Hancock Chiropractic Blog

Many Patients With Multiple Sclerosis Have Overcome Their Pains

2011-07-25T07:30:00.000-07:00

Multiple sclerosis is a chronic inflammatory disorder that affects the central nervous system. Some of our nerve cells have a lipid coat which is known as the myeline sheath. In multiple sclerosis, an inflammatory reaction destroys myelinated nerve fibers.

Patients often suffer from severe pains that are usually the result of irritation of the inflamed nerve fibers.

Multiple sclerosis is a disease that is characterized by bouts of exacerbation pain intervened by periods of quiescence. Exacerbations are usually separated by long periods, months to years, which are free of symptoms.

The classic symptoms of multiple sclerosis include any of the following:

- Sensory loss and parasthesias. These are usually early complaints.

- About 40% of patients suffer from pains at a point or another during the course of the illness. The pain is usually gnawing or burning in character.

- Muscle cramps that are secondary to affection of the motor cells of the spinal cord.

- Symptoms due to affection of the involuntary, or autonomic, nervous system such as bowel and bladder dysfunction.

- Patients occasionally complain of fatigue and dizziness.

- Impairment of concentration, attention span, judgment and short term memory.

- Mood disorders such as depression or euphoria.

- Inflammation of the trigeminal nerve (trigeminal nerve) which leads to weakness of the muscles of the face.

- Convulsions or fits occur in some patients.

Pain is an important issue for most patients with multiple sclerosis. The pain is sometimes severe. The pain is occasionally resistant to conventional medical treatment lines.

The human brain, nerves and spinal cord are loosely enveloped in 3 layers of thin biological membranes that are known as the meninges.

When the meninges are subjected to tension, pressure is transmitted to the nerves leading to pain and nerve dysfunction.

A new unique treatment called the NRC technique is directed towards relieving the tension that maybe affecting the meninges. The NRC involves stimulation, using a special method, of a certain area on the back of the head (occiput) and the first cervical vertebra (atlas). The technique relieves tension exerted on the meninges; thus, reducing the pressure applied to the nerves.

Many patients with multiple sclerosis have overcome their pains after only a single session of NRC.

However, normally, most patients report marked improvement after a few weeks of regular NRC treatment. A simple therapeutic test session can help the chiropractic decide whether or not NRC can have positive influence on the patient's symptoms.

Improvement of the patient's symptoms after the 10 minute test can predict even better results after longer periods of regular NRC therapy.

NRC has opened new horizons for patients with multiple sclerosis. Hundreds of patients of multiple sclerosis have managed to rid themselves of the pain that commonly accompanies this disorder.

Dr. Tanner Hancock, Hancock Health & Wellness is one of the few clinics in the U.S. and the only clinic selected in Wichita, Kansas to provide the NRC technique for the natural, drug free treatment of many types of pain & other conditions.

Stress & Depression Can Trigger Trigeminal Neuralgia

2011-07-18T11:09:00.000-07:00

Trigeminal neuralgia is a rather common painful disorder.

The exact cause behind this disorder is not completely understood. Conventional medications are often ineffective in controlling the severe pain that is experienced by patients with trigeminal neuralgia.

The trigeminal nerve is a cranial nerve that primarily carries sensory nerve fibers of the skin of the face. Injury to the nerve fibers of the trigeminal nerve leads to pain which is usually severe and burning in nature.

Although the exact mechanism behind trigeminal neuralgia is yet to be known, research has proven that stress and depression can aggravate the pain attacks that patients experience.

The presentation of trigeminal neuralgia is often in the form of stabbing or burning pain of one side of the face. The pain is usually localized to the area between the angle of the jaw and the corner of the mouth. However, some patients report pain localized to the area between the upper lip and the eyebrow.

The pain is often severe and occurs in attacks that can last for up to 20 minutes.

The frequency of the attacks varies greatly; while some patients experience 1-2 attacks per day, others may experience 10 attacks or more per hour. The pain is often triggered by talking, chewing, smiling, shaving and drinking hot or cold drinks. Furthermore, blowing the nose and brushing the teeth can trigger the pain in some patients.

