This month’s health observance is about scoliosis.(Wikipedia entry) Basically, scoliosis is an abnormal curvature of your spine when looking at you from the front or back. Some of the side effects of scoliosis include back pain and altered function of the organs within your abdominal & chest cavity.
www.healthsystem.virginia.edu
One of the most common reasons for health problems that I see in my office is faulty posture. Having poor posture will almost guarantee that you’ll have Chiropractic structural problems. But luckily, if you get proper chiropractic spinal & extremity adjustments and are put on a postural rehabilitation program, postural faults will not plague you.
If you drop a line down from your head to your feet it should pass directly through the following:
Ear canal
Shoulder joint
Hip joint
Knee joint
Ankle joint
The immediate effect of having poor posture is that you’ll start to develop abnormal pains in your body. These are pains that you have no idea why they’re there. You’ll begin to notice that you’ll have upper neck, back and low back pain. You may even develop foot, knee and hip pain.
Step 1: Make sure that you are analyzed by a competent Chiropractic physician (preferably one who focuses on postural alignment and is also very familiar with Applied Kinesiology or Muscle Response Testing. When you call in to an office, ask the receptionist if the doctor uses Applied Kinesiology or Muscle Testing).
Step 2: Remove structural interferences in all affected joints. As Chiropractors, we term these interferences “subluxations.” These subluxations interfere with your joint’s normal motion and restricted motion is the first step toward postural distortions.
Step 3: Focus on retraining the surrounding stabilizing muscles. This is most important to a lasting postural correction. Along with making sure the surrounding muscles are “firing at optimal” your chiropractor should then make sure all the surrounding muscles move together in a synchronous pattern. When the muscles move synchronously you decrease the wear and tear on the joint.
Step 4: Focus on general postural enhancing exercises. There are specific exercises that will help you to regain proper posture. Some include: chin-tuck, abdominal bracing and pelvic rocking.
