How do I know when I Should make my first Chiropractic Appointment?

Ask the Chiropractor-How do I know when I am ready to make my first chiropractic appointment?  Unsure if your case is a chiropractic case?  Dr Hulsebus discusses this in this weeks podcast. #healthy815 #icachiropractor

www.rockforddc.com

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- Hello and welcome to another edition of "Ask the Chiropractor." I'm Dr. Brant Hulsebus, chiropractor. So we're coming at you today with another question that we've been asked, we get asked this from time to time. How do I know when it's time for me to start chiropractic care? How do I know when it's time for me to call and make that first appointment? How does one know when it's time to go see a chiropractor for the first time? So a lot of people ask this question and they never think to ask a chiropractor this question because, well, maybe they don't know a chiropractor yet. So I'm gonna try to answer this. And again, if you have a question about chiropractic, the best person to ask is a chiropractor. Not a dentist, not a podiatrist, not your family doctor. And the reason I say that is because they are not educated in chiropractic care. Chiropractors are. So, what's a good time? How do I know when it's time to go see a chiropractor? Well, I'm gonna answer this in a few different ways. And this might be one of my longer podcasts, but here we go. I'm gonna start off first with the most obvious which is why people come to a chiropractor, and that's because their spine hurts, their neck, their lower back, somewhere in their spine they're having aches and pain. And maybe that ache and pain is traveling down into your arm or into your leg, or maybe it's going into the back of your neck, into your head giving you headaches. And, you know, that's a pretty obvious reason why people come to a chiropractor. But a lot of times people really wanna know, like, when is it bad enough and I should go? Well, you know, it's bad enough as soon as you think it's bad enough. But let's just say that you can look to the left so far, but not to the right as far. That's an indication that something in your spine bio-mechanically is not moving the way it's supposed to. Let's say you can lift one leg higher than the other leg. Let's say you have somebody watch you walk, and they notice your gait's off. That's a good reason to go see a chiropractor. A lot of times I tell people to back up to a mirror and have somebody else take, like, a marker, and draw above each ear, each shoulder, each armpit, each hip and see how well those lines line up. If those lines do not line up very well, your spine's probably kinda little crooked. It's time to go see a chiropractor. So that's kind of the easy, that's the muscular skeletal stuff. But a lot of people come see us for non-muscular skeletal stuff. A lot of people come to see a chiropractor because you're seeking an alternative form of healthcare other than say maybe some more medicine, or maybe, like, "I don't feel like I'm having headaches'cause I don't take enough medicine. I feel like there might be a cause to my headaches." Well, if you have a health condition and you've been really suffering from a health condition and maybe you don't think more pills is the way, or maybe that you see these opiate problems that we have today with people taking too many opiates and getting addicted to that and that leads other drugs, that leads to problems. And maybe you don't want to go down that road. Speaking to a chiropractor about your condition or your issue would be a very, very good idea. You know, people with headaches, people with neurological things, a lot of them have got great success with chiropractic care. Even my own family, how the Hulsebus family got involved in chiropractic had a lot to do with my grandmother having female healthcare problems and not being able to conceive. And they went to the chiropractor and next thing you know she's pregnant. So there's a lot of different reasons why people seek chiropractic care. So if you've been having a health problem for a while, an ongoing health problem, and maybe you're already on your third medical doctor trying to seek out answers or help for this, maybe not your third doctor, but maybe your third different medication, or your third different course of actions for this, maybe it's time to go speak to a chiropractor, get a different approach. Most of us, we're not anti-medicine, like we won't tell you,"Oh, going to the medical doctor is bad." But we'll maybe give a different spin, a different loop on it. And we can look to see what medications you're taking so that we can learn the side effects and stuff like that. So, you know, as you heal, as you get better and you're taking a medication for condition let's just say condition X and the body gets better and gets more well, the medication will do something to your body. And if condition X is no longer