ADVERTISING: Advertorial — I can I adjust myself, can’t I?

Nearly everyone will experience neck or back pain at some point during their life. Chronic misalignment of your vertebrae can lead to pain and inflammation. Realizing that you have a problem and treating it before it becomes a chronic problem with a chiropractic adjustment sounds like a great idea. But can you adjust your own spine?

I get asked that a lot. I have patients quite often tell me that they adjust themselves. Worse, I have heard patients say I adjusted my child, I watch you do it. I let them know that I went to school for 8 years, practiced for 22 years and I still can’t adjust myself! The answer is NO! You cannot and should not adjust yourself or anyone else.

A chiropractic adjustment is the hallmark of chiropractic care. So what exactly is a chiropractic adjustment? Chiropractic adjustment is a procedure in which trained chiropractors use their hands or a small instrument to apply a controlled, specific, sudden force in a precise direction to a fixated or misaligned vertebrae or a joint. This in turn, improves spinal or joint motion and improves your body's physical function. This helps to alleviate pain, often within a very short time, and the improved motion within the joint helps decreases the chances of ongoing joint and disc degeneration.

Since a chiropractic adjustment is a specific force applied in a specific line of drive, to a specific joint, it is impossible to effectively adjust your own spine. Yes twisting your neck or back in certain way may create a “popping” sound similar to that made when a chiropractic performs an adjustment. This sound is called a cavitation. When you attempt DIY chiropractic adjustment the pressure within the joint suddenly decreases, releasing gasses into the joint space, causing the popping sound. Most people think the popping sound is the end goal, but that's not what gives you relief from your pain. When a trained chiropractor performs a specific adjustment, they can create a cavitation. But the end result is improved joint function, relax muscles, and decrease nerve irritation within the targeted pressure.

When you self-adjust, it isn’t specific or targeted and is entirely random. When you do this type of misguided self-care it is usually counterproductive, often making an already unstable area even more unstable. That's why it's impossible to replicate the same long-lasting relief that you get from a chiropractor.

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Dr. Wayne M. Fichter Jr. is a chiropractor at Natural Spine Solutions. The business is located at 3913 Schreiber Way in Coeur d’Alene. For more information, please contact us at 208-966-4425.