The Concussion In Your Spine
If you’ve ever swung a golf club and either hit the ball wrong or hit the ground, you know how it feels as the force travels up the shaft to your hands. The concussion actually happens at the club head, but you feel it all the way up your arms. A similar dynamic happens when we experience a concussion with the head on our shoulders. As our head hits another object or the ground, we might have the illusion that only our head suffers the damage but as the force moves down our spine, our entire body suffers from a blow to our head.
Your spine absorbs the shock of a head concussion like the golf club absorbs the shock of swing. What’s worse, the shock to your spine often cause misalignments of your neck bones which in turn causes interference to the nerves feeding back to your head, worsening the head injury. As time goes by with the problem unresolved, the damage eventually shows up in the brain but the damage in the spine continues to go undetected.
Raymond Damadian, the inventor of the MRI machine, recently observed that spinal trauma occurs about 11 years prior to the diagnosis of common brain conditions. This is how impactful the spine is to the brain and brain function! Without treating anything, Chiropractors can assess your spine and nervous system to remove interference in the spine but even more importantly, remove interference to your brain when you are desperately trying to recover from an injury such as a concussion: All without even touching your brain.
When spinal interference is removed with a Chiropractic adjustment, your potential returns to normal and allows you to heal as well as possible. Dr. Damadian has also documented significant recovery from what were otherwise considered difficult medical cases when someone received Chiropractic care for the first time. In his words, he was “astonished” to see the affect that Chiropractic had on chronic, concussion related injuries that were not improving with medical care.
It is essential to realize that a head concussion is also a spinal concussion. When someone gets treated for a concussion, it is very important to have his or her spine checked as well because if your spine isn’t working properly, your brain can’t possibly heal properly. And since you can’t feel this interference until it gets worse, the only way to know for sure is to have a Chiropractic evaluation.
Another concern with concussions is preventing them. Although there are more advancements being made, such as sports equipment and rules to try and decrease the blows outside your body, Chiropractic can improve your chances of withstanding concussion blows from within your body.
Because your nervous system controls everything in your body, Chiropractic adjustments remove interference to this system, allowing your body to function optimally in any environment like a field, a car or a sidewalk. Chiropractic improves strength, flexibility and balance, which are all important in a situation that can produce a concussion and improve the ability to receive a concussive force. The stronger and less compromised your body is before and during a blow, the better you are able to withstand an injury that could produce a concussion. If you can get checked by a Chiropractor before an injury even occurs, your body will be at its best to withstand any kind of blow, concussion or not.
Medical experts are just now realizing the vital connection between the spine and the brain related to concussions, but they are not trained to check your spine for the specific interference as only a Chiropractor can. There are 3.8 million concussions reported each year and in a day and age where concussion injuries are being recognized as happening more often than anyone ever knew, it is essential to understand what exactly a concussion really is and what it takes to get better again. See a Chiropractor to make sure concussions don’t deal you a lower blow than they already are.
