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chiropractic and the elderly

9/26/2017

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Chiropractic care has many benefits especially for the elderly. Learn more about these benefits here:


1. Pain Relief
Chiropractic care is a safe and effective form of health care to treat pain. Doctors of Chiropractic are specifically trained to identify and treat subluxations (misalignments of the vertebrae) and misaligned joints. Anti-inflammatory medication and pain relievers merely mask the symptoms and have many undesirable side effects.


2. Increased Range of Motion
As we age, our joints become stiff, our cartilage wears down, and we become less mobile. With Chiropractic care a person’s range of motion can positively affect their lives in many ways. Keeping your skeletal frame in alignment means it will function at its peak for it’s age range. If your skeletal frame is aligned properly then your tendons, ligaments, and muscles, usually function as they should which makes day to day tasks much more manageable. An increased range of motion means being able to bend down to pick up their grandchildren. For others, it means they can garden without pain or get an extra 40 yards of distance out of their driver on the golf course. Range of motion makes a large difference in someone’s quality of life.


3. Increased Balance and Coordination
Loss of balance is a major cause of falls later in life. Many problems in balance and coordination in the aging population have been shown to come from injury or degenerative changes to the cervical spine (neck region). Structures known as mechanoreceptors are located in the posterior (back) joints of the cervical spine and are responsible for providing the brain with essential information important for balance and coordination. Older individuals also suffer from loss of proprioception(sense of body awareness). To compensate for this loss, the brain can no longer accurately gauge where the extremities are in relation to the rest of the body, so you have wider motions with the arms, the feet are kept wider apart than usual, steps become irregular and uneven in length. As impairment increases, the patient becomes unable to compensate. With severe loss of proprioception, the patient is unable to get up from a chair or rise after a fall without assistance.


Chiropractic care can help keep proprioception under control so that balance and coordination is more stable, reducing risk of falls and keeping seniors more independant.


4. Increased Joint Degeneration
Unfortunately, one of the many things that accompanies getting older is increased joint degeneration. A small spinal misalignment can cause degeneration at a rapid pace. Regular chiropractic care can slow down this process preventing more serious back issues from forming.




5. Improving Health and Immune System Function

Chiropractic care addresses subluxations along the nervous system. When subluxations occur, the nervous system is unable to function in the way it is supposed to and it can prevent the brain from sending important messages throughout the body. When individuals receive routine care their nervous system and their immune system can function properly, it means less sick days and fewer chances of catching illnesses.


Improve your health so you can continue to enjoy your life!





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    Author

    Dr. Rachel Heneberry is a Chiropractor in Staunton VA practicing the Gonstead method of adjustment.

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