent NFL player. An NHL rookie and a teenage girl, each with a concussion. An aging biology teacher who’d had a stroke. A boy with brain damage sustained after a van ran him over. A middle-aged physician who’d lost his ability to talk or walk after a tick bite. In every case, Carrick ran through a version of the same evaluation, exercises and equipment he used on Crosby. “We saw something like nine MDs, neurologists, cardiologists,” says one patient’s relative. “I’ve seen nothing that compares to this.”
Nor had most of the people at the press conference now bracing to hear about Carrick’s involvement with Crosby. Staring out from behind gold-rimmed eyeglasses, Carrick surveyed the fidgety strangers. “Good day, people. I’m here because Sid asked me to be here to discuss with you some of the things that have been going on in his life over the last little while.”
But Carrick’s statements were more puzzling than clarifying: he took “a different type of approach” to brain injuries, one that looked at “physicality” and involved “specific measurements” to “make a very good diagnostic impression of what was happening in Sid’s brain.” Carrick alluded to Crosby’s compromised spatial awareness—“areas of space were not in an appropriate grid to where he would perceive them”—and described how he had fixed that. “We were able in our lab to quantify this, and then to develop strategies that allowed us to basically build him a new grid,” Carrick declared. “So at the present time he is able to embrace strategies with a new system where everything is in line.” And then he added: “It’s Christmas, I think, for Sid Crosby and for the people that care for him. And it’s a very good start.”
When question period finally arrived, the only thing any reporter could think to ask Carrick specifically was: “The Christmas line—I was a little confused by what that meant, so if you could maybe elaborate on that, please?”
For whatever vague or bewildering comments were made during that 40-minute press conference, a singular message came through loud and clear: Sidney Crosby was getting better, and this man, Ted Carrick, was a big reason.
Carrick started out as a chiropractor, but has since developed an encyclopedic understanding of the brain. But what Carrick practises goes far beyond alignment and adjustments or conventional medicine. He is a self-made man: Carrick invented his discipline, and then founded an educational institution, the Carrick Institute for Graduate Studies, devoted to growing it. He lectures and practises around the world, and has legions of earnest students and loyal graduates. Today, 2,700 individuals in the world are board-certified to practise chiropractic neurology or functional neurology, a related field that permits pharmacy and surgery and draws professionals from other backgrounds too.
The method used by Carrick and his colleagues is notably different from the current “rest and wait” approach endorsed by an international consensus group, which recommends patients refrain from any physical or mental activities until all symptoms have disappeared. Then they slowly reintroduce activity, but if symptoms resume, they revert to the “rest” stage again. Carrick encourages his patients to rest immediately after the injury occurs, but then incorporates stimulation into the treatment, based on a “thorough neurological exam” that pinpoints their particular problems or symptoms as well as what brain functions are most viable. The stimulations might include eye or balance exercises, multi-tasking activities or body rotations. “We tailor our treatments very specifically to the individual,” says Carrick. “When we have an area that’s not working right, we look at other areas that can compensate for that if we need to, or we look at mechanisms to make those areas work right.”
The wait list to see Carrick can be as long as three years, though in some cases, such as with Crosby, patients can be expedited. By the time they met in Georgia, the reality of what Crosby could lose if he didn’t get better soon was abundantly and uncomfortably clear: his career, his endorsements, the adoration of an entire nation. Yet in many ways, the NHL’s golden boy was just like many people stuck in a concussion vacuum where conventional medicine can’t readily cure the injury, leagues can’t easily curb it from happening and patients and their families can’t know how long symptoms will last and what life will be like once they’re gone, if they ever do go.
However strange and sickening that first day of treatment was for Crosby, it proved encouraging enough that he continued seeing Carrick for the whole next week. They’d meet as early as seven in the morning, and they’d go as late as six at night, says Carrick, running through a circuit of high-tech equipment and low-tech exercises in the lab and at the local hockey rink. By the time Crosby travelled back to Pittsburgh, Carrick says, “he was better than, you know, super-normal.” The Penguins’ medical team, who have been overseeing Crosby’s recovery, also saw an improvement: they ran computerized tests called IMPACT to compare his current neurocognitive abilities with what they were before the concussion. The results: not quite “super-normal,” but “the best we’ve seen” since Crosby got hurt, as Collins said at the press conference. (He declined interview requests.)
