“Even if you’re on the right track, you’ll get run over if you just sit there.”~ Will Rogers
Monday, March 19, 2012
Exercise of the Week: Seated Twist
Difficulty: Easy
Start: Seated on a chair.
Exercise: Keeping kness pointed straight ahead, reach around behind you, holding onto armrest or backrest of chair to maintain the twisted position. Relax lower back, breathing slowly and deeply. Hold for 30-60 seconds, and then return to starting position. Switch sides, and repeat 2x per side.
Topic of the Week: Why Is Posture So Important?
Excellent posture is not only beautiful to look at, but it also reflects self-confidence. This can be beneficial in any environment where you want to be more impressive, like at a job interview or on a first date! Improper posture causes misalignment in your spine, and this can put excessive stress and strain on muscles, joints and the supporting connective tissues.
Your chiropractor at Life Wellness Center defines posture as: “The position of the human body relative to gravity.” Relative to gravity is important here, because this is the force that can cause the pain and damage related to improper postural positions.
Posture can be either dynamic or static, but both are important when it comes to your functional strength and stability. Dynamic posture is related to your body position while performing different activities like running or climbing, whereas static posture is more related to positions like sitting or standing.
Regardless of which type of posture you are talking about, one of the most important factors in good posture is the proper curvature of your spine. The spinal column is made up of 26 bones stacked one on top of another, combined to form 4 different postural curves from top to bottom: cervical, thoracic, lumbar and sacral as shown in the diagram below.
One of the main functions of these curves is to allow for an adequate amount of shock absorption from above (gravity) and below (impact from feet striking the ground). If the curves are positioned properly, fewer injuries are likely to happen due to these forces. If the curves are too much or not enough, this can cause excessive compressive loads on the discs, joints, muscles and connective tissues of the spine.
The most common postural deviations are:
FORWARD HEAD POSITION
- occurs when the ear is not centered over the middle of the shoulder (from a side-view). Because the weight of the average head is approximately that of a large bowling ball, for every inch it drifts forward relative to your shoulder, 10X more weight is exerted upon the muscles, joints and ligaments of the neck and upper back, causing strain in these tissues. This occurs most commonly when sitting in front of a computer screen or television. To avoid it, first position the screen at the level of your eyes, preferably directly in front of you. Second, be sure your eyesight is good. If it is poor, you will have a tendency to lean forward to get closer to the screen.
SLOUCHING
- occurs when the upper back is over-curved and the shoulders round forward. This makes a person look tired or dejected, and is one of the most unattractive postures. It also alters the curvatures of the entire spine, so it is the least desirable in that respect too. Postural muscles of the lower back are placed under a tremendous load, and their over-activation adds to the compressive forces felt by the discs and joints of the lumbar spine, increasing the likelihood that these tissues will become irritated and/or inflamed.
Any alteration in the natural curves of the spine will also lead to vertebral subluxations. These are specific areas of the spine where one vertebra does not move properly relative to another. When this happens, nerves that exit the spine at the level of the subluxation can become irritated, as well as the muscles attached to these vertebrae. If these areas are not adjusted by your chiropractor, then function will not be restored, leading to chronically tight and restricted segments. Long-term, this makes it near impossible to maintain proper posture.
How do I correct my posture?
AWARENESS
- pay attention to your posture when sitting or standing. If you know you are out of position, correct it. Instead of “pulling your shoulders back”, imagine standing as if you are a quarter-inch taller. The thoracic curve will balance out, and your chest should naturally rise, thereby allowing the shoulders to gently fall back into position. Head position will be more centered, taking stress and strain off the area where the head meets the shoulders.
GET ADJUSTED
- when vertebral subluxations are present in your spine, it is almost impossible to maintain a proper pattern of spinal curves.
Disclaimer: Information contained in The Wellness ExpressTM newsletter is for educational and general purposes only and is designed to assist you in making informed decisions about your health. Any information contained herein is not intended to substitute advice from your physician or other healthcare professional. Copyright © - The Wellness ExpressTM
Thursday, March 15, 2012
Double Indemnity (Newsletter issue for March 2012)
In the classic 1944 film noir, "Double Indemnity", insurance salesman Walter Neff (played by Fred MacMurray), gets into some pretty hot water involving his client (Barbara Stanwyck) and his co-worker (Edward G. Robinson). Neff tries to misuse the concept of double indemnity and he pays a heavy price. Surprisingly, double indemnity works very well for the rest of us. Exercise, healthy nutrition, proper rest, and regular chiropractic care can pay off, not only double, but often in many multiples. However, before we begin reaping these benefits we have to know where to look and how to make use of this property we all get for free.
