Blog - OKC Chiropractors Oklahoma City - Specials

Apr 22 2019

Lumbar Disc Condition

What is Lumbar Disc Herniation?

Structure

The backbone is comprised of several discs that are fixed between two vertebras. The spongy material can be compared to a jelly donut, which has an outer cover and is filled with a soft jelly on the inside. Similarly, a disk has a strong outer covering and a soft substance as a filling.

The Leak

Several times the outer coating of the disc is ruptured, causing an opening for the inner jelly like substance to seep out. Once out of its protective outer laying, the leaked material interferes with the normal functioning of the spinal nerves. The already narrow spacing of the spine, through which nerve roots runs, is narrowed further and puts pressure on the nearby nerves.

Lumbar Specific Herniation

Lumbar region is found in the lower back and is considered to be the strongest area of the spine. It is said to bear a large portion of the weight of the body. Sciatic nerve is said to be a conglomeration of nerve roots running down from the lumbar spine. Therefore, lumber disc injuries can cause pain in the legs and feet.

Symptoms

As the lumbar region is strongly associated with the leg and feet area, one of the significant signs of lumbar disc injuries includes pain in the legs. Another symptom common to this condition is the tingling sensation in the feet. Feet might also feel weak and numb at times following a lumbar disc herniation.

The lumber region falls in your lower back area, therefore lower back pain is another common sign and symptom. Almost every body part below the lumbar region easily gets affected by lower back disc injuries. A weak bladder or loss of control of bowel movement and pain in the buttocks are considered to be symptoms of this condition as well. Other common indications include muscle weakness, groin pain as well as atrophy.

Visiting a Chiropractor

Considered to provide a conservative treatment, chiropractors can alleviate lumbar disc injuries. A case study of a 26 year old man is a validation for the success of recovery associated with visiting a chiropractor. Within a period of 90 days, the patient, who suffered from a lumbar herniated disc due to an athletic injury, completely recovered from the condition. Utilizing activator adjustment instrument (AAI), a controlled mechanical force was applied to the location of concern. A follow up after 12 months indicated successful long term recovery.

Image used under Creative Commons Licensing: Lumbar vertebrae anterior.png

Apr 22 2019

Dietary Tips

A Good Diet Equals Healthy Living

In order to live a healthy lifestyle, there are some essential nutrients which need to be present in your diet. A good chiropractor will also include a diet plan in his treatments to reduce the risk of disease. Here are some dietary tips you can use to improve your health.

Avoid Junk Food

Avoid junk foods with low nutritional values and additives such as artificial flavoring and coloring, as most of them contain chemicals that your body isn’t familiar with and can cause certain problems such as abdominal pain, diarrhea and irritable bowel movements.

Eat Foods with Good Nutritional Values

Let’s suppose a person has a calorie requirement of 1600 calories a day. He can either get these calories from healthy foods with good nutritional values, such as beans, vegetables or salads, or he can get them through unhealthy foods such as bagels, donuts or junk food. The calorie requirement is the same but he would be getting a more nutritious diet by choosing the former option, thus making him healthier.

Add Unrefined and Uncooked Foods in Your Diet

Natural foods contain relatively more nutrients as compared to their refined counterparts. For example, refined flour lacks the fiber and other nutrients that whole grain contains. Cooking can also destroy many of the beneficial nutrients in food, so it is important to add some raw fruits and vegetables in your diet to balance out the nutrient requirement.

Avoid Fried Food Items

Though they may seem tempting, a high consumption of fried foods can directly lead to certain health problems such as high cholesterol and heart problems. If you live a busy lifestyle which doesn’t give you time to exercise, fried foods can also cause obesity.

Don’t Use Too Much Salt and Sugar

Too much salt results in high blood pressure, increasing the likelihood of developing health problems. High levels of sugar can also increase the risk of diabetes. Try to reduce the amount of salt or sugar you use in food items.

Ask Your Chiropractor for Advice

As most chiropractors have information on nutritional requirements, you can ask your chiropractor to advise you further on what you should include and what you should exclude from your diet. A chiropractor can also formulate you a proper diet plan which you can follow to stay healthy.

Image used under Creative Commons Licensing: A Matched Set by Tony Alter

Apr 22 2019

Why Spinal Surgery is a Bad Idea

Because it takes the smallest mistake to permanently paralyze a healthy individual, a fact that any chiropractor will attest to. There is always a risk of injury involved in spinal surgery.

Almost 80% of the people in the country will complain about lower back pain at some point in their lives. More work days are missed because of spinal pain than any other sort of ailment. This also places it as one of the most common causes of disabilities right after cardiovascular disease.

However, most people would rather seek the services of certified chiropractors than their doctors. Doctors usually prescribe numbing medication or painful surgical procedures like spinal surgery for patients who complain of repetitive chronic pain. But that is hardly a permanent solution and also involves a great deal of risks.

What can go Wrong:

Transitional Syndrome

Perhaps one of the most interesting aspects of the spine has to do with its behavior. Your spine behaves like a chain of repeated segments. Each of the individual segments works as a whole to share the workload that is involved in moving the body by sharing the load along the spinal column. In other words the stress that is imposed on the spine during the movement is shared amongst the segments.

