Can Seeing a Chiropractor Provide You with Back Pain Relief?
Chiropractic therapy is a non-medicinal treatment that is concentrated with aligning one’s musculoskeletal system so that your body functions more efficiently. Chiropractic therapy is a personalized treatment that doesn’t involve drugs and aims to treat the cause of pain, rather than the symptoms. The professional chiropractors serving Thornhill, Vaughan, Richmond Hill, Maple, and Markham at Be Well are dedicated to providing you with optimum back health. Our goal is to reduce your back pain to a minimum and work with you to help you live your life to a maximum.
What Is Involved When Choosing Chiropractic to Relieve Pain?
Chiropractors use spinal manipulations to relieve pain in your joints and muscles. Patients who visit a chiropractor at Be Well in Thornhill typically spend more time in initial visits with further treatments usually becoming shorter. It is not uncommon for a patient’s initial visit to be about 30 minutes in length with further treatments taking as little as 5 minutes. Of course, this all varies according to the individual being treated and the nature of their ailment.
Chiropractors Treat the Cause of Your Pain, Not the Symptoms
Chiropractic is a form of alternative medicine that has to do with diagnosis and treatment of issues concerning the neuro-musculoskeletal systems in the body. Chiropractors are licenced health professionals that are trained to diagnose and treat neuro-musculoskeletal issues such as back pain, headaches, neck pain, disc herniation, carpal tunnel syndrome, plantar fasciosis, and many more. Chiropractors are unique in that they often take a conservative and holistic approach in their patient’s health. This means that often times Chiropractors will get to the root cause of the problem, and try to address the issue, instead of just treating the symptoms.
Typically, the chiropractors at Be Well in Thornhill will utilize different types of treatment modalities depending on the diagnosis. A chiropractor might use techniques such as spinal manipulation/ mobilization, soft tissues therapy, electrical stimulation, rehabilitation exercises, and acupuncture to treat your injuries.
What to Expect When You First Visit a Chiropractor at Be Well
On your first visit to see a chiropractor at Be Well in Thornhill, we ask that you arrive 5-10 minutes early to fill out some paperwork. Once your paperwork has been completed, your chiropractor will perform an intake assessment. The intake assessment will consist of a thorough history of your chief complaint, a health history, and a detailed physical examination.
Your chiropractor at Be Well might ask you questions such as where is the pain, characteristics of the pain, how long has the issue been going on for, and gather any other pertinent information. It is also a very good idea to note down aggravating factors and relieving factors to your injury prior to visiting in order to assist the chiropractor in figuring out the issue. After gathering information for your chief complain, your chiropractor will also ask you questions regarding your health history in order to help with your diagnosis.
Next, your chiropractor will perform a physical assessment consisted of observation, range of motion testing, muscle testing, and other orthopedic testing to pinpoint the root cause of your pain. Once the physical examination is completed, your chiropractor will have a diagnosis for you. At that point, your chiropractor will then provide a plan of management for your injury.
Depending upon your initial diagnosis, your chiropractor might provide some treatment. This might include pain control therapy such as soft tissue therapy, mobilization/manipulation, and/or rehabilitation exercises.
Generally, your initial appointment will take somewhere between 45 minutes to 1 hour depending upon your injury, and what your chiropractor finds during their assessment.
And Subsequent Visits to a Chiropractor at Be Well?
Subsequent visits will usually be about 30 minutes in duration. Your chiropractor will follow-up with you regarding your progress, and continue with their plan for the management of your pain.
Once your plan of management is completed, or your injury has completely resolved, your chiropractor might discharge you, or they might recommend a maintenance care program depending on your diagnosis. Generally, pain that has existed for a longer time, or chronic conditions, might require a maintenance care program. Patients choosing a chiropractor in Thornhill, Vaughan, RichmondHill, Maple, and Markham typically choose Be Well because of our personalized care and convenient location at Highway 7 and Bathurst in Thornhill, just across from Richmond Hill Country Club.
What Treatments Will My Chiropractor Provide?
Often times, patient wonder what chiropractic is, and how it helps them with their condition and pain management. Chiropractic derived from Latin, which loosely translate to “do by hand”. Your chiropractor might perform one or more of the following techniques.
- Soft tissue therapy- is a form of therapy that deal specifically with certain muscle or muscle group. This is different from massage therapy, in that soft tissue therapy typically involved shortening of the muscle, application of a compressive force, and lengthening of the muscle. And the goal of soft tissue therapy is to release muscle tension, promote healing, and stimulate stretch reflex response in the muscles. Soft tissue therapy is often used to restore range of motion limited by muscle tension due to myofascial contraction.
- Electrical stimulation (IFC, TENs)- this is a form of pain management your chiropractor would utilize in order to management your pain. Typically, this is done on patient with an acute injury (i.e. an ankle sprain, or a muscle tear). The way these modalities work is by stimulating peripheral nerves in order to help inhibit perception of painful stimulus via the pain-gate mechanism and/or opioid system. Electrical stimulation works by stimulating A-beta sensory fibres, which helps decrease transmission of noxious stimulus sensory to the central nervous system (pain-gate mechanism). Another way electrical stimulation can work is by stimulating A-delta fibres, which will active the opioid mechanism, thus providing pain relief.
- Rehabilitation- With physical injuries, it is extremely important to perform specific rehabilitation exercises. Rehabilitation exercises help enforce the passive treatment your chiropractor provides for you. By combining both physical rehabilitation and passive therapy, this will improve the time it takes for you to recovery from your injury.
- Spinal manipulation- Spinal manipulation is a technique in which the chiropractor will take the spinal joints to it’s end range, and applied a controlled high velocity, low amplitude force through the joint in an attempt the stretch the joint capsule. Often times this will produce an audible “pop” sound. This pop sound is created when the joint capsule is stretch, and gas bubbles within the joint are released. This is similar to when one “cracks their knuckles”. Spinal manipulation can help relief pain by decreasing noxious stimulus input, restoring range of motion in the spine, and helps reset muscle spindles/ reducing muscle tensions.
Contact Be Well wellness clinic if you are interested in Chiropractic and reside in Thornhill, Vaughan, Richmond Hill, Maple, or Markham. We are here to get you back into the game of life.
