I received a lot of inbox questions from my last blog “Everyone Who Exercises Should be Seeing a Chiropractor”. A common theme I read is that it is even more important for anyone who regularly competes athletically to get chiropractic adjustments. As stated previously, if you exercise you should see a chiropractor on a maintenance schedule; but if you are a competitive athlete, especially one in-season, you may need to see a chiropractor a couple times a week.
In the last article, I spoke about the stress being placed on one’s body when exercising regularly, but when talking about a competitive athlete you have to add hitting one’s body against ground, pounding against a competitor or expending more energy running? These types of stresses are compounded, even more so than one would realize.
While playing or practicing in an athletic setting, your body will release endorphins which act as the bodies natural pain medication. This is why it is so common not to feel bumps and bruises until long after the game. As you unwind, your body begins to rest and the output of endorphins eases. The level of insult placed on the body isn’t even realized at times until long after the game; or until someone on the bench tells you about a hit you took and got right back up.
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Not all sports like, tennis and track are contact sports. Although these sports do put a world of strain on the body; ask any long distance track runner what their body goes through during a meet. The constant pounding, the pushing of one’s body further and mental anguish of these sports taxes the spine and extremity joints. The sooner full motion can be returned to all the body’s articulations the faster the athlete may recover. The same can be said about all contact sports including football, basketball, hockey, soccer etc. The level of trauma from impact, whether great of small will affect the body in similar ways. Baseball and softball were not included here but they have their own contact/non-contact stress; whether it is sliding to a base, repetitive throwing of a ball, twisting with a swing or diving for a ball.
Competitive athletes do better when seeing a chiropractor and getting adjusted regularly. In-season I typically see an athlete two times a week; usually a day after their game while they recover, and the day before their next game for complete competitive fluidity. Of course this excludes treatment for true injuries they may suffer, for the sake of this article we are only speaking about optimizing full athletic ability.
Treatment usually consists of some mild therapy to relax the soft tissue musculature then an adjustment. The therapy varies depending on the athletes body type and sport played; this is all determined at the initial consultation. A visit typically lasts 10 – 15 minutes, which is plenty of time to get the athlete feeling his or her top self.
The same way an athlete eats right, sleeps enough and exercises regularly chiropractic treatment will enable him or her to reach a physical level of freedom of movement and post-game repair that will ultimately help their game and athletic potential.
Until Next Time.
Dr. Michael Guadagnino, Chiropractic Physician
Your spine has a central hole, or more correctly called the central canal, which runs the entire length of your spine; from the base of your skull to the top of your buttocks. Inside most of this hole is your spinal cord. Located on the sides of your spinal cord are 32 pairs of (left and right) “lateral recess” ; which is where the nerves branch off the cord. As the nerve moves out from the lateral recess it pierces through another hole called the foramen (foramen literally means hole in latin).
bend over to reach the leaves, squat with your legs; let your quads and hamstrings do all the work, not your back muscles, joints and discs.
PRS contacted each licensed and active chiropractor within Bergen County. PRS asked those chiropractors in an exclusive peer-review online survey which chiropractors they would recommend, other than themselves across the county. Each Chiropractor was allowed to recommend up to three colleagues. Once the ballots were complete, each nominee was carefully evaluated on the basis of the survey results, the legitimacy of their license and their current standing with the State Board of Chiropractic Examiners. Chiropractors who received the highest number of votes in chiropractic medicine are featured in the Top Chiropractors for 2017.