However such a process can only happen seamlessly when the spine is healthy. When one or more of the segments doesn’t work as they should their neighboring segments have to pick up the slack and work harder. The segment that is closest to the dysfunctional one gets most of the stress. This means that the area near where the spinal surgery was performed takes on more stress. This is what is known as transitional syndrome since it occurs due to the transition of a healthy area of the spine to the fused area.

General practitioners and even orthopedic surgeons can never claim to know what causes pain in the back. To them, complex procedures like spinal surgery appear as handy default treatments. This is not to mention the disastrous residual pain that is caused by inappropriate surgery. Such a complication is more of a possibility after common spinal surgeries, such as laminectomies, in which a disc is removed to give the nerve near the central spinal cord more space to move, or fusion, in which a vertebra is surgically joined to another to restrict excess movement.

Image used under Creative Commons Licensing: Illu vertebral column.jpg

Apr 22 2019

Oklahoma City Chiropractor shares ankle exercises for beginners.

Here is a simple exercise that you can do at home with no equipment.
It works the peroneus longus/brevis, tibialis anterior, tibialis posterior, gastrocnemius, soleus muscles.
The purpose of this exercise is to improve muscular endurance, ankle strength, and proprioception.
By doing this exercise you can have the benefits of Improved stability, functional strength and injury prevention.

Begin seated in a chair with good posture.
Extend leg.
Attempt to write alphabet from A through Z with toes, moving ankle in all directions.
Repeat for prescribed sets.

Apr 22 2019

Say Goodbye to Headaches in 2012!

Living with neck pain and headaches is tough. Day after day of being miserable, irritable, and looking a lot older than you really are. The frustration of knowing that your friends and family just don’t understand what you’re going through. Add this to doctors’ visits, MRI’s and CT scans — which only come back with “normal” results. And that’s not all… trying one medication after another, feeling like you’re on a merry-go-round of drugs. All this is enough to make anyone want to scream!

My name is Dr. Micah Carter, and I’ve been helping patients with neck tension, headaches and migraines live pain free for nine years now. Every week I hear how people suffer from severe headaches – statements like…,“I feel like my head is in a vice,” “My eyes hurt and I feel so drowsy,” “I have to lie down,” “I’ve had migraines since a child,” “Muscle tension in the neck and pain into the shoulders,” and more. They tell me they’re sick and tired of jumping from one headache medication to the next. Here’s what I hear… “I am tired of being looked upon as someone who is only out there to get medicine. I only want RELIEF. I don’t know why that is so hard for people to understand. I don’t want to be treated badly anymore. I want to get help, and I want to get rid of the headaches.”

This was my life before I met Dr. Case. You see, I had headaches at least three days every week, and at least one of them a migraine! My medicine cabinet was always stocked with the largest bottle of acetaminophen and ibuprophen. I would take one until it quit working and then I would switch to the other. Back and forth, headache after headache. I was a high school science teacher at the time and found it hard to even get up for work some days because of recurring headaches. Then I met Dr. Case. Dr. Case is a chiropractor in a small town in northwest Kansas. He shared with me the cause of my headaches and it made sense! I would get off work and drive 35 miles to see Dr. Case. (There were seven chiropractors in the town I lived in, but I drove to see Dr. Case because he knew how to correct my headaches.) My headaches rapidly reduced to one a month, then down to a couple times a year. What a Blessing! I loved teaching, but chiropractic fascinated me so I enrolled in chiropractic school. Now I get to help people get rid of their headaches for good!

Imagine being able to live life like a normal person again, pain free and without headaches — being able to play with your kids, enjoy time with friends, and not have to worry that your headache will hit you at just the wrong time. That’s my goal for you, to live virtually headache free, like I do now. Don’t just trust me though, numerous studies have shown the benefits of spinal adjustments with headache patients, here are a couple:

The Boline Study

This study compared two groups of headache patients, half went for chiropractic adjustments, and the other half took amitriptyline, a medication often prescribed for the treatment of severe tension headache pain. After six weeks, researchers found that chiropractic patients experienced almost no side effects. And only the chiropractic patients continued to report fewer headaches when treatment ended.

The Duke Study

Medical experts concluded that spinal manipulations resulted in almost immediate improvement for headaches. Patients also had significantly fewer side effects and longer-lasting relief of headaches than a commonly prescribed medication.

If you have a headache more than once a month, your body is trying to tell you something is wrong. Recurring Headaches Are Not Normal. No question… if you are having headaches then something is wrong. Pain is your body’s way of telling you something is wrong. Finding the problem and fixing it has got to be top priority! Call today… Phone 405-340-4400. Our office is called Family Tree Chiropractic and you can find us at 12325 N. May Ave., Suite 111. (We are on the NW corner of 122^nd and May, by Backwoods)

Sincerely,

Micah D. Carter, DC, CCST

P.S. Why Suffer With Years Of Misery?

How many years can your body handle taking one pill after another? That’s no way to live, not when there could be an easy solution to your problem. Many of the pain medications available are quite addicting and can have drastic side effects. Call today. I may be able to help you live a normal, pain-free life again.

Lumbar Disc Condition

Dietary Tips

Why Spinal Surgery is a Bad Idea

Oklahoma City Chiropractor shares ankle exercises for beginners.

Say Goodbye to Headaches in 2012!

Office Hours:

Schedule an Appointment

Office Hours:

Connect With Us

Schedule an Appointment