“Carrick had a very prominent role in Sidney’s current recovery status,” Brisson, Crosby’s agent, told Maclean’s. “He progressed extremely well under Carrick.” Just 10 days after the press conference, Crosby joined his teammates on the ice for the first day of training camp. Three-and-a-half weeks after that, Crosby was cleared for contact—the final step before returning to play. Now, after nearly a year of nagging symptoms that have included fogginess, light-headedness and nausea so paralyzing Crosby couldn’t drive or watch TV, and after a slew of setbacks each time he pushed too hard while exercising or skating, the greatest hockey player of this generation is verging on a comeback—perhaps because of a relatively unknown therapy he received at a relatively unknown university from a relatively unknown man who isn’t even a medical doctor.
Come what may, Carrick has set out to do what no amount of time or rest or other expert has managed to accomplish so far: rebuild Sid’s brain.
It’s just before 8 a.m. on the first Saturday of October. Carrick is about to give a four-hour lecture on chiropractic neurology at Life University in Marietta, Ga. He is standing beside a massive screen displaying the first slide of his PowerPoint presentation. It shows the Carrick Institute coat of arms, which features bees because “they represent work and continuous diligence as a team,” says Carrick, and the motto “seek wisdom” in Latin because it “is something that I have always ascribed to.”
The slide also lists Carrick’s professional titles, which include affiliations with Life, Logan and Parker universities, and president of the American Chiropractic Association’s Council on Neurology. After his full name, Frederick R. Carrick, there are several acronyms signifying various credentials—60 letters in all, mostly unrecognizable.
A large man stands in front of the slide, and the crowd hushes. John Donofrio, president of the chiropractic neurology board, introduces Carrick by describing the first time he heard him speak. “I was there for one hour when I said, ‘My whole life is now changed forever,’ ” says Donofrio. “He has no idea, okay, of how much of this world he has touched.” Carrick “basically is what D.D. and B.J. were back in the 1900s,” he says, referring to the Palmers, father and son, who founded the field of chiropractics. “He is really the father of chiropractic neurology.”
Carrick was born on Feb. 26, 1952, in Toronto, and raised in Calgary, Edmonton, Winnipeg—wherever work took his father, a career soldier with the Princess Patricias Canadian Light Infantry who fought in the Korean War. After finishing high school, Carrick says he “had a calling” to join the Princess Pats too, and served in Cyprus. While on leave in the Bahamas, he met his future wife, a New Englander on vacation. After three years in the army, Carrick quit. “I was really going to do it forever, except that I thought that I might be able to help people more in health care.”
The decision to pursue chiropractic rather than medical school was a “very calculated coin toss,” says Carrick, because, as a lifelong martial artist (he still does karate), it seemed more in line with his preference for natural means of healing and well-being. Carrick was also “more impressed” with the chiropractors he talked to than the medical doctors. “I like to do things with vibrancy,” he says over lunch at a Middle Eastern restaurant near his lab. “Not death and dying.”
Carrick wed in 1973, and after he graduated in 1979, the couple moved to New Hampshire to set up his practice. Over the years, he developed a clientele that included patients from overseas with “everything from strokes, low back pain, dystonia—you name it, I saw it,” recalls Carrick. “People would come to me when other things failed.” Carrick keeps on hand a state of New Hampshire resolution “honouring” his clinic in 1988 for “its contribution to the quality of human life and performance,” and for his ability “to afford his fellow man great relief from physical pain and disability.”
By the mid-1990s, Carrick and his family had relocated to St. Cloud, Fla., and he obtained a self-designed Ph.D. from Walden University in what he calls “brain-based learning.” Around this time, he gained attention for bringing comatose patients out of their vegetative states using stimulation. A program that aired on PBS, entitled Waking up the Brain: Amazing Adjustments, described Carrick as a “remarkable healer and teacher.”
As Carrick’s practice has grown, so too has the Carrick Institute, which is headquartered in Cape Canaveral. Since the mid-’80s, it has evolved from teaching partnerships between Carrick and a few chiropractic schools into its own educational entity specializing in “clinical neurology.” It has more than a few dozen faculty members who teach courses such as “neuron theory and receptor activation” and a three-part series on “vestibular rehabilitation.” To become a chiropractic neurologist requires three additional years of studying, a residency and board certification exams.