Out in the world, insurance policies pay us a benefit when problems arise. Car insurance, home insurance, life insurance, and health insurance are all financial instruments that compensate people (in some degree or other, more or less) when things go wrong. Inside our bodies, double indemnity is turned on its head. When we do things that are good for our health and well-being, our built-in "insurance policies" pay off double, sometimes triple, and sometimes in ways that cannot even be calculated.
Let's consider a person who is overweight, possibly seriously overweight. That person decides, much like Howard Beale in the multiple-Academy Award-winning film "Network" (1976), that he is "not going to take this anymore". He declares to himself that he will begin to lose weight. He makes a commitment to start exercising regularly and eating nutritious food. Change takes time, and sooner rather than later he loses a few pounds. Then he loses a few more. After three months he's 12 pounds lighter, and after six months he's more than 20 pounds lighter than when he first chose to live a healthier life.
By now his body's double indemnity clause has started to pay off. He began doing some things, began engaging in a healthy new lifestyle, and he begins to reap the benefits. Owing to his new exercise program and his new diet, his blood pressure begins to go down. His insulin levels begin to stabilize,1 rather than spiking and falling off drastically throughout the day. His blood glucose levels become steadier, too, and his cells, organs, and tissues (particularly his brain) are beginning to receive consistent supplies of oxygen and other precious nutrients.2 His immune system gets stronger.3 As a direct result, his stress levels are going down and his heart rate is steadier. His sleep is more restful and he has more energy throughout the day. There are many other benefits, too, known only to him and his loved ones.
Our built-in double indemnity clause is primed for action. It is ready to kick in and begin an open-ended flow of good health and well-being. All we need to do is begin taking consistent actions that will enable our innate powers to function in the ways they were designed to function.
1Bloem CJ, Chang AM: Short-term exercise improves beta-cell function and insulin resistance in older people with impaired glucose tolerance. J Clin Endocrinol Metab 93(2):387-392, 2008
2Ahmadi N, et al: Effects of intense exercise and moderate caloric restriction on cardiovascular risk factors and inflammation. Am J Med 124(10):978-982, 2011
3Walsh NP, et al: Position statement. Part one: Immune function and exercise. Exerc Immunol Rev 17:6-63, 2011
Monday, March 12, 2012
Quote to Inspire:
“Although the world is full of suffering, it is also full of the overcoming of it.”~ Helen Keller
Exercise of the Week: Seated Glute Stretch
Difficulty: Easy to moderate
Start: Seated on a chair.
Exercise: Place one ankle on opposite knee. Then, bend forward until you feel a good stretch in hip. Also relax lower back in this position. Hold for 30-60 seconds, and then return to starting position. Switch sides, and repeat 2X per side.
Topic of the Week: Children and Chronic Pain
Various medical associations and institutes have different definitions as to what constitutes chronic pain but generally it is described as pain that continues well beyond the normal healing stage of acute pain. Chronic pain can be continuous or it can be episodic. While diseases, such as arthritis, can contribute to the emergence of chronic pain, sometimes the cause can be a complete mystery. The most prevalent pain condition in kids is headache - other pain problems noted are abdominal pain and musculoskeletal pain.
A 2011 Canadian medical study reviewed research published in the last 20 years on children and chronic pain, and it revealed the problem is affecting more kids than ever before. The review also indicates girls experience chronic pain more often than boys; however, the reasons for this remain unclear. The research reviewers noted that social and psychological factors may influence the development of chronic pain, including “anxiety, depression, low self-esteem and low socioeconomic status.”
“We found that persistent and recurrent chronic pain is overwhelmingly prevalent in children and adolescents, with girls generally experiencing more pain than boys and prevalence rates increasing with age," said lead investigator Sara King, PhD, "Findings such as these argue that researchers and clinicians should be aware of the problem and the long-term consequences of chronic pain in children."
Chronic Pain Treatment Can Be a Challenge
Just like adults, children may suffer additional disadvantages as a result of chronic pain. They are more likely to miss school, avoid or withdraw from extracurricular activities and develop mental health problems.
Despite the increasing rate of chronic pain among children, there are a number of obstacles that make treating kids for this health condition a challenge. Young children may not have the verbal skills to express their pain. Even when they can, kids may want to avoid seeing a doctor and so don’t share their pain with parents. Without verbal cues from their children, parents may not notice chronic pain issues as many kids can carry on normally. However, consistent untreated pain in childhood boosts the risk of numerous health problems emerging in adulthood.
