Recently some great posts have been placed on a few of our favorite blogs helping to explain the how and why upper cervical care works, and why so many make it a part of their lives.

Satisfaction associated with upper cervical chiropractic care

What information can prospective patients garner from this data? First, that the true Upper Cervical approach doesn’t require dozens of visits before patients see improvement. This is valuable in a number of ways…

Ten reasons to try upper cervical chiropractic care (in Auburn Hills, Michigan)

Although there are other reasons that may be unique to your situation, here are ten good reasons why you might want to make your next consultation with a health care provider in an upper cervical chiropractic office.

Six things upper cervical doctors do differently than other chiropractors

Upper cervical doctors are different than other chiropractors. To help you understand the differences, here are the top six ways your upper cervical doctor will be different than any other doctor of chiropractic that you will see.

How many adjustments do I need (part 1)

Those who choose the third way have gotten the big idea that a healthy life lived to the fullest extent depends on a healthy nervous system, which depends on a healthy spine, and that in this day and age, a healthy spine depends on quality chiropractic adjustments.

How many adjustments do I need (part 2)

Some people think that if you’ve visited one chiropractor, then you’ve visited them all. In reality, chiropractic care and the delivery of the chiropractic adjustment is its own art form. There are multiple ways to adjust the spine, and multiple ways to figure out if that adjustment was successful or not.

Great upper cervical safety study by Eriksen at al.

What’s really remarkable, but not surprising, is that all 83 Chiropractors have delivered over 5 million adjustments with no reported incidence of serious adverse events.

Why I am an upper cervical care advocate

So, when my upper cervical doctor released my wife and me from our pain, I couldn’t just run to freedom without taking my fellow “inmates” with me. Of course, not everyone will be able to go. Fear, and the comfort of “an evil that they know” will make it difficult for some to follow when the door swings open.

The thermal imaging scans shown below were taken of a 12-year-old boy whose mother asked me if kids could benefit from chiropractic adjustments.

A simple way to understand thermal scans is to examine the colors. Red is bad; green and yellow are good; orange is acceptable. Start by focusing on the “Before” scan…

See all that pressure along the right side in the upper neck, back, and shoulder area? Adults with this type of scan would almost certainly be experiencing muscle stiffness, soreness, or sharp pain. Surprisingly, this boy is pain-free. Instead, he suffers from nocturnal enuresis, more commonly known as bed-wetting.

Notice how well things cleared up in the “After” scan taken one week later. All he needed was one correction to achieve this level of improvement. His mom is really glad she brought him in!

Not all parents, however, think to bring their children to a chiropractor. It’s not their fault though… Political groups within the chiropractic profession have fought diligently to gain recognition as experts for the treatment of back pain. As a result, many people believe that you should only call a chiropractor when your back “goes out.” Since most children don’t have back pain (or are unable to describe it), parents don’t perceive the need for chiropractic checkups.

Whenever I’m around my niece, nephews, or friends’ children, I can’t help but notice the twisted body positions these little contortionists put themselves into… While not necessarily painful, these activities can easily cause misalignments within the spine. Imagine if adults tried doing this stuff… they’d be laid up in bed for a week!

Good moms and dads take their kids to a pediatrician and to the dentist because its important for their health and development. Receiving checkups from a chiropractor is equally as important.

It’s easier to build a child’s future than it is to repair an adult’s past.

If your son or daughter has never received a chiropractic checkup, now is a great time to explore the benefits of chiropractic care for kids.

Trigeminal Neuralgia, Suicide Disease?

Trigeminal Neuralgia is the #1 cause of facial pain, with 4 to 5 persons per 100,000 having the disease. Some authorities say that more might be suffering, but aren’t counted because of misdiagnosis.

According to the National Pain Foundation, 1.7 millions have been diagnosed with Trigeminal Neuralgia. TN’s reputation as one of the most severe body pains makes that 1.7 million too many. In many cases TN grows to be a debilitating and chronic pain that threatens the livelihood of the one who suffers with it.

Listen to the story of one man who had TN below:

In the past TN has been called Tic douloureux, and also the suicide disease, because the suffering it causes some patients drove them to take their life. Modern medicine has improved pain management through drugs and surgical procedures, and takes credit for reducing TN’s deadly reputation.

Yet, medicines don’t always work, and the idea of a cranial surgery can be too expensive, or downright scary for many. Some choose to seek help from alternative treatments. Indeed, popular web sources like Mayo.com list some of those therapies, like acupuncture, biofeedback, and vitamin therapy.