there it's gonna find something else to do and that's when the side effects go way up. So talk to your chiropractor about the medications you're on and why you're taking them, and together maybe with help from the pharmacist, you can learn a little bit more about when the medication stops working. So if you have an ongoing healthcare problem that you've been dealing with for you know more than six months, you're not getting the results go ask the chiropractor and see what the chiropractor can do. If you came to me I would tell you what we would expect to see on examination, X-ray examination prior to starting care. So if you came and told me,"Hey, you know I'm having these really, really bad headaches. I've seen, like, three different doctors. I've tried all this different medication. Can chiropractic help me?" I would tell you what I expect to see, you know, on the exam this, and I expect to see on X-ray this, and this, and this. And if we don't see those things then, you know, then maybe it's not a chiropractic problem, I don't know. But that's usually how we do things as we will kind of lay it out for you ahead of time and tell you what we expect to see. Do the examination and see if those things show up. If they don't show up then, you know, it's a different story. But, you know, a lot of times we find those things. The other nice thing about chiropractic is there's no negative side effect, right? Like, "I went to the chiropractor for condition Y. I got it adjusted for a while condition. Condition Y still bothers me." But the good news is probably two or three other things got better while you're under chiropractic care. So even when chiropractic care might not be the answer, by going to the chiropractor you're still gonna improve, you're still gonna get better in other areas. So, and then, you know, just have open dialogue with your chiropractor about, you know, why you're there and what your goals are and what you hope to achieve. Another area where chiropractic excels on is we get a lot of new patients from,"Hey, I've tried everything else under the sun, nothing else is working. I thought I'd come see you last. You're my last hope to see what's going on." So we always love seeing those patients too, but we wanna try to see you before that. So if you've tried, like I said, three or four different things and you're not finding answers, speaking to a chiropractor's not a bad thing. Another reason why people come to see us is prevention, right? A lot of people come to see me for prevention. I've even had surgeons, medical surgeons come see me because they heard that a lifetime of hunching over doing surgeries can really put a lot of stress on your neck and they cause a lot of arthritis degeneration in the base of your neck, and that arthritis degeneration goes into your hands. And that can make your hands and your arms achy and sore. And there's an article that said they don't get to enjoy retirement because of all the years of working and damage to their neck. So they ask me, "Hey, can you take care of me to make sure that I can enjoy my retirement because of the job that I do?" So I actually have medical doctors that seek care from me in order to enjoy their retirement later in life. And that's okay, that's prevention right there. So a lot of people that have tough labor jobs, they will come see a chiropractor because they want to get adjusted and keep their spine loose and keep it healthy and try to keep the arthritis away so they can enjoy their later years. So prevention is a big reason why people come see us. So if you want to know how to stay young, you wanna know how to stay active, you wanna know how to keep yourself going, that's a big reason why people come see us. Another reason why people seek chiropractic care? Performance. I mean, right over my shoulder right here is the Ice Hog logo, right? So the players come see us before games and before events as they want to do the maximum speed, maximum effort. So if you're an athlete you would seek chiropractic care'cause maybe you notice, like,"I feel like I could go faster, but I'm not going faster. I think I could react quicker, do things quicker, but I feel like something's hindering my speed, or hindering my my development." As chiropractors a lot of times we're able to adjust you and help you. They've been able to do research papers where the athletes could jump higher or run faster and have quicker reaction times when they've been adjusted versus when they haven't been chiropractically adjusted. So some people come to seek us to improve their performance. So if you're an athlete, you know, you feel like some of your performance is not, just not quite there, getting adjusted a lot of times could help. Like I said, I go to the ice hockey games, take care of the players. We do more care before the game than we do after the game. A lot of people think,"Oh yeah, of course you have a chiropractor at a hockey game. Those