Archive for April, 2010
April 21st, 2010 | 
Author: As a chiropractor, I recommend daily exercise to all of my patients.Regular moderate exercise improves the health of every system in the human body, including the musculoskeletal system, my specialty. exercise helps to keep joints mobile, reduces the symptoms of arthritis, increases bone health, and improves muscle performance. In other words, exercise is essential to good health. And, because I know that most of my patients are very busy people, I always suggest that they make exercise as much a necessary part of their day as brushing their teeth or having a nutritious meal, which is to say that they don't need to put on special clothing and head for the gym to get a beneficial workout. That's why I was very interested in an article I just read in the health page of msnbc.com that described the results of a study done on women that linked a moderate activity like walking to a substantial decrease in stroke risk. In addition to walking, the study looked at vigorous activities like running, swimming and biking, but didn't find a link between those activities and the 37 percent reduction in stroke risk that walking provided.
So ladies, take a walk! Do it for your health's sake! For more information on this interesting story, click the link provided above.
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As a chiropractor who treats many senior patients suffering from painful back problems, I was very concerned when I read about a new study published this month in The Journal of the American Medical Association that found that the percentage of older adults undergoing a complicated fusion procedure for the painful lower-back condition called spinal stenosis has increased sharply– rising fifteenfold from 2002 to 2007.
This type of fusion procedure is not only complicated, but costly. And worse, it carries three times the rate of life-threatening complications than alternative procedures such as decompression (removal of part of the bone pressing on the nerve) or simple fusion (in which two or three vertebrae are fused and only the front or back of the vertebrae, rather than front and back). And, the bottom line is that earlier studies haven’t found that the complex surgery leads to better results or greater pain relief. Gentle, non-invasive chiropractic treatment can often relieve the severe back pain caused by spinal stenosis. I fully recommend a short conservative trial of chiropractic care prior to considering most surgeries involving the musculoskeletal system. Any type of surgery carries risks and such risks increase exponentially as we age. But, when a study reveals that a costly, life-threatening surgery does little to relieve pain or improve an individual’s quality of life, in my opinion such a surgery should not even be considered.