Still, there is one glaring omission of what might help TN. Upper cervical chiropractic care.

Upper Cervical Chiropractic and TN

There are several theories on what causes, or possibly exacerbates the symptoms of facial nerve pain. The most popular is a mechanical explanation: there is pressure on the facial nerve, inside the skull, most likely cause by a blood vessel. Pain then occurs with little or no warning, often just with moving the head, eating, or touching the face.

It’s thought that the pressure actually occurs at the base of the brain stem, where the roots of the facial nerve are.

What’s interesting about the facial nerve is that it’s not just found at the brain stem. There are actually cell extensions of the facial nerve which descend down into the spinal cord to the level of our second cervical vertebra. So, reach back to just about the back of your hair line, at the back of your neck. You have cells hooked up to the trigeminal nerve which are nestled less than a few inches  away from your finger.

If there was a doctor who could do a surgery and take away small amounts of pressure at the top of the spinal cord, in between the second vertebra and the bottom of the head, do you think it might relieve the pressure on the facial nerve?

Now what if that doctor wasn’t doing surgery, but was gently improving the balance between the head and neck? Balance that affects nerve pressure and blood flow into the brain stem. Would you think that might relieve pressure on the facial nerve?

And what if I told you that non-surgical doctor was a chiropractor, practicing upper cervical chiropractic?

Upper cervical chiropractic worked for one TN patient of an upper cervical doctor in St. Louis. And it did for James Tomasi, who you can read about here, or listen to his story in the recording above. I have personally  seen improvement in facial pain in 3 different patients in the last 45 days.

So, why haven’t you heard about this before? Good question. Here’s one answer: when you search the current National Institute of Heath’s clinical trials, there are only 3 TN studies. And not one of them is examining Trigeminal Neuralgia and chiropractic care. There is very little funding for chiropractic research period, let alone research into a non-back-pain related condition.

Here’s a second answer:  Mayo and other authorities are  comfortable reporting on the potential of acupuncture, vitamins, and biofeedback, because it’s not chiropractic. You simply haven’t heard about Trigeminal Neuralgia and chiropractic care because of bias.

And it’s not just limited to facial pain, but other chronic pains as well. Thankfully patient advocacy groups like the Facial Pain Association are willing to tell others about facial pain and upper cervical chiropractic.

A woman came for NUCCA care after hearing that Upper Cervical Chiropractic is effective as a headache treatment. While I told her that people with headaches often respond wonderfully to NUCCA care, Upper Cervical Care is not a treatment for headache.

It’s a treatment for a head to neck imbalance that may be limiting the body’s ability to heal its own headaches. I can correct her imbalance. But I’m not going to cure her headaches.

Only the body cures.

After suffering with headaches for years, often on strong, multiple doses of over the counter pain killers, she was ready to see what her body could do under NUCCA care. And so was I.

So, can you see a headache on an x-ray?

Above are her x-rays. Notice how her head is leaning quite a bit to her right in the x-ray on the left. I had her stand in front of a mirror so she could see it as well. And she did. Not surprisingly this head tilt showed up in her x-ray. And I could see that her head and her neck were creating a kink on her right side. This was placing pressure on muscles and ligaments for sure. But also potentially placing pressure on blood vessels and nerves going into her head.

I made a gentle correction based on what I measured from the x-ray. Then I measured again after the adjustment. That’s the x-ray on the right. Can you see the improvement. Her head is only leaning half as much.

But, I wasn’t happy yet. With this new information, I lowered my approach and we made another correction. You didn’t need an x-ray to see that change. She noticed that when she looked in the mirror, her head was on straight. She couldn’t believe that she had lived with head tilt all her life.

And the best part: her headaches went away after the first visit. Even the bad ones she would have with her cycle. And months later, they’ve stayed away.

Attention Deficit Disorder or Attention Deficit and Hyperactivity Disorder, otherwise known as ADD/ADHD. It’s the number one reported behavior disorder for children in America. Many overlooked adults suffer with it too.

While there is no “gold-standard” diagnostic test for this disorder, kids are generally described as distracted,  inattentive, and behavior problems. The diagnosis is often contentious, and children are placed on addictive drugs, simply by observation alone.

What is the the major treatment?

For many years now, the treatment of choice by medical personnel is the use of behavior modifying drugs like Ritalin (Methylphenidate). This treatment option is often supported by classroom teachers, administrators, and parents who are often exasperated by the child’s behavior. They just want him or her to be able to concentrate and learn, or at least stop disrupting the classroom.