Initially, patients may find relief with one of the drugs that are usually prescribed to patients with trigeminal neuralgia such as carbamazepine.

Afterwards, the pain becomes resistant to medical treatment and the severity of pain aggravates over time. Most recently, NRC has been proven to be effective in controlling the severe pain attacks that are experienced by patients with trigeminal neuralgia.

The unique NRC technique is a chiropractic hands-on technique that has produced magical pain relief results in many disorders associated with pain including trigeminal neuralgia.

The NRC design was based on the fact that compression and/or irritation of the meninges, which are membranous sheaths that envelop the brain and nerves, are the main causes underlying painful disorders.

The NRC technique involves compression of the occiput and the atlas which relieves tension exerted on the meninges sheathing the nerves. Patients with trigeminal neuralgia can experience complete relief of their pain after a single session of NRC therapy.

One of the great benefits of NRC is that relieves stress.

As mentioned earlier, patients with trigeminal neuralgia often develop depression which further aggravates their perception of pain during the attacks. Accordingly, not only can NRC decrease the severity of pain attacks in patients with trigeminal neuralgia, but it can also relieve stress which helps in the control of associated depressive symptoms.

A 10 minute therapeutic test can help the chiropractor determine whether or not NRC can help alleviate your pain.

A decrease in the severity of the pain after a short NRC session predicts even better results with longer repeated sessions.

Even more, some patients with trigeminal neuralgia experience complete disappearance of their pain during or shortly after the therapeutic test.

The NRC technique is totally safe and has been increasingly becoming an effective pain control treatment in many diseases such as rheumatoid arthritis, fibromyalgia, headache, lupus, arthritis, reflex sympathetic dystrophy, multiple sclerosis, insomnia, Parkinsonism, irritable bowel syndrome, nervousness, anorexia and various painful disorders.

Dr. Tanner Hancock, Hancock Health & Wellness is one of the few clinics in the U.S. and the only clinic selected in Wichita, Kansas to provide the NRC technique for the natural, drug free treatment of many types of pain & other conditions.

Chiropractic As Part Of A "Get Healthy" Program

2010-12-22T13:53:00.000-08:00

If you're like many people, you'd love to be a healthy person. If you already feel pretty healthy, that's great. However, I've noticed more and more people are searching the internet for ways to get healthy. They want to be healthy, they just don't necessarily want to have to take any difficult action steps in order to make it happen.

Getting healthy usually means all the normal steps. Eating better, getting some regular exercise, and addressing various ailments and symptoms that have begun to show up. Still, most people are going to take a passive approach to their health. They want to do things and go places where things will be "done to them" rather than them having to "do stuff."

Let's take eating better for example. There's no real mystery any more for you in which foods are good for you. Fast food is usually bad (even the stuff they try to make seem like it's good for you), and vegetables are good. When you are snacking on potato chips, you can't honestly be telling yourself "I sure am eating healthy."

Eating healthy things, putting only healthy things in your shopping cart, and worse, planning your meals ahead of time so you don't get caught starving and nothing to eat but fast food requires effort.

Exercise is the same thing. Remember those belts that people used to strap around their waist and get shaken into better health? You don't see them anymore because exercise really is not a passive thing. You've got to get out of your chair and regularly move around to make anything happen. After awhile, just walking around is not really going to get you the results you want either. You'll have to put in more effort to increase the intensity of your exercise to hit the next level.

Here's the good news for those people that want to do something healthy, but don't want to put forth a ton of effort. Get a chiropractic adjustment. You don't have to wait for headaches, neck pain, or back pain to decide to visit a chiropractor (even though that's what a lot of people do). Getting a chiropractic adjustment is one of the easiest things to do, and one of the healthiest.

It's an insidious thing. You don't see that your spine is breaking down. You don't see the degeneration process start to occur in your spine and the spinal discs. You just know that things aren't quite right. I've had patients that never complained of anything more than low back stiffness, before coming in for their first chiropractic visit.