As well, physicians may not be knowledgeable in the management of long-term pain in children. Chronic pain treatment is more often associated with adults – as increases in age make this type of health problem more likely to develop.
Clues for Parents
What can a parent do to detect pain problems in his or her child? Keep an eye open for some of these behaviors…
• Changes to appetite
• Changes to sleep patterns
• Weight loss
• Irritability
• Avoiding social activities
• Less physically active
• Fever
• Sweating
• Flushed skin
• Shallow or fast breathing
If your child shows these symptoms, ask him if he is in pain and where the pain occurs in his body, and then consult your chiropractor or pediatrician
* * *
Your chiropractor knows pain is often intimately linked to your body’s central nervous system. For example, when you experience nerve interference in the spine (subluxations), extra irritation to the nervous system could cause a signal that is interpreted as pain, when normally the same signal would not in the absence of subluxations. By correcting the subluxation, your chiropractor normalizes nervous system tone. This is why it is important to have regular adjustments to help keep your nervous system in optimal condition and prevent pain before it starts!
Disclaimer: Information contained in The Wellness ExpressTM newsletter is for educational and general purposes only and is designed to assist you in making informed decisions about your health. Any information contained herein is not intended to substitute advice from your physician or other healthcare professional. Copyright © - The Wellness ExpressTM
Tuesday, March 6, 2012
Your Personal Energy Conservation System
The world's supply of fossil fuels has been dwindling for a long time. It's been easy to pretend this wasn't happening because there seemed to be an endless quantity of oil and gas reserves. How could we ever run out? All we had to do was drill another well or lay down another pipeline. But now it seems that ineffective public policies and naive consumer practices have amplified the effects of two critical factors: an exploding global population and surging demands of thriving new economies in formerly developing nations.
Energy conservation has become an important topic around the globe, in communities, nations, and confederations such as the European Union. Energy conservation is not only critically important for global stability. It also serves as an important metaphor for the health and well-being of individuals.
Physiologically, humans have their own energy conservation systems. For example, your heart rate is tightly regulated. If your heart beats too fast for too long, owing to ongoing stress or anxiety, it may ultimately break down. Other problems may develop. A racing heart requires a lot of oxygen to supply the energy for heart muscle cells. This precious fuel is always needed elsewhere, and symptoms may develop in the gastrointestinal or hormonal systems.
Human internal energy conservation also involves the use of glucose, your body's primary energy currency. Glucose is used by every cell in the body as an energy resource to power normal physiological processes. For example, your brain is the number one consumer of glucose. In a fasting adult model, up to 80% of the glucose manufactured from stored complex carbohydrates is used for brain metabolism.1,2 If your glucose storage and supply mechanisms are not optimized, many systems, including your mental functioning, will suffer significant drop-offs.
Importantly, regular vigorous physical exercise, particularly strength-training, ensures your body's optimal use of energy resources. Strength=training causes your body to build lean muscle mass, which burns energy even when you're resting. One long-term result is that both your blood glucose levels and your blood insulin levels tend to flatten out.3 The result is a body that knows how to optimally burn glucose for energy, rather than a body that is out of synch and storing glucose as fat. The glucose you consume as complex carbohydrates gets used efficiently, and your body works much more effectively.
You don't need to lift heavy weights to get these long-term health-promoting benefits. Lifting weights that are heavy enough to provide a modest challenge is all that's needed. The simple rule of thumb is this - if you can easily do three sets of eight repetitions with the weight you're using, it's too light. Increase the weight slightly so that attempting to do three sets of eight repetitions is a little challenging. That will be the right weight for you for that particular exercise.
Energy conservation is not only needed in the world today. The practice of energy conservation is also key for our internal health and well-being. Regular vigorous exercise helps us conserve the energy we need to live.
Chiropractic Care and Energy Resources
Chiropractic care plays a role in almost all aspects of health and well-being. In terms of your body's internal energy conservation system, chiropractic care is important to help ensure that all the various mechanisms are functioning smoothly. Your body is made up of systems, organs, tissues, and cells, and the proper functioning of every aspect of these structures depends on receiving timely information from the master system, i.e., the nerve system.
At the deepest level, cells need appropriate instructions as to when to perform certain tasks, how much to do, or how much to produce. The nerve system transfers messages from the brain to orchestrate all of these activities. By making sure a person's spine is aligned, chiropractic care helps smooth out the pathways on which these nerve signals travel. Chiropractic care helps all of your body's systems to do the job they were designed to do.
