Movement is the fundamental expression of healthy living.
People often come to our centre with pain and a restriction of movement. Commonly they don’t know what has caused it. A detailed history and examination is important to identify the cause of your pain. We then use “hands on” techniques to help you out of pain, and get you moving again. Our standard consultations are longer and always include remedial massage.
Chiropractors spend 5 years at University and study the entire body. We know just as much about your ankle, knee, hip, shoulder, elbow etc as we do about your sore back. So if you have a sprained ankle, torn hamstring or shoulder impingement we can help. Often these “peripheral” joints have a profound influence on your spine. For example your knee, hip and pelvis will compensate for an old badly sprained ankle. It may even go all the way up your spine. We develop a full body map of your “weak links”…….everything is connected.
Once you are feeling better and moving more freely, you need to learn techniques to help prevent a relapse. Pain has a habit of returning, often for no particular reason. Current research from around the world tells us that exercises that target weak de-conditioned areas of your body will help prevent a recurrence. They are easy to perform, you don’t need any special equipment and they are quick to do. You just need us to teach you which ones are safe, and which ones to avoid. You may actually be doing ones that harm rather than help. Also movements you perform in your daily life can lead to injury. Something as simple as getting in and out of a chair can cause pain if performed incorrectly. Learning simple “spine sparing” techniques will make getting around in your daily life easier.
People who suffer from chronic pain often avoid movement because they are scared they will hurt their back. Knowing that “hurt” does not always equal “harm”, and what movements are safe to do, will help give you the confidence to get moving again……pain free.
You don’t have to do it all, and we won’t be upset if you forget your exercises, but we do know that if you take some combination of our advice, treatment and specific exercises, your movement will improve and so will your quality of life.