However, their x-rays showed advanced spinal degeneration something that simply could not happen overnight. The best part of all in starting this type of program is that the only "action" you have to take is to show up. The chiropractor will do the rest, and you get to just sit back and feel better about taking a healthy step toward a better you.

Montel Williams Testimonial

2010-12-15T13:53:00.000-08:00

Your Pain Just Started, But...

2010-12-08T13:52:00.000-08:00

There are problems that have just started, lurking beneath the surface where you have not yet felt their pain. You may go years, occasionally feeling some soreness and stiffness, just to have it go away on its own. Maybe you feel a twinge, take a pill, and it all seems like it's going to be okay.

Then one morning you get up, accidentally drop your socks on the floor, bend down to pick them up and you can't get back up. You are having so much pain that you barely manage to make it to your bed and hang on. You start taking pills like crazy until you manage to pull out the yellow pages and find a nearby chiropractor.

On your visit to the chiropractor, he explains that your spine is showing signs of wear and tear, that your problem likely began years ago. "What? I just bent down to pick up my socks. My problem started this morning." The problem with believing that your problem is new is that you will also likely believe that your pain should go away quickly.

You are likely forgetting about all the times you felt warning signals and quickly dismissed them or medicated them away. You don't realize that you haven't been able to touch your toes in years, you don't exercise regularly, and your job entails you sitting for extended periods of time. These were all factors in the building of your spinal problem, long before you ever felt your first symptom... the back pain.

The back pain ended up as the final result of the years of build up on your spine. Now you can either go for stronger drugs to cover things up, or you can begin to undo the years of ignoring the warnings and work to build up a healthy and normally functioning spine. The good news is that it rarely takes nearly as long to put your back together as it took to make it bad in the first place.

There is a point of no return. There is a point when you've ignored and dulled the warning signals for so long that the degeneration in your spine and the bulging of your spinal disc have eliminated some of the more conservative treatments. There is a time when your only choice is a spinal surgery or injections to stop the pain even if they aren't fixing anything.

What can you learn from this? When the back pain hits, take a good look at when your problem began and not just when your symptoms began. Seriously evaluate what its going to take to get your spine back to a good place and pain-free. The longer you wait in taking the proper steps, the more difficult the journey.

Is Back Pain Due To A Lack Of Exercise?

2010-12-01T13:51:00.000-08:00

Many people seem to want to know if you can just exercise lower back pain away. Is it only about exercise? That is, did you end up with lower back pain due to a lack of exercise? Or could it be something else?

Your back pain is not necessarily caused by a lack of exercise, but it's probably a good place to start looking. When I ask patients if they exercise, most are still saying "no." Those that do exercise tend to stick with the same machine or routine for their entire program. (And almost none of their "routine" exercises focus on improving their back muscles.)

So on one hand, we have those that don't exercise and have lower back pain. It's easy to take a guess and see that their spine is having problems due to a lack of muscular support. While their spine may need more work at this point (check with your healthcare professional), eventually they'll exercise lower back pain away by creating a muscular back support around their spine with regular exercise.

Those that do exercise, but are not performing a variety of movements are causing a different problem; muscular imbalance. They are likely only developing certain muscle groups while largely ignoring others. Worse, they may be performing activities that are alarmingly similar to what they already do all day.

They are strengthening muscles that are already overworked (muscles in the front of the body) and not strengthening muscles that are typically ignored (back muscles). This is a standard recipe for developing lower back pain problems and should be avoided.

Overall, maintaining a variety of activities that includes exercises to enhance cardiovascular health, strengthening and stretching will help exercise lower back pain away for good. The same formula works for almost everyone. First, due some exercise regularly. Next, make sure you take some time to strengthen your back muscles (especially if you already know you need it!).

Chiropractic For Ear Infections

2010-11-25T13:51:00.000-08:00

Have You Developed Computer Posture?

2010-11-18T13:50:00.000-08:00

Have you developed "computer posture?" Is your neck beginning to jut forward while your upper back takes on the rounded shape of someone hunched over a keyboard all day?