Despite the buzz surrounding this burgeoning field, many people outside it aren’t sure what to think. Before the press conference in September, Blaine Hoshizaki, professor and vice-dean of the University of Ottawa’s school of human kinetics and director of the Neurotrauma Impact Science Laboratory, had never heard of this specialty, despite his extensive work in concussion research. He found it “strange” that a medical neurologist wasn’t included in the Crosby press conference, and is hesitant about Carrick’s approach, saying, “I’m not sure you want your chiropractor as your guide to the new frontier.”
Dr. Kevin Gordon, a pediatric neurologist in Halifax, finds Carrick’s approach intriguing and perplexing. “Are specific exercises targeted at particular parts of the brain likely to change the way in which the brain works? It is a possibility,” says Gordon, a professor at Dalhousie University. Still, he isn’t convinced. “The question is, what’s the science behind these interventions?”
This isn’t Carrick’s first brush with cynics: in 2007, he was the subject of online debate over his credentials and credibility on the website Chirotalk: The skeptical chiropractic discussion forum. “These people are chiropractic haters,” says Carrick now. He gets frustrated that the field is dismissed offhand. “It’s like saying, ‘Hey, what do you think of this curling iron?’ Well, I’m bald. I can’t tell you anything about it. It doesn’t mean it’s bad.” He’s also inflamed by any suggestion that his work is wacky. “To characterize what we do as some fringe science is crazy,” he says. “We don’t have Kool-Aid. We don’t have a little fire. We’re not dancing around naked. There’s no pins in the dolls, and there’s no dolls.”
In fact, Carrick argues that all of his diagnostic techniques, exercises and equipment, excluding the gyroscope, are used by medical doctors too. “There’s nothing we do that is different from anybody else. But the combinations that we do, the frequency that we do it, are often different,” he says. “If you can imagine, you’ve got some eggs, you’ve got some flour, you’ve got some sugar, you’ve got an oven, you’ve got a ramekin, you’ve got some butter. But your soufflé isn’t as puffy as mine,” Carrick continues. “We just put in our recipe a little bit different.”
One thing Carrick says skeptics fail to mention when comparing his methods to the current “rest and wait” approach, which is what Crosby adhered to during most of his recovery, is that “the gold standard people had him for eight months, you know?” he says. “That’s the gold standard, right?”
Before Crosby goes in the gyroscope, Carrick learns more about what problems he’s having. That involves another machine, the “computerized assessment of postural systems,” or CAPS. In a small white room, Crosby stands in his skates on a black foam platform while wearing sound-dampening headphones. Carrick and his colleagues surround him in case he gets unsteady; his agent and trainer watch from the doorway.
Crosby’s only objective is to stand still while his eyes are closed and his head points to the left, to the right and to the ground for 25 seconds at a time. Three sensors inside the platform detect motion and transmit the data into a system that calculates his stability and what is described as his fatigability ratio.
“Tuck your chin down to your chest,” instructs Barton, who is running the system. “And close your eyes.”
Crosby obliges. Carrick, standing nearby, responds with encouragement: “That is so helpful to what we’re going to do for you. Just putting those skates on there gives us exactly the information we wanted to get,” he says. “Now we’re going to fix it for you.”
So begins a week of tests and exercises based on Carrick’s neurological exam of Crosby. Standing in front of him, Carrick pulls from his pocket a red-and-white-striped cloth ribbon called an optokinetic nystagmus strip. He moves it horizontally in front of Crosby’s eyes to check how smoothly he can track the stripes as they go by. Other times Carrick flicks his thumbs in front of Crosby to gauge how quickly and accurately Crosby targets objects. Occasionally Crosby lies on a chiropractic table while one of Carrick’s colleagues transmits high-frequency currents into the tympanic membrane in his ears. They put on graphite conductive gloves that are connected to a machine, and insert their thumbs in his ears. Often, Crosby does eye exercises on an iPad that challenge him to stare at a dot or follow a moving pattern.
Sometimes Crosby has to stare at or track red or green laser-beam dots as they appear or move across a wall. For this test, called videonystagmography, or VNG, he sits on a dusty-rose upholstered metal chair like those found in a banquet hall. He is wearing a pair of black goggles with cameras in each lens that transmit live video of his eyes onto a laptop. Carrick, the lab team and Crosby’s agent and trainer watch as two eyeballs dart from dot to dot or glide from side to side. After one such session, Crosby sees the footage of his own eyes.
