Benefits of Chiropractic: Part 2

Today we will be going over a few more of the benefits of seeing a chiropractor/receiving chiropractic care. 

Reduced medication usage (especially opioids). It has been shown in several studies that chiropractic care can help to decrease the amount of opioid usage by a patient who has spinal pain. Most recently, Whedon et al. found that you are 50% less likely to fill a prescription than someone who is not seeing chiropractic care. They further found that if the patient saw a chiropractor within the first 30 days of injury/diagnosis, it was even less likely that the patient would need to fill their prescription. This study had 101,221 participants spanning ages 18-84 years old. 

Improved Function: By decreasing the pain that the patient is experience and increasing their range of motion, chiropractic care helps to improve the function of the patient. For example, if you hurt your shoulder and you cannot move it in all directions but then you are seen by a chiropractor who helps you to be able to move your shoulder in all directions, they have helped to improve the function of that shoulder because you are able to do more things. It could be as simple as being able to put your seat belt on or as complicated as improving your tennis swing. 

Improved Posture: Chiropractors find posture to be very important as it helps to decrease the stress on your spine/body. Your head weighs more than you think and if you have poor posture, like when you are looking down at your phone, your head is more forward than it normally is so your neck has to work much harder. That is more stress and strain on your neck joints, discs, muscles, ligaments, etc. By keeping good posture, you are letting your body heal more fully so if an injury does happen it is not happening to a body that has already been stressed and made tired. This will help to enable you to heal quicker too. 

Stay tuned for next weeks blog post, Part 3 of our series on the benefits of chiropractic care!

Sources: Whedon, et al. Impact of Chiropractic Care on use of Prescription Opioids in Patients with Spinal Pain. Pain Med, 2020 Dec 25:21(12):3567-3576