Whiplash occurs when forces jerk your head suddenly forward, then snap it violently back. Think of a whip-cracking motion—the action this condition was named after. The violent acceleration then deceleration results in your neck changing from its normal curve to a straight line.
Many people in Naples, FL consider whiplash a minor condition and don’t seek auto injury treatment, hoping symptoms go away soon. It’s just a little pain in the neck, right? That might be the case right now, but whiplash also has long term effects and won’t get better without intervention. In fact, it’ll only get worse the longer it’s left untreated.
Here’s a quick overview on whiplash and how combining medical and chiropractic treatment can help mitigate symptoms and ensure a healthier future for sufferers.
Whiplash Symptoms to be Aware of
Car accidents are the most common cause of whiplash. Being belted into your seat causes your body to remain stationary while your head and neck keep moving. This causes the “snapping” movement that forces your head and neck into forward flexion, then hyperextension, followed by hyperflexion. This sequence of events results in the following symptoms:
Neck pain and stiffness
Shoulder pain and stiffness
Headaches
Fatigue
Jaw Pain
Arm pain and weakness
You may also experience secondary symptoms, especially if you do not address your pain issues. These include anxiety and stress, frustration, insomnia and depression.
Your symptoms may not be apparent right away. You may feel fine on the day of an accident and be in horrible pain the next day. If you fail to treat whiplash, you may even feel symptoms years later because the underlying soft tissue damage was not addressed. That’s why, if you are in an auto accident or sustain neck pain playing sports, it’s a good idea to see your doctor or chiropractor as soon as possible after a whiplash incident.
Treatment and Recovery for Whiplash
Pain management is first on the list of whiplash issues to address. This can include over-the-counter medication and icing your neck to reduce swelling. For severe pain, you may need to wear a neck collar or explore exercises and motions that help reduce pain.
Bodywork, including massage and chiropractic adjustments, is also helpful. It can help realign your spine and relax your stiff muscles. Another option is physical therapy, where a therapist helps you work and stretch your muscles to reduce stiffness and regain strength. These treatments make the healing process much more bearable and reduce the chances of symptoms returning.
At our clinic in Naples, FL, Hiler Chiropractic & Neurology uses Digital Motion X-Ray to view the neck and back in motion. Since pain often doesn’t occur until you move, this allows us to better assess where it comes from. This technology x-rays the spine at 30 frames per second to help us see the underlying damage. From there, we can design a rehabilitation plan for you so you can return to your normal routines.
Once you start treatment, recovery may take a few days to several months. It all depends on the extent of your injury. While we can estimate your treatment time, your circumstances may vary.
Whiplash Demands Targeted Treatment
Make no mistake, whiplash is a serious condition that requires a targeted approach to address. Left untreated or under-treated, you could end up living with lasting side effects for the rest of your life.
Feel Amazing Institute/ Hiler Chiropractic & Neurology offers auto injury treatment focused on whiplash. Our state-of-the-art clinic includes the latest treatment techniques and chiropractic and medical professionals to ensure your recovery. Call us as soon as possible after a whiplash incident to schedule an appointment.
You never realize how much you take sitting down comfortably for granted, until you can’t do it anymore. Sciatica is a nerve condition that affects many adults, causing tingling, numbness and even stabbing pains down one or both legs. While there’s no known cure-all for sciatica, chiropractic care can help take pressure off your sciatic nerve.
Here’s what you need to know about sciatica’s causes and how a chiropractor in Naples, FL can provide the treatment you need.
What is sciatica?
Sciatica isn’t recognized as an actual medical condition. Instead, it’s a term commonly used to describe the sensations that occur when your sciatic nerve is compromised, whether it’s pinched or your body is out of alignment. Most patients report feeling sharp, stabbing pains, weakness, numbness and tingling going down one or both legs. (Feeling it in one leg is more common.)
Sciatica can be caused by problems with the lower lumbar and lumbosacral spine, as well as degenerative disc diseases. When the cartilage cushioning your spinal discs starts to break down, the nerve can be pressed upon, pinched or moved out of its normal position. If you have any of these conditions, you may deal with sciatic pain.
However, sciatic pain can occur even if you don’t have the aforementioned conditions. Sometimes unusual stretches, new exercise routines or injuries to the lower back and legs can trigger sciatica. It can affect anyone, and it’s quite common in adults. When it becomes chronic, however, it’s harder for patients to cope with the pain.