It makes sense that no matter what your occupation, if you spend extended amounts of time in the same position, your body will begin to stay that way. Your body loves to adapt. If you lift weights, your body thinks that you must need bigger muscles to accomplish your daily activities. On the other hand, if you don't lift weights, your body assumes there's no need for big muscles.

If you are hunched over the keyboard, your body begins the process of creating a computer posture for you. A postural change that will help you stay in the position that you are in the most.

So to solve this problem (yes, computer posture is a problem), you're going to have to do activities that tell your body that your desire is to sit up straight -- and out of pain.

The great thing about your body is that you won't have to do the additional activities nearly as much as you are doing the position that is contributing to your computer posture.

You just have to do it effectively. You have to target the muscles of your back that support your posture and help you maintain a straight position. Just going to the gym and bench pressing is not going to get you the results you're after.

Spend time exercising your back and you'll make it difficult for you body to keep you hunched over your desk.

Do You Need Chiropractic Care After An Auto Accident?

2010-11-11T13:49:00.000-08:00

Do you need to seek out chiropractic care following an auto accident? My answer is a resounding "yes!" Why is it so important? Why can't you just rest and take the medications that were prescribed by your medical doctor? Is the insurance company going to give you a hard time about it?

The reason why chiropractic care is so important after an accident has little to do with you being in pain (although it's good for that too). A vertebra that moves out of its normal alignment can wreak havoc on your neck and its associated nerves. You may not be in a lot of pain immediately following the accident, but research indicates that most people will experience a bulk of their symptoms after a few days.

Once you start to feel symptoms, this is a good indicator that something has moved out of place, and likely that you're experiencing a sprain/strain kind of injury. Sprain and strain don't sound horrible, but really they are describing tears of various tissues in your body. The severity of the tear will indicate the type of treatment you should probably consider first. The chiropractor can help make the determination.

Eventually, your body will heal with scar tissue. Scar tissue is more sensitive than the previously uninjured tissue that you had within you before. Once scar tissue sets up (this takes about 3 weeks following the trauma), it will become increasingly difficult to get you back to your pre-accident state. Receiving some chiropractic adjustments to your spine will help assure that your spine is in its best position as that scar tissue begins to form. The better your spine is when all of this occurs, the more likely you can return pain-free following your therapy and treatment.

So why can't you just rest and take the medications? That may be your best first course of treatment for a couple of days following your accident, but certainly can't be the best choice long term. The medications are there to help you with pain, to help you get through the difficulty of the initial phase of your injury. However, they're certainly not fixing anything.

In addition to the chiropractic adjustment, you can typically receive additional therapies that will help your muscles and other soft tissue heal more quickly than just "resting" alone. The additional therapies also help with pain, swelling, and inflammation and can be a big help in the speed of your recovery.

Will your auto insurance or health insurance company give you any trouble? You have insurance for just this type of situation, when you need health care and you can't afford to pay for it yourself. Your health insurance company may have issue if the accident wasn't your fault and the other person should be paying for it (or their insurance), but otherwise you shouldn't have trouble here.

Your auto insurance policy will determine the amount of coverage and just how much help the company has to give. Still, it's your body and your health and you'll need to make sure your injuries are taken care of following the accident. Where you will have trouble is if months have gone by and you haven't gone to see any doctors, just hoping it will go away. Then you decide to tell your insurance company that they need to pay for it all. That doesn't go over too well.

If you've been in an auto accident, it's a good idea to see a chiropractor and do it as quickly as possible once you realize you've been injured. The faster you get some type of treatment, usually the better your results.

Jerry Rice Testimonial

2010-11-04T13:48:00.000-07:00

Can Chiropractic Help Your Neck Pain?

2010-10-29T13:47:00.000-07:00

Your neck consists of seven very small vertebrae and supports the entire weight of your head. The average weight of the human head is 10 to 12 pounds, which isn't very light when you consider the neck is constantly supporting it!

Add in how much neck strain is incurred when you sit for long periods in front of the computer and you steadily increase the amount of work and strain you are expecting of your neck.