As the days go on, Carrick incorporates ice time into the treatment. His colleagues have set up a mini lab in an office inside a nearby arena. Canadian and American flags hang at one end. Half a dozen local hockey players have been recruited to practise with Crosby, and it is easy to pick him out. After running through shooting and skating drills—dozens of pucks are strewn across the ice—Crosby is scuttled into the makeshift lab for more tests.
Crosby, who has on a black jersey like the Penguins wear, takes off his white helmet. He is dripping with sweat, breathing heavily and chugging from a cold bottle. Except for Carrick standing in front of him waiting to do the thumb test, it is easy to imagine that this is the same Crosby that fans have come to idolize. He puts down his drink and begins the eye exercise. Carrick catches a glimpse of the old Crosby too: “The reflex is back there, which is great.”
After their time in Georgia, Carrick says he set an alarm on Crosby’s iPad to go off every hour, reminding him to do various eye exercises. Since then, Carrick says he hasn’t seen Crosby, but they have been in frequent contact. “He’s excited about getting back into the game,” says Carrick, “and hopefully things will continue to go very, very well for him.”
Even medical professionals such as neurologist Kevin Gordon acknowledge that Crosby’s recent progress has been promising. “You’re dealing with a remarkable case report that says this holistic approach with multiple interventions has made somebody with a severe concussion improve on a time course which would seem remarkable compared to how they were recovering before,” he says. But Gordon is cautious about what this means for the future. “Is it going to change his ultimate recovery? We can’t tell yet. Is he completely recovered? We don’t know yet.” Having researched and treated concussions for many years, Gordon says that “if indeed this is the solution, then there are a lot of people this needs to be standardized and developed for. We can’t ignore it. But we have to study it.” At Life University, Carrick and his colleagues have begun a 400-person study to determine whether the gyroscope does improve balance. But he is also emphatic that because his approach is so patient-specific, it is difficult to study. “If you hurt your brain, I’m probably going to treat you differently than this person here. It’s hard to design a study like that, because studies like to say we’re going to give you this drug and we’re going to see what happens,” says Carrick.
For those close to Crosby, all that matters now is whether he is well enough to get back in the game. And there is only one person who can ultimately make that call: Crosby himself. “It’s like a race-car driver. The car could be fixed, the tires are perfect, the pipes are good, but if the driver isn’t mentally prepared to go 250 mph on the track, it outweighs” any expert opinion, says Brisson.
On one of his last days in Georgia, Crosby did another round of VNG. As the testing wrapped up, Carrick responded with unabashed enthusiasm about Crosby’s recovery: “This is so exciting for me,” he told him. “But for you and your brain, I mean, it’s perfect. We shouldn’t test you anymore, just send you home.”
And Carrick did just that. Crosby returned to Pittsburgh, to his team, to his fans, to the same rink where less than a year ago he was skating toward the best season of his life. He’s traded his white helmet for a black one, signalling he can take contact again. He’s goading his teammates into hitting him so he can prove his toughness—as much to himself as to them or to the world, which is analyzing his every move. In this way, nothing has changed: he is still the one hockey player everyone watches. Sidney Crosby is home, indeed.
There’s only one question left: when the time comes, will Sidney Crosby play as if he was never gone?
Almost everyone has dealt with a joint injury once in their lives. The problem with joint injuries is the ligaments and joint capsule can heal but damage to the hyaline cartilage may not. This can lead to early degenerative changes of the injured joint. Glucosamine can help repair the damage to the joint cartilage. As your chiropractor in the Woodbridge, Dale City VA I want to share some information on how glucosamine can help.
This is a good video but you can buy any brand.
Helps Improve Joint Health & Osteoarthritis
Glucosamine is one of the best supplements for supporting joint health and lowering symptoms related to degenerative disorders like osteoarthritis. Aging naturally impacts the strength and durability of our joints, normally causing cartilage loss and joint pain over time. It doesn’t improve symptoms 100 percent of the time, but compared to many other supplements like chondroitin, glucosmine consistently rank as one of the most effective for treating arthritis discomfort.