Sciatica treatment
If you visit a medical doctor for your sciatic pain, they will likely prescribe over-the-counter medications to relieve pain and inflammation, like aspirin or ibuprofen. Sometimes they’ll prescribe muscle relaxers, which prevent muscles from spasming around the sciatic nerve and causing pain or numbness.
Chiropractic care addresses the problem at its root cause, not just the symptoms. Because the problem is caused by muscles or discs pinching the sciatic nerve, your chiropractor in Naples, FL will work to take pressure off the nerve. This can be achieved through many forms, including manual adjustments, stretches, realignments and spinal decompression therapy. Chiropractic treatment is the best way to achieve long-term sciatic pain relief.
How spinal decompression therapy can treat your sciatica
Spinal decompression (also known as vertebral axial decompression or VAX-D) can provide relief for long-term sciatic pain. The spine is gently stretched with belts, harnesses and a special traction table to separate the discs. This helps relieve pressure on the sciatic nerve. The spine undergoes a series of stretches and periods of relaxation to increase nutrient flow to the spine and affected muscles. It takes about half an hour per session, and should be pain free. Most patients start feeling significant results within the first few weeks of treatment.
If you suffer from sciatica, seeking chiropractic care in Naples, FL can change your life. Hiler Chiropractic & Neurology is dedicated to helping our patients heal through a series of holistic modalities. Call today to set up your first appointment.
If you’re reading this on a mobile device, it’s likely you’re craning your neck down to read it. After all, holding our phones and tablets up to our faces is weird and uncomfortable. Unfortunately, the neck and shoulder pain that stems from bad screen time posture is even more uncomfortable in the long run.
Dubbed “text neck” in pop culture, thanks to the amount of time many of us spend texting, reading and playing games on our phones, this can lead to chronic pain, fatigue, headaches and jaw pain if left unaddressed. Yes, you can make lifestyle changes to mitigate damage—but if you’re like the majority of Americans, you spend about four hours per day looking at your phone. It’s hard to maintain perfect posture every time you go to answer your latest message.
Luckily, text neck is a condition that benefits from treatment at a chiropractic clinic in Naples, FL.
Do you have text neck?
Text neck is characterized by neck, shoulder and spine pain, thanks to our propensity for looking down at mobile devices. Your head weighs anywhere from eight to 12 pounds, and when you look down for hours at a time, it puts immense stress on the muscles and connective tissues in your neck. Studies estimate that 80 percent of Americans keep their cell phones in reach at all times, and spend multiple hours per day looking down at them.
If left unaddressed, text neck can develop into chronic pain. It’s crucial to not only make lifestyle adjustments, but also have a chiropractor assist you by providing spinal adjustments.
How to start reducing your text neck symptoms
Obviously, we can’t completely ditch our devices. They’re necessary for work, personal communications and entertainment. Here are three ways you can reduce your text neck symptoms:
Posture check: Check in with yourself periodically to see if you’re slouching or tilting your head down. Try setting hourly or half-hourly reminders on your phone until it becomes a habit. When you notice yourself tilting your head down, adjust your spine and neck until you’re able to work, read or chat comfortably.
Try keeping screens at eye level: You won’t always be able to hold your screen up at eye level, but this will help reduce pain and other text neck symptoms. If you love to watch movies and shows on your tablet or phone, get a phone stand that will hold the phone at a comfortable position. There are plenty of gooseneck adjustable stands and other options that will help you keep your neck in a stable position.
Take breaks: Screen time is not only bad for your neck and shoulders, it’s also bad for your eyes. Take technology breaks when you start to feel achy and bleary-eyed, and schedule regular stretching breaks every half hour or so. Bonus: it’ll help keep you feeling focused.
When you need a chiropractor to help you deal with text neck in Naples, FL, visit Hiler Chiropractic & Neurology. Call us today to book an appointment.
Accidents often happen in a flash. In the moments after the collision, most people find themselves scanning their bodies to determine whether they’ve been injured. If everything seems to be in good working order, they’re good to go, right?
Unfortunately, our first impressions after an auto accident are clouded by the adrenaline rush. Your body produces adrenaline as part of a fight-or-flight response. One of the things that adrenaline does is increase our pain threshold, so something that would normally be excruciating now barely registers. This is an evolutionary survival mechanism, but it can also mask severe injuries. Adrenaline can take hours and even days to fully wear off—and in the meantime, you might not realize how badly you’ve been hurt. That’s why attorneys always caution you not to tell the other driver that you’re uninjured—you might find out differently in a few hours.
