What Is Chiropractic?

According to The Association of Chiropractic Colleges, "Chiropractic is a health care discipline which emphasizes the inherent recuperative power of the body to heal itself without the use of drugs and surgery". Chiropractic is based on the scientific fact that your nervous system, which includes your brain, spinal cord and millions of associated nerves, relies on your skull and the 24 movable bones of the spine as a protective conduit to make sure that these delicate tissues and the messages they are sending and receiving are not being compromised or changed. Chiropractic philosophy states that, no part of your body escapes the dominance of your nervous system. Improper function of the spine due to slight misalignments, called subluxations, can cause poor health or function, even in areas far removed from the spine and spinal cord itself. Even the slightest malfunction of your spine may alter the regular transmission of nerve impulses, preventing that portion of your body from responding optimally. Misalignment can reduce the ability of your body to adapt to its ever-changing environment.

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Chiropractic is a natural form of health care that uses spinal adjustments to correct these misalignments and restore proper function to the nervous system, helping your body to heal naturally. Chiropractic care is non invasive and doesn't use drugs or surgery. Rather, a chiropractic spinal adjustment - the application of a precise force to a specific part of the spinal segment - corrects the misalignment, permitting normal nerve transmission and assisting your body to recuperate on its own. Many chiropractors often offer other services to provide patients multi-faceted approach to wellness.

Each year millions of Americans choose chiropractic treatments for safe, natural and effective relief from back pain, neck pain, headaches, extremity pain, poor overall health, low energy levels and much much more.

On this page we will cover the following:
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1. The Goal of Chiropractic

2. How Chiropractic Works

3. What Chiropractors Do

4. The Benefits of Chiropractic

1) The Goal of Chiropractic

The goal is to restore and optimize human health. In fact, according to a statement from The Association of Chiropractic Colleges, "The purpose of chiropractic is to optimize health."

Because chiropractic treatments are primarily applied to the spinal region, many individuals incorrectly assume that chiropractors treat only back and neck ailments. While we do quickly and effectively eliminate back and neck pain, it's not the only goal.
 

2)How Chiropractic Works

You may be wondering... how can the same chiropractic treatment which effectively treats my mid back or low back pain also optimize my health? The answer can be found by looking into the relationship between the spine and the nervous system.

As you may already know, the nervous system is the control center for all living cells, tissues and organs; orchestrating and coordinating all cellular functions. The spinal column encases the nervous system (spinal cord and nerve roots) and is responsible for its protection.

Because of this intimate relationship,biomechanics and structural problems in the spinal column can irritate parts of the enclosed nervous system. This irritation can result from noxious inflammatory biochemicals released during tissue injury or may result from direct mechanical pressure. In either case, the functioning of the nervous system is negatively influenced as is the functioning of the cells, tissues and organs which are supplied by the affected nerve(s).

The resulting ailment(s) depends on the cells, tissues and organs affected as well as the extent of nervous system compromise.

In conclusion, because the body's innate recuperative powers are affected by and integrated through the nervous system, correcting spinal abnormalities which irritate the nervous system can lead to a number of favorable results in patients suffering from various, seemingly non-spinal health conditions.

3) What Chiropractors Do

Practically speaking, chiropractors are primarily concerned with locating and treating vertebral subluxations.

A vertebral subluxation is a complex of functional and/or structural and/or pathological articular (joint) changes that compromise neural integrity and may influence organ system function and general health.

Using a number of unique and highly refined skills, the chiropractor checks the patient's spine for any misalignments, fixations or other abnormalities (vertebral subluxations). If subluxations or other abnormalities are detected, the chiropractor will generally apply a gentle force in a corrective manner to the affected spinal area.

Chiropractors use many specialized techniques to identify and treat these spinal abnormalities and optimize overall health. In addition to spinal adjusting techniques, soft tissue techniques such as massage, dietary and nutritional counseling, physical therapies, and lifestyle modification programs are commonly used. There is a significant and very important difference between the way chiropractors and medical doctors approach health ailments.

When evaluating and treating patients, chiropractors take a holistic approach which includes identifying and correcting the cause(s) of the patient's health ailment. In contrast, the medical approach tends to focus more on the treating the symptoms of a condition rather than focusing primarily on the actual cause(s).

Chiropractors believe that correcting the cause of the problem provides significant long-term benefits over only treating the symptoms.

4)The Benefits of Chiropractic Care

Short and long term chiropractic care has a number of benefits which includes:

• spinal and extremity pain relief

• treatment without painful surgeries

• headache relief

• increased mobility and range of motion

• involves no harmful drugs

• decreased stiffness and muscular spasms

• arthritic joint pain relief

• treats the root cause of the problem

• increased joint health

• customizable treatments

• increased performance and energy

• increased sense of well being and relaxation

• helps with chronic conditions

• increased balance and coordination

• can help with fertility issues

• reduced degeneration and risk of injury

• enhanced tissue healing

• improve posture

• decreased tissue inflammation

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Cocoa Beach Chiropractor | Chiropractor in Cocoa Beach