Glucosamine slows down deterioration of joints when used long-term, plus it offers other benefits that prescription painkillers cannot (such as lowering chronic inflammation and improving digestive health). The results of taking glucosamine differ from person to person, but some long-term users often report pain relief that allows them to avoid surgeries and lower or eliminate medication use.
Osteoarthritis is a disorder characterized by ongoing joint pain caused from years of accumulating pressure and friction places on joints. It’s the most common type of arthritis worldwide, effecting millions of people (especially older adults). Glucosamine is one of the top supplements I recommend as part of a natural treatment approach for managing arthritis with diet and lifestyle changes.
Osteoarthritis is a degenerative disease, so it becomes harder to move over the years as joint friction increases. Studies show that taking about 800 to 1500 milligrams of glucosamine daily can help millions of people suffering from degenerative joint diseases, preventing further damage, especially in commonly effected joints such as those in the knees and hips. It has been shown to help offer relief from joint pain within 4–8 weeks, which might be longer than some prescriptions or over-the-counter pain killers, but it’s also a more natural and well-tolerated approach.
Glucosamine, whether used alone or in combination with other supplements like chondroitin, is not a “cure all” and guaranteed to help everyone, but major studies have found it can help many, especially those impacted most by arthritis. The Glucosamine/Chondroitin Arthritis Intervention Trial (GAIT), which is considered the most comprehensive trial ever done involving glucosamine, found that the combination of glucosamine and chondroitin sulfate used for 8 weeks resulted in significant relief in the majority of study participants who had high amounts of joint pain. Many experienced improvements regarding their moderate-to-severe knee pains, although not all did (including those with milder pains).
Glucosamine is a helpful supplement for improving digestive function and repairing the lining of the GI tract. It’s even been shown to be an effective leaky gut supplement, combating a condition sometimes called “intestinal permeability.” This condition involves undigested food particles and proteins (like gluten, toxins and microbes) passing into the bloodstream through tiny openings in the lining of the GI tract.
Once these particles enter the bloodstream, they often trigger inflammation or initiate or worsen immune responses in the body. These include food sensitivities, arthritis and inflammatory bowel diseases. Glucosamine supplements, or naturally glucosamine-rich bone broth, help repair damaged tissue and lower inflammation related to inflammatory bowel disease (IBD), a set of conditions that are notoriously painful and hard to treat. The supplement may also help repair the lining of the bladder and stomach and intestines.
In 2000, researchers from the University Department of Pediatric Gastroenterology at University College School of Medicine found that glucosamine was an effective, inexpensive and nontoxic supplement used for treating chronic inflammatory bowel diseases, such as Crohn’s disease and ulcerative colitis. Children affected by inflammatory bowel disease tend to have lower levels of glucosamine in the body. Interestingly, N-acetyl supplementation (GlcNAc) offered a mode of action distinct from conventional treatments, resulting in lower symptoms in 75 percent of patients.
The researchers found evidence of significant improvements in the majority of patients using glucosamine, even those who were unresponsive to other anti-inflammatory medications and antibiotics. Results showed improved integrity of the GI tract and restoration of healthy epithelial cell structures that helped stop gut permeability.
Can Help Relieve TMJ Symptoms
TMJ (a disorder related to the temporo-manibular joint in the jaw) is common in young to middle-aged adults and characterized by frequent jaw and neck pains, headaches and trouble sleeping. TMJ affects the joint that connects the jaw to the skull and allows for the head to move up and down, or side to side, normally without pain.
As the TMJ joint becomes inflamed and worn down, pain worsens. This makes it harder to talk, eat and function normally. Studies suggest glucosamine helps ease TMJ symptoms and pain in people with arthritis that effects the jaw. The pain relief is on par with taking NSAID pain relievers can (such as ibuprofen or Advil). Taking 500 to 1500 milligrams of glucosamine daily for several months or years may help you sleep better, chew and heal while lowering inflammation in the jaw long-term.
Helps Alleviate Bone Pain
Many people with bone pain, low bone density and a history of fractures can benefit from taking glucosamine, which assists bone healing. This is especially true if they also have joint pains or a form of arthritis. Some evidence suggests that glucosamine helps preserve articular cartilage surrounding bones, decreases pain, increases physical function, and enhances activities in people with bone disorders or those who are at most at risk for bone loss (such as middle-aged and older women).