Car accidents can lead to whiplash and other painful back and neck injuries. Chiropractic care can provide the auto injury treatment you need in Naples, FL. Read on to learn more.
What happens to your back and neck during a car accident
Your seatbelt performs an important function by keeping you strapped into the car instead of being jostled around or ejected. However, this can cause your neck to violently whip forward and back. This strains the muscles and connective tissue that support your back and neck. The force of the impact, seatbelt position, impact direction and headrest position can all make a difference in the severity of your injuries.
After the accident, this impact can develop into chronic fatigue, neck and shoulder pain, back pain, soreness, headaches, jaw pain and more. You may not notice these injuries at first thanks to the adrenaline rush, but when it wears off, you might find that you hurt far worse than you initially realized.
Make sure you seek medical and chiropractic care immediately after the accident. Your doctor will treat external symptoms and look for internal injuries, while your chiropractor will take an x-ray of your spine to spot potential whiplash symptoms.
How chiropractic care can help
Chiropractic care includes a number of different modalities—not just the satisfying “popping” adjustments that can provide instant relief. Your chiropractor will evaluate your injuries through digital motion x-rays and make recommendations. This can include manual adjustments, massage therapy, physical therapy exercises and more to readjust your spine. To help you continue this alignment, we may also make lifestyle adjustments and teach you how to improve your alignment at home as well as in the office. The idea is to provide holistic therapies that address the root of the problem—your strained muscles, ligaments and tendons—so your body is able to heal properly.
If you’ve been in a car accident and require auto injury treatment in Naples, FL, the team at Hiler Chiropractic & Neurology can help. We will work with you to develop a treatment plan—get in touch with us today to schedule your initial appointment.
There are sore, tired feet, and then there’s plantar fasciitis. When the ligaments in your feet are damaged, the pain can evolve from annoying to excruciating, making it difficult to carry out everyday activities like going to work, exercising and even standing for more than a few minutes at a time.
Stem cell therapy for plantar fasciitis in Naples, FL is a safe treatment that may help heal your chronic pain. Read on to learn more about how it works.
Plantar fasciitis: An overview
Plantar fasciitis occurs when the ligaments that connect your heel to the front of your foot (the plantar fascia) are damaged, whether from injury or overuse. These ligaments support the arch of the foot and help absorb the shock and strain we put on our feet each day. When you wear ill-fitting shoes (particularly those without arch support) or find yourself walking, running and otherwise straining your feet more than usual, the tissue can tear. This results in inflammation, stiffness and chronic pain.
Patients describe the pain as being needle-like or stabbing. Until the ligaments are healed, further walking simply exacerbates the injury and the pain. For most of us, it’s simply not practical to stay off our feet until they heal—so the pain keeps getting worse.
Traditional medicine uses ice to reduce inflammation, physical therapy, stretching and painkillers to try to reduce pain and heal the ligaments. This is effective for some patients, but others still find themselves struggling to get through their daily activities. If traditional medicine hasn’t been effective at healing your plantar fasciitis, stem cell therapy allografts may help.
How stem cell therapy helps heal plantar fasciitis
Stem cell therapy uses real human stem cells, which form every kind of cell found in the human body. As babies develop in the womb, stem cells gradually turn into everything from bones to nerve tissue. Doctors are now able to harvest stem cells from umbilical cords in FDA approved US labs. The cells are tested and screened then used in treatments for chronic pain and injuries.
Stem cells have a unique ability to replicate and repair damaged tissue. When they’re injected into an injury site, they are able to seek out the damaged areas and release growth factors which help repair the type of tissue most needed, including cartilage, nerves and ligaments—even if the type of tissue in question normally doesn’t regenerate on its own. Your body’s normal healing processes are aided by the stem cells allografts, delivering faster comprehensive results.
The stem cells are delivered in one or a series of injections, which take little time to complete and also require almost no recovery time. There’s no risk of rejection, and you won’t need to undergo surgery, making it a safe and attractive option for many.
If you’re interested in finding out whether you’re a good candidate for stem cell therapy in Naples, FL, contact Feel Amazing Spine and Joint Institute, formerly Hiler Chiropractic & Neurology today. We work with our patients to create a treatment plan and address the root causes of their pain so they can lead full and healthy, pain-free lives.
