Patient Education
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The more you understand your body and how it functions, the better equipped you'll be at taking care of yourself to achieve optimal health. Our team of chiropractic professionals empower patients to take charge of your own health and future, educating you about your condition to decrease your need for future care. We've included the Patient Education section on our website to provide you with valuable, practical wellness information which you can incorporate into your lifestyle to improve the quality of your life. We hope you will turn to these pages whenever you have a question about health related issues and urge you to contact our practice at any time to make an appointment with one of our chiropractors.
The purpose of chiropractic is to improve and sustain quality of life.
This is achieved by awakening the body's natural healing ability through treatment of the musculoskeletal system, the healing power of touch and guidance in proper nutrition and exercise.
On Health
Many People think that health is how you feel. But lack of symptoms doesn't mean you're healthy. If you look good and feel great but have undetected cancer - you're sick.
True health is how well your body works mentally, physically and socially. If something isn't working right, then you're sick.
It is the purpose of your brain and nervous system to control the function of every cell, tissue, organ and system of your body. A properly working nervous system in concert with musculoskeletal integrity, proper nutrition and exercise is the key to good health.
We believe in the body's ability to heal itself. We believe healthy people are happy people.
On Chiropractic
Besides medicine and dentistry, chiropractic is the third largest doctoral health profession in the United States.
The typical applicant at a chiropractic college has already acquired four years of pre-medical undergraduate college education including course in biology, inorganic and organic chemistry, physics, psychology and related lab work. Intensive studies include course in anatomy, physiology, rehabilitation, nutrition and public health.
The curriculum includes no less than four years of classroom, laboratory and clinic experience - all aimed at preparing the doctor of chiropractic to be a portal-of-entry healthcare provider. The course of study is approved by an accrediting agency which is fully recognized by the U.S. Department of Education. This has been the case for 25 years.
Chiropractic involves the study of philosophy, science and art. Philosophy considers the fundamental nature of the existence of human beings and their interaction with the environment. The sciences deal with aspects of the universe related to human biology, and especially the relationship between spinal segments and the nerve system. Chiropractic's art is the expression of its philosophy and the concern with locating and correcting vertebral subluxations.
Instead of treating your symptoms, your Doctor of Chiropractic is primarily interested in detecting, reducing, and preventing the Subluxation.
How Chiropractic Works
To understand chiropractic, one must have a basic understanding about how the body functions. From the time you were born, an "inner wisdom" has known exactly how to keep you healthy and alive. It knows how fast your heart should beat, how often your lungs need to breathe, how to digest food and how to eliminate waste. There are millions of details controlled by this inner wisdom that keep this marvelous machine in prime functioning condition.
Every living organism in our world possesses what chiropractors call Innate Intelligence. The body machine comes out of the "factory" fully able to function, as long as it has regular fuel and adequate maintenance, thanks to this Innate Intelligence.
Innate Intelligence sends instructions to every organ and cell in your body through the nervous system housed and protected by the vertebrae. However, if these vertebrae are misaligned, even a little, those instructions can be interrupted. The result is "dis-ease" and dysfunction.
The word disease is a combination of 'dis' and 'ease'. 'Dis' is a prefix meaning "apart from" and ease meaning a "state of balance." It follows then that dis-ease is a lack of comfort, a loss in harmony in the system. When there is a lack of harmony in music, the musician adjusts the notes to complement each other. That's exactly what a chiropractic adjustment strives to do, restore body harmony, thus restore health.
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"Health is worth more than learning."
-- Thomas Jefferson
For centuries scientists, physicians, and even philosophers have long believed that the body's spinal cord is at the root of many ailments that have nothing to do with back or neck pain.
But the birth of the chiropractic profession was not to occur until the late-19th century—September 18, 1895, to be exact—in the small offices of the Palmer Cure & Infirmary in Davenport, Iowa.
Late that day, Canadian-born Daniel David Palmer was in his office trying to have a conversation with the building's janitor, Harvey Lillard.
Palmer noticed that Lillard was nearly deaf, and asked the man what caused him to lose his hearing. Lillard didn't know, but told Palmer his hearing began diminishing after a back injury he sustained while stooping in a cramped position. Lillard remembered hearing a "pop" in his back, and suffered hearing loss for years after that.
It was a revelation that capped what Palmer had long suspected—an indubitable connection between the spine and disease—that misalignment of the spinal column interferes with normal nerve function, and thus, leads to a host of maladies. Palmer suspected that if he were able to return the popped vertebrae in Lillard's back to its original position, it would also restore his hearing. Using a technique called the "spinous process," Palmer gently repositioned the vertebra with a firm thrust.
Lillard's hearing began to return. Over the next week, Palmer continued his spinal manipulation treatment on Lillard; each day his hearing gradually improved. Palmer coined a term for his new technique: chiropractic from the Greek words chiro, meaning hand, and practic, meaning practice. He dedicated his practice from that point forward to use of the new therapy.
In the ensuing months, Palmer treated flu, sciatica, migraine headaches, stomach complaints, epilepsy, and heart trouble with adjustments he called "hand treatments"—all without the use of drugs, medications, or surgery.
Despite Palmer's early successes, chiropractic adjustments were not readily accepted by the medical community. Palmer was later indicted for practicing medicine without a license and was sentenced to 105 days in jail and ordered to pay a $350 fine.
Palmer is the author of two well-known books: The Science of Chiropractic (1906) and The Chiropractor's Adjuster (1910). He died in 1913 at the age of 68 in Los Angeles.
His son, Bartlett Joshua, carried on his father's work and was instrumental in getting chiropractic recognized as a licensed profession.
In the 20th century, the chiropractic profession grew into a respected branch of the healing arts, largely through research and recognition by the government and medical community. Here are some milestones:
- The American Chiropractic Association was founded in 1922 and merged with the Universal Chiropractors Association to form the National Chiropractic Association (NCA) in 1930.
- In 1944, the Chiropractic Research Foundation (CRF) was created by the National Chiropractic Association to promote and obtain research funding.
- In the 1960s, the National Chiropractic Association once again became the American Chiropractic Association (ACA) and the CRF became the Foundation for Accredited Chiropractic Education, whose main purpose was to assist chiropractic colleges in gaining accreditation.
- In 1974, the U.S. Department of Health, Education and Welfare recognized the Council on Chiropractic Education (CCE), and the Foundation for Accredited Chiropractic Education was reorganized as the Foundation of Chiropractic Education and Research (FCER).
- In 1975, the U.S. Department of Health Education and Welfare sponsored a research conference on spinal manipulation, an event that raised awareness of the need for research. Out of that, the Chiropractic Research Council (CRC) was born to assimilate research directors from the nation's chiropractic colleges.
- In 1979, the Foundation of Chiropractic Education and Research expanded its research program and established a competitive scientific review process for submitted proposals.
- Today, 14 English peer-reviewed chiropractic journals routinely publish the results of chiropractic research.