The neck also allows your head in nearly all directions which adds even more stress to your neck. With all of this responsibility, the neck is subject a great deal of stress, which often results in chronic pain and stiffness.

Once neck pain has been persistent for any period of time, you may begin to develop neurological symptoms. These may include numbness, tingling, or a "pins and needles" feeling. Usually these complaints are in the neck at all, but can be felt in the fingertips or up and down the arm.

If you begin to experience any of the neurological symptoms, this is usually an indicator that the neck problem is becoming worse. The early phase of pain is just stiffness, then it moves to real pain that can be sharp in nature. The pain will continue to get worse until the radiating symptoms begin.

Many people have neck pain and it is often extremely bothersome. Medical doctors cannot do a whole lot to permanently relieve neck pain. They can prescribe medications to mask your neck pain and they can do x-rays and other tests to see where the pain is coming from.

When they do find something wrong with the neck they will probably want to schedule surgery, which can prove to be a painful procedure with a long recovery. Surgery, while sometimes necessary, really should be considered a treatment of last resort. You can always do the surgery, but if you do the surgery first, you eliminate many other effective and conservative options.

If you have neck pain it may be wise to consult with a chiropractor before going to the extent of something much more serious such as surgery. Some of the first things that a chiropractor will do on your first visit will be to ask you questions about your neck pain.

Some questions they may ask are:

- When did your neck pain start
- What have you done to try to ease your neck pain
- Are there any other parts of your body that your neck pain stems to or from?

These are a few questions that your Chiropractor will most likely ask. After the initial consultation they will then perform a physical examination. The examination will consist of chiropractic tests, orthopedic tests, and a neurological examination. This entire process will allow the chiropractor to get to the root of your problem and allow him or her to come up with a solution to your pain.

A common practice of chiropractors is to perform a neck adjustment. A neck adjustment is a form of spinal manipulation, and is very specific in nature. This is a very precise technique and is usually very effective in alleviating neck pain.

Low Back Pain After Sitting At Your Computer?

2010-10-22T13:47:00.000-07:00

These days, most people have to sit at their computer all day. They don't have the best posture in the world, and they don't always have the best ergonomic set up for their desks. They are also under a lot of stress. However, usually bad posture, stress, and poor ergonomics will lead to frequent headaches, neck and upper back pain... not low back pain.

Low back pain is usually reserved for those employees doing physical work, a lot of lifting, bending, and stooping. During the times that I've seen patients with more physical jobs, most of them presented to my office with low back pain. Now, the top half of their body provides the more abundant symptom.

So if you don't do physical work all day, why are you getting low back pain? I noticed the same two major muscle groups being tight and stressed over and over again. By stretching these two major areas, a lot of very common symptoms, including low back pain and sciatica seemed to get quick relief. Doing the stretches also seemed to make a difference long term in my patients' ability to get longer lasting results from their chiropractic care.

The first muscles you should stretch are your hamstrings. You sit all day and the seated position puts them in their shortest position. Standing up means your hamstrings are pulling on your pelvis and pulling things out of place. Keeping this muscle more flexible is key in helping your back pain.

People have the most trouble because they can't quite get it stretched. First step would be to get off the floor. That's usually too much! Stand up or sit in a chair and put your leg straight out on a chair. Slowly try to touch your toes. Just go slow and only as far as you can reasonably go without pain. Hold the stretch for at least thirty seconds. Repeat on each side twice. Usually people just don't hold their stretches long enough to do much good. Consistency will make the difference in getting more flexible.

The next muscles to stretch are your hip rotators. Relieving the muscles here takes a lot of strain off the sciatica problem. For this one, you can even do it while lying in bed or on the floor. Keep one leg straight while you pull your other leg up to your chest. You should feel a pull. You can further stretch this area by pulling your knee across your body to get better results. Again, hold the stretch for at least thirty seconds.

Chances are, you're not going to stop working on your computer any time soon. Taking a few minutes each day to do some stretching will make a world of difference. Seeing a chiropractor on a regular basis is also a huge help.

Chiropractic Miracle Story!