A 2013 study by the Department of Orthopedics and Traumatology at Haseki Training and Research Hospital in Turkey found that glucosamine helped speed up the time it took rats to heal from bone fractures. Those researchers found that new bone formation and osteoblast lining were significantly higher in glucosamine-treated rats compared to those in control groups. After 4 weeks of taking 230 milligrams of glucosamine sulfate daily, the rats’ connective tissue surrounding bones were more cellular and vascular, and the newly formed bones that were previously fractured were stronger compared to controls.
Low back pain is one of the most common things I see in my Woodbridge, Dale City VA Chiropractic office. The problem with the diagnosis of low back pain is most of the pain isn’t in the low back, it is in the SI. SI pain is that pain along your pant line which is worse on either the right or the left. It can sometimes shoot into the butt or leg.
Pain in and around the sacroiliac joint is one of the more common causes of low-back pain. With approximately 80 percent of the population suffering from low-back pain at some point in their lives, the sacroiliac joint dysfunction likely represents about 15-25 percent of those cases.
The following points will help you educate your patients about the sacroiliac joint dysfunction.
What Is Sacroiliac Joint Dysfunction?
Sacroiliac joint dysfunction (SJD) is a broad term often applied to pain in the sacroiliac joint region—the largest joints at the base of the spine.
SJD can be painful and debilitating, but it is rarely life-threatening.
SJD rarely requires invasive types of treatment such as surgery.
Symptoms and Causes
SJD symptoms include low-back pain, typically at the belt line, and pain radiating into the buttock or thigh.
These symptoms are hard to distinguish from other causes of low-back pain, such as disc herniations or facet joints disease.
Most often, SJD is caused by trauma. For example, rotation of the joint when lifting or participating in some vigorous activity may cause tears in small ligaments surrounding the joint, resulting in pain and dysfunction.
While more serious conditions such as fracture or dislocation, infection and inflammatory arthritis can cause sacroiliac joint pain, minor trauma is considered a much more common cause.
The risk of SJD may also increase with true and apparent leg-length inequality, abnormalities in gait and prolonged exercise.
Pregnant women may suffer from SJD because of hormone-induced relaxation of the pelvic ligaments during the third trimester, weight gain and increased curvature of the lumbar spine.
Evaluation
Because SJD pain resembles other types of low-back pain, it is often difficult to isolate it as the actual cause of the patient’s discomfort and disability.
Diagnostic imaging procedures, such as X-ray or MRI, aren’t very helpful in evaluating SJD.
The mostcommonly used diagnostic procedures are physical examination and anesthetic blocks of the sacroiliac joint.
Physical examination involves stressing the joint in various body positions and movements.
During anesthetic blocks, a procedure with unproven validity for SJD diagnosis, the anesthetic solution often creeps outside the sacroiliac joint and may relieve pain from other structures.
Treatment
Because it is often difficult to isolate SJD as the source of pain, an appropriate management strategy is hard to implement. Once SJD is determined as the cause of the problem, many therapies are available.
Exercise focusing on strengthening the core stabilizer muscles of the spine and trunk and on maintaining mobility of the sacroiliac joints can also be helpful.
Patients with a leg-length inequality may benefit from a shoe inserts helping to properly distribute weight borne by your lower back and sacroiliac joints.
For those with abnormal gait biomechanics, gait training may be needed.
To reduce the excess rotation that sometimes occurs with SJD, a pelvic belt can help stabilize the sacroiliac joints.
In cases of fractures and dislocations of the sacroiliac joints, surgery is needed.
Prevention
Use proper lifting techniques and ergonomics during your daily activities.
Maintain a regular exercise program and a healthy diet to help you function at peak capacity and prevent injuries
As your chiropractor in the Woodbridge, Dale City VA area I want to give you some general information on back braces. They do have some benefits if used properly and sporadically. The biggest problem with them is not using them properly but using them too much. Generally, you should use crank it on nice and snug do your activity and take it off. Leaving it on all day is the problem.
If you walk into any drug store, mega-box store or sporting goods store, you’ll be sure to find a variety of lumbar supports, back braces and alike. Because these devices are readily accessible, many users grab one off the self before seeking professional advice. That’s not necessarily a good idea because back braces offer a mixed bag of benefits and risks.