1Tintinalli JE, et al: Emergency Medicine. A Comprehensive Study Guide, 6th ed. New York, McGraw-Hill, 2010, p 826
2McCormack SE, et al: Skeletal muscle mitochondrial function is associated with longitudinal growth velocity in children and adolescents. J Clin Endocrinol Metab Epub August 10, 2011
3Ryan AS: Exercise in aging: its important role in mortality, obesity and insulin resistance. Aging Health 6(5):551-563, 2010
Monday, March 5, 2012
Exercise of the Week: Seated Low Back/QL Stretch
Difficulty: Easy
Start: Seated on chair, with legs apart at knees.
Exercise: bend forward, reaching toward floor between feet. Rest for 30-60 seconds, relaxing muscles of the lower back. Then reach both hands toward one foot, and rest for 30-60 seconds. Switch sides and rest for another 30-60 seconds. Return to starting position.
Topic of the Week: The Future of Health Care: A New Pill…Or A New Paradigm?
What if you knew that jumbo jets, each one carrying 300 passengers, were going to start falling out of the sky? What if you were told that this was going to happen twice a day, for the next 365 days, each time killing all 300 passengers on board? Would that alarm you? Would you maybe hesitate a bit before deciding to get on the next airplane?
What if you discovered that it is already happening, but it is not airline pilots flying those planes—they are medical doctors!
A commentary written by Dr. B. Starfield, published in the Journal of the American Medical Association (July, 2000), provided a shocking yet conservative estimate: in this year alone, more than 220,000 North Americans are going to die—not from natural causes, but from medical causes. Iatrogenic illnesses, or problems directly resulting from medical intervention, are the third leading cause of preventable deaths in North America. Only heart disease and cancer lead to more deaths annually.
In another recent study, researchers reported that almost 20% of all patients admitted to the ICU of one hospital were there because of iatrogenic causes, and most of these were related to over-medication. Does that scare you enough to question your doctor the next time he or she hands you a prescription?
If you are in an accident, be thankful that you live in North America. Our emergency medical care is second to none. However, as far as our general health and wellness is concerned, allopathic medicine is failing us. Americans are considered over-fed and under-nourished, we get too much medication and not enough exercise, and our youths are being taught about health with a philosophy that is out-dated and incorrect.
When did the medical model start to go wrong?
In the 17th century, philosopher Rene Descartes compared the human body to a machine, with a mind and body that were considered completely separate structures. As such, he suggested that diseases of the body should be treated only by doctors of the body, and diseases of the mind were only to be treated by doctors of the mind.
Western medicine adopted this philosophy—to our detriment. Where Descartes went wrong, and what many doctors seem to be neglecting, is the fact that the mind and body are intimately connected—and that by treating one, you greatly influence the other.
Combine this problem with the fact that we have become a society of “need it now”: we have fast-food, fast cars and want faster and better technology all the time and this is spilling over into the healthcare industry. Most people nowadays are seeking that “quick fix”—that one-treatment wonder or one pill that will make them instantly better.
The United States is now the largest consumer market for pharmaceuticals in the world, with 48% of the entire population using at least one prescription medication in the last month. This is not a state to be proud of, as it is only making us sicker, not healthier.
What can we do about it?
We need to start taking care of ourselves. We need to shift to a more health-based paradigm and get back to the basics. The solution will not be found in the treatment of our problems, but in the prevention of them. A headache is not the indicator that the body needs more Tylenol! We need to reduce the amount of stress we are exposed to in our environments. We need to take control of our own health, and stop handing it over to a system that is inherently flawed.
Who can you turn to for guidance and help? Your chiropractor, of course!
Chiropractors have been working diligently for over a hundred years under the basic premise that “the power that made the body heals the body”. They adjust spines to remove vertebral subluxations—helping take stress away from the spine. Alleviating pressure from the sensitive joints and nerves of the spine works to facilitate a better mind-body connection, thus helping to improve the general health and wellness of the whole patient, no matter what condition they are suffering from. Since nothing is added or taken away from the body, it is the most natural, safe and effective thing you can do to enhance your health. Regular chiropractic adjustments help prevent sickness by making the body work better.
If it is health and wellness you are seeking, it is time to reach for a paradigm called chiropractic, not another pill or prescription.
Disclaimer: Information contained in The Wellness ExpressTM newsletter is for educational and general purposes only and is designed to assist you in making informed decisions about your health. Any information contained herein is not intended to substitute advice from your physician or other healthcare professional. Copyright © - The Wellness ExpressTM
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