2010-10-15T13:46:00.000-07:00

Dealing With Back And Shoulder Pain At Work

2010-10-08T13:45:00.000-07:00

There are many signs that you're developing a posture problem. Back and shoulder blade pain is a common one. These areas of the body are under a lot of additional stress and pressure when your spine is not in a good position all day.

If your daily activities require you to sit in front of the computer all day, back and shoulder blade pain may be on their way if you don't take steps to prevent it. If you've already got these symptoms, the treatment is the same as the prevention.
As a frequent computer user, you've probably already been told to take breaks from sitting in that position at least once per hour.

Doing this give the muscles a chance to relax and regroup. A good formula is to figure out how long you can work before you experience the first symptoms. Let's say that's 55 minutes. Subtract ten minutes from that time and you've got the longest amount of time you should spend in front of the computer before taking some sort of break.

What are you doing during that five minutes of rest? Are you still in a position that will continue to allow the muscles in the front of your body to grow short? Take the time to stretch them out. Or you can keep working, but maybe it's time to return a few phone calls or drop off those files to the guy down the hall. Just break up your activity and get some movement.

A quick and easy stretch that will actually keep the pain from coming back right away can be done right in your office. Find an open doorway and brace yourself against the frame. Push forward and feel your chest muscles and the front of your shoulders stretch. Hold it for just a few seconds. Now repeat that about five times.

Are you giving your back muscles a chance to improve in strength? A simple exercise to help with back and shoulder blade pain is slowly move your shoulder blades together. One way of describing this motion is to imagine that you are squeezing an orange between your shoulder blades. Hold that position for a few seconds and release.

It's not necessarily your work that's causing your problem, but it is likely that your daily activities are very repetitive and they are leading to your posture issue and your back and shoulder blade pain. Take some small steps and you'll be amazed at the difference.

Neck Pain After Sitting At Your Computer?

2010-10-01T13:43:00.000-07:00

You sit down at your computer, ready to put in a full day's work and make some serious headway on your projects. You know you'll easily be spending 8 to 10 hours sitting in front of the computer.
You've set up your computer workstation as effectively as you can figure.

Your keyboard is appropriately placed in front of you and your monitor is directly in front of you at eye level. So why will your neck start to hurt? Why will your effectiveness be destroyed by the nagging, aggravating neck pain that seems to show up more and more frequently?

If you are regularly spending a lot of time in front of a computer, you have to realize that your body is going to begin to change and adapt to take on this frequent activity. Your front neck muscles are slowly growing shorter and tighter, while the muscles in the back of your neck are growing longer and weaker.

The back muscles are also growing full of spasm and knots while they are forced to hold up your ten pound head for hours at a time. You would think they would grow stronger from having to hold your head up all the time, but it just never seems to work that way. As they get longer, they are growing weaker, and the job of holding up your head becomes increasingly difficult.

The best options are to do exercises and activities that will counteract the extended computer usage. The rule of thumb is to spend time stretching the front of your neck and strengthening the muscles in the back. This same rule applies to anyone looking to improve posture.

To stretch the front of the neck, turn your head slightly to one side, about forty-five degrees. If you turn your head to the right, you are stretching the left and vice versa. Place your right hand on left side of your chest and pull down gently as you tilt your head back. Stop immediately if you feel sharp pain or any dizziness.

To strengthen the back of the neck, the easiest route would be with a neck exercise machine. Some health clubs have them, but they are more of a specialized device. You can also fold up a towel and place it against a wall. Put the back of your head against the towel and push into it. Hold for a few seconds and release. This is an isometric contraction.

If you are unable to complete some of these movements, or you find that you can't painlessly move your head backwards, it may be time to visit a chiropractor. The chiropractor will perform a spinal adjustment and restore the normal movement of your spine.

Your neck shouldn't hurt just because your sitting in front of your computer. You've got to work and pain can be a nuisance, but it doesn't have to be there with a little effort.

Hancock Chiropractic Is Blogging!

2010-08-31T09:29:00.001-07:00

Check back soon, as we'll be sharing information with all of our Wichita community!