guys hit each other." Well, I don't really see a lot of 'em after the game. These guys wanna skate faster, skate quicker, have better reaction time and just move easier, more free than they care about after the game. So it's about the game. Feeling good for the game, not so much after the game. So, you know, if you're a good athlete, I take care of a lot of high school kids that went on to become division one athletes, and division two, and division three athletes, right? We work with Rock Valley College. We help support their athletic program. Same idea. They just wanna stay healthy and stay strong. Speaking of stay healthy and stay strong. If you're someone who's chronically ill, chronically sick, chronically battling the same things over and over again, that's another reason why people start chiropractic care because of this chronic always being sick, always having headaches, always fighting the sinus problems. If you just do this thing over and over and over again, year after year after year, chiropractors a lot of times can sit down with you and help address the cause of why you keep having this reoccurring thing every year, like,"Man, every fall I'll catch a cold and I'm out of work for a week'cause I'm just miserable." Well, come see a chiropractor. Let's see why every fall you're catching that cold. What is it about your body that's weak and not doing its job that every fall you have to suffer? Or let's say,"Every month I get a headache at the end of the month." Come and get it adjusted. Let's figure out what's causing that.'Cause that's not normal. You know, getting a headache once a month is not normal. Getting a cold every winter is not normal. That doesn't have to happen. You can strengthen your immune system, you can get stronger and better and avoid these things. So, and then you see a lot of kids come in here. Why do kids try our chiropractic care, right? Well, kids, most kids try chiropractic care'cause Mom and Dad have chronic issues and they're trying to make sure that they don't pass it on. I mean, honestly, that's the number one reason why we see kids. But a lot of kids just want come in. They want, like I said, what the athletes say. They want to feel better, they wanna run better, they want to grow better, they want to make sure they grow up with every advantage they can to be healthy and strong. So Mom and Dad bring them in. We see lots of babies, we help a lot with. I always say if the baby's not sleeping right, baby's colicky or baby's not having good bowels, we see big changes with that. A lot of parents, like, when the kids are starting to walk and crawl, the parents want to bring their kids in and have us evaluate them, make sure that everything's going the way it's supposed to be so we don't set 'em up for things later on in life that could be altered in the way their growth and development. So there's a few reasons when it's time to start chiropractic care. You know, bottom line is you're not moving very well. You feel locked up, you feel tight, your having aches and pains. Another reason is you just, you know, you've gone to the doctor, you've tried three or four treatments for something, you don't feel like you're getting better. Instead of just doing more of the same thing over and over. I know a lot of times like,"Hey, you know, I'm having this" notice I say sinuses,"my sinuses are really bad."`"Well, what did the doctor say?""Well, he tripled the medication.""Oh, so the medication, it didn't work?" He tripled it? Giving you three times the amount?" You know, if you're tired of hearing those answers and you're not getting success there, come see a chiropractor. The other thing is,"Hey, I've tried everything. Nothing seems to work for me." Go see a chiropractor. Or, "Hey, every summer I deal with this." Or, "Every fall I deal with this." Or, "At the end of every month I deal with this." Go see a chiropractor. That's not normal. Maybe we can figure out why you're doing that all the time, and break that cycle. And, again, why do kids come in? Kids, 'cause usually come in they don't want to have issues and they wanna make sure their kids don't have issues. Hey, so that's the chiropractor. That's this week's episode of "Ask the Chiropractor." Why do I start care? How do I know it's time to start care? So if you have a question for the chiropractor that you'd like to hear me answer, I'm Dr. Brant Hulsebus, chiropractor here at Rockford, Illinois. I'm a graduate of Palmer College of Chiropractic. I am an ICA, International Chiropractic Association member, and the rep of my State. So if you have a question that you'd like to hear me answer about chiropractic care, feel free to leave me a message below. To shoot us a comment, go to rockforddc, R-O-C-K-F-O-R-D-D-C.com, leave me a message there and I'll get back to you. Maybe next time you turn on, you'll be the question of the week. All right everybody, stay healthy, stay strong. Good to talk to you.