It is a noble desire, and can be an effective treatment, but it is  not without risks. Drugs like Ritalin are class II controlled substances, which are habit forming, and whose long term effects we are just beginning to understand.

The thought of using these substances to control child behavior causes some educators and parents to pause. They wonder, “Isn’t there another option before we resort to potentially addictive, mind-altering drugs?”

Why is this happening to my child?

Over the last 10 years, searching parents, doctors, and nutritionists have sought the answer for the rise in ADD/ADHD, and treatment options that do not have to involve pharmaceuticals. Although the not everyone sees the results that they want, the answers they have found are now providing natural, drug-free relief for many children and their parents.

They believe that one, or a combination of the following is playing a major role in the disruptive child’s behavior:

• Vital nutritional deficiencies, particular in necessary fatty acids
• Exposure to heavy metals and environmental toxins, through prior medical intervention, or through chemicals in the home environment
• Toxic levels of food additives which over-excite parts of the immune system in those who are susceptible

What about spinal alignment?

In addition to the above possibilities, another cause needs to be examined: the influence of the spine, particularly the upper cervical spine, and the balance between the head and first two vertebrae of the neck.

In the  landmark book, Manual Therapy in Children, edited by German surgeon and manual therapist Heiner Biedermann, MD the author Reinhard W. Theiler (doctor of manual medicine) speaks of the role the top of the spine plays in attention disorders.

He writes:

Parents reported that in general the children’s’ ability to concentrate, sustained effort, ability to sustain attention, and impulsivity had improved considerably, and that their children seemed more mature. The follow-up tests confirmed this, with children working more quickly and confidently.

(Theiler, R. Attention Deficit Disorder and the Upper Cervical Spine. Manual Therapy in Children, H. Beiderman Ed.  Churchill Livinstone Press, Elsevier. 2004.)

What treatment did these improved ADD/ADHD children get?

They recieved manual re-alignment of the upper cervical spine, improving balance between the head and neck. These German doctors call the misalignment KISS (Kinematic Imbalance due to Subboccital Strain).

NUCCA doctors call it the Atlas Subluxation Complex.

In any case, if German surgeons are recommending upper cervical care for children with an attention-deficit problem, what about the ADD/ADHD person in your life…should not he or she be evaluated by a qualified upper cervical doctor here in the U.S. for an upper cervical imbalance?

The case for more than just Ritalin

Upper cervical alignment, environmental toxins, and food additives all may be playing a role in a child’s inability to concentrate. While Ritalin and similar substances may be effective in many cases, you do have other, safer, less invasive options to help control disruptive childhood behavior labeled as ADD/ADHD.

Even if you do not get support from your child’s teacher, principal, or pediatrician, you still have the right to seek alternatives to behavior modifying drugs.

What’s the next step?

First, talk to other parents in your community who have tried altering their child’s diet and/or assessed his or her exposure to environmental toxins, and see what resources are available in your area. Or, is there a teacher sympathetic to alternatives in your school district? She might have a few suggestions on where you should start.

Second, and just as important, examine your child’s posture for signs of upper cervical misalignment. If your child’s head is leaning or tipped toward one shoulder or the other, or if he carries his head forward, in front of the chest, then an exam by an upper cervical doctor should be helpful.

Other signs up upper cervical imbalances can be headaches in childhood, a difficult birth, and preference for nursing on one breast as an infant.

Remember adults need help too

Natural, non-invasive options for attention deficit problems may be just as effective for adults as well. Please have them get checked by an upper cervical doctor as well.

Article copyright 2009, DrZWard.com

These are the 3 lies people believe about headaches.

1. Persistent, recurring headaches are normal. They’re not. Persistent, reoccurring headaches are a sign that something’s not right in the body.

2. Headaches run in the family, so I’m stuck with them. There are lots of different kinds of headaches, some mild, and some severe. There are many factors that go into headaches as well. But just because your mother and her sisters all get the same kind of headaches, doesn’t mean you’re destined to live with the same pain.

3. I can only control my headaches with drugs. Believe it or not, there are other answers for your headaches outside of drugs. And upper cervical care (NUCCA) is one of them.

Many headache suffers have found that an imbalance between their head and their neck was the root cause of their pain. Once that imbalance is corrected, the body is able to recover, and pain is reduced, if not eliminated. All thanks to a new alignment, and the body’s ability to heal itself.

Is an upper cervical imbalance causing your headaches? The only way to know is to get an evaluation by a trained upper cervical doctor.

This article copyright 2009, drzward.com