Now, strapping on an elastic lumbar support is tempting as a means to relieve pain and keep on going. And for the most part, these medical devices can help to accomplish that goal. The wrap-around support mimics the internal support that supposed to be provided by the abdominal muscles. Because many people have weak core muscles, the extra bracing does help sometimes. It’s probably most helpful in someone with disc degeneration as opposed to someone with lumbar stenosis. And it’s probably most helpful in average-weight individuals that don’t carry a lot of belly fat. Even if you don’t get a great deal of actual support from a brace, these medical devices when worn do provide physical cues that serve as reminders about using proper body mechanics.
The most beneficial back braces that are on the market are usually only available through an orthotist or specialty medical supply company. A basic example is a lumbar-sacral corset like the Aspen Quick Draw which has some rigid reinforcements in addition to the elastic support. Those who have a need for extra-support because of a spine fracture might be prescribed a brace like the chair-back lumbar brace or a brace that incorporates the thoracic spine called a TLSO (Thoracolumbar sacral orthosis). After surgery, some surgeons order a custom fit, hard-shelled orthosis that looks like a turtle’s shell and supports the entire thoracic and lumbar spine. No matter which brace your doctor thinks is best for you, your doctor will eventually want to you to gradually stop wearing a brace as your injury heals and as the muscle strengthen. This weaning process is best accomplished by sending you to physical therapy to strengthen your natural, built-in back brace.
Your natural back brace is your abdominal muscles, your spine muscles, and your core muscles. If you wear a lumbar support too much, you’ll weaken these muscles. Your body will become dependent on the use of the back brace to the point that the muscles will get lazy. Once that happens, your pain will get worse when you remove the back brace.
If you are already at that point, you’ll need to wean off your back brace dependency slowly. Weaning involves removing the support for brief periods of time every day and gradually increasing that “no brace” time week by week. In order to avoid lumbar support dependency, don’t wear it all the time. Wear your brace only as prescribed by your doctor or only when you are doing some heavy activities that require extra support to do them. However, when you buy that brace at the store, you don’t get these warnings or directions for use.
So buyer beware: back braces provide mixed bag of benefits and risks. You may experience temporary pain relief but you also risk becoming dependent, too.
Well it looks like all the excuses have to end soon. Time to clean up all those old leaves. You know the ones you hoped would blow into your neighbor’s yard. Warm weather is here, so unless you want dead patches of grass or mold allergies on overtime, it is time to get that rake. The problem is leaf raking takes longer than you think and it is more physical than it looks. As your Chiropractor in the Woodbridge, Dale City VA area I have to warn you against just getting up and doing it.
Just as playing football or golf can injure your body, the twisting, turning, bending, and reaching of mowing and raking can also cause injury if your body is not prepared. Like an athlete, if you leap into something without warming up or knowing how to do it, the chances of injury are greater.
What Can You Do?
The American Chiropractic Association (ACA) offers the following tips to help prevent the needless pain yard work may cause.
Do stretching exercises, without bouncing, for a total of 10 to 15 minutes spread over the course of your work. Do knee-to-chest pulls, trunk rotations, and side bends with hands above your head and fingers locked. Take a short walk to stimulate circulation. When finished with the yard work, repeat the stretching exercises.
Stand as straight as possible, and keep your head up as you rake or mow.
When it’s still warm outside, avoid the heat. If you’re a morning person, get the work done before 10 a.m. Otherwise, do your chores after 6 p.m.
Wear supportive shoes. Good foot and arch support can stop some of the strain from affecting your back.
When raking, use a “scissors” stance: right foot forward and left foot back for a few minutes, then reverse, putting your left foot forward and right foot back.
Bend at the knees, not the waist, as you pick up piles of leaves or grass from the grass catcher. Make the piles small to decrease the possibility of back strain.
When mowing, use your whole bodyweight to push the mower, rather than just your arms and back.
If your mower has a pull cord, don’t twist at the waist or yank the cord. Instead, bend at the knees and pull in one smooth motion.
Drink lots of water, wear a hat, shoes and protective glasses. And, to avoid blisters, try wearing gloves. If your equipment is loud, wear hearing protection. If you have asthma or allergies, wear a mask.
Try ergonomic tools, too. They’re engineered to protect you when used properly.
If you do feel soreness or stiffness in your back, use ice to soothe the discomfort. If there’s no improvement in two or three days, see your local doctor of chiropractic.
