Adjustments in the cervical area can increase proprioception (body awareness) in the upper extremities.

What does that mean exactly???

When a person has experienced mild neck pain, ache, and/or stiffness, the person’s nervous system isn’t as aware of where their upper limb is in space compared to a person who’s never had neck symptoms. After receiving a cervical adjustment, the person with neck symptoms has a significant increase of awareness of where their upper limb is in space. This is called increase proprioception.

Does this matter? Yes!

Imagine how important it is to know where your arm is in space? We all rely on body awareness every day and don’t even realize it! Gymnasts, swimmers, kayakers, and rowers rely heavily on proprioception in their upper extremities. On a daily basis when you eat, brush your teeth, and/or fix your hair, you are relying on proprioception.

That’s not including the importance of proprioception in your lower body when you walk, run, skip, and jump. Without proprioception, you wouldn’t be able to walk well because your body wouldn’t know where it is in space. Proprioception is important for all of us!

#neck #stiffneck #bodyawareness #chiropractic #drchestencantrell #wellness #newdaychiropractic #rockymountva #franklincountyva #proprioception #chiropractor #getadjusted 

Here are more details about the research:

Haavik H, Murphy B. Subclinical neck pain and the effects of cervical manipulation on elbow joint position sense. JMPT;34(2):88-97.

This study compared people who had subclinical neck pain* against a control group. All of the participants did a test to determine how accurate their elbow joint position sense** was. Those with subclinical neck pain were not as accurate as the control group. None of these participants had a history of shoulder or elbow pain! After receiving an adjustment, those with subclinical neck pain had a significant improvement in accuracy of their elbow joint position sense. This implies that issues in your neck could cause a disturbance in proprioception in the neck and upper limb. It also is possible that receiving a spinal adjustment improves it.

*Subclinical neck pain is when mild neck pain, ache and/or stiffness occur with or without a history of neck trauma. The symptoms are not consistent. All of the participants were adjusted when they did not have any neck symptoms!

**Elbow joint position sense means; does the person’s nervous system know where the elbow is? Their elbow was placed in a position. The participant moved their arm around and then was supposed to place their arm back in the original position. This was done with the participant’s eyes closed.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21334540

I would like to talk about a topic that is near and dear to my heart. Create your outlet. What do I mean by that?

We all have stress occurring in our life on a daily basis. It can be from work, finances, academics, family, friends, or other areas that are beyond our control. We can sometimes be bombarded with emotions that we would rather not have and we don’t have a great way to release these negative emotions.

Instead of dealing with these emotions, a lot of people turn to addictive non-productive alternatives to try to escape from their emotions. It can be through smoking. It can be through drinking alcohol or doing recreational drugs. It can be through gambling. It can be through eating a lot. It can be through not eating at all. It can be through playing video games. It can be through watching television or movies. You get the picture.

For me, the way I create my outlet is through writing. I have a notebook that I write in at least fifteen minutes every night. It doesn’t matter how tired I am or if I feel like I have nothing to write about. I still write. I typically write about things that may be bothering me at that moment. I write about my stresses. I write about the things I am grateful for. I write about the people and situations in my life who have made me better. I write how I feel about these different situations I’m in and the people that I am interacting with at the time. There are times I write fluff! There are times my writing turns into stories or poetry. For me, writing is the best outlet I have found. It has benefited me in many ways including:

  1. It helps me find and keep my voice. We are constantly overwhelmed with other peoples’ opinions and propaganda on a daily basis. We all need a space we can go to that allows us a moment to remember who we are and bask in our individuality.
  2. It helps me see how I am viewing myself in the situation. It is easy for us to fall into a pattern of being a certain type of person during a conflict. For me, writing it all down allows me to find out how I really feel about myself. Am I trying too hard to make it seem like I was the victim in the situation or am I merely stating all of facts of what occurred? Am I too hard on myself or giving myself too much slack? Again, this gives perspective.
  3. It gives me clarity on my situations. It helps me figure out if I over-reacted, under-reacted, or reacted appropriately. Sometimes, a situation appears one way in our head, but once it gets put on paper, the situation suddenly doesn’t seem as detrimental.
  4. It helps me realize when my emotions have nothing to do with a current situation. We all have childhood scars. With this come emotional triggers that we may or may not realize we have. For me, if a person does something to remind me of a negative person from childhood, I automatically go in defensive mode and over-analyze everything the person does afterwards even though the person in general is nothing like the one from my past. By writing everything down, it helps me realize when this occurs. It helps me realize what my emotional triggers are. It helps me remember not to do it again.
  5. It helps my seemingly terrible issues melt away. I feel more at peace after I write. I feel like it was a way of getting everything off my chest without accidentally reacting inappropriately in a situation.
  6. It helps me react better to situations. Because I am constantly letting go of my stressors, I am able to react well to new stressors. Instead of constantly feeling overwhelmed and waiting for that last straw, I’m throwing off the weight every night. I feel that, for me, I tend to over-react less and I am able to analyze the current situation better than I would if I didn’t write.

Writing isn’t for everyone and I fully acknowledge that. Writing about stressors may not be for everyone either. If your negative emotions only feel stronger when you write about it, then that may not be the way to go about it. I’m just sharing what works for me.

Your outlet could be drawing, painting, or some other arts and crafts project. Your outlet could be working on your car or athletics.

The important thing is, create an outlet. Don’t just settle for the things everyone else does.

Instead of only playing a video game, why not come up with the idea for a video game? I don’t know how easy it is to invent a game, but with the advancements in technology, it seems like it’s possible to make some pretty amazing games on phones, internet, and gaming systems.

Instead of only watching a television show or a movie, why not write a script for it? Or, why not get some friends together and perform a skit? You can even get it recorded and put it online to share with others.

Instead of only listening to music, why not take part in creating music? If you like singing, sing! If you want to learn an instrument, then learn it! If you want to create an album, create it! Again, with the way technology is now, you could record an album from home.

As long as your outlet is safe and helps decrease your stress, you ought to venture out to find it.

By no means is this post meant to take away from people in the mental health care field. I am not a psychologist, psychiatrist, therapist, or any other certified person in that respected field. It can be a rewarding experience to go to one of these credentialed individuals to get professional help. This post is not providing professional help. This post comes from personal experience and nothing more than that. If you feel that your stressors are overwhelming to the point that you feel that you may hurt yourself and/or others, you should seek professional counseling immediately.

Thanks for reading! Go forth and create!

Dr. Chesten

Bumps and bruises are part of life, right? How many people do you know that suffer from neck pain? Well, Taylor and Murphy found that when a person injures his/her neck, it is possible for the injury to cause harmful changes to the brain. These changes in the brain can result in chronic neck pain and/or a decrease in functional movement of the neck and (possibly) the upper extremity (like the shoulder, arm, forearm, and/or hand).

The good news is that Taylor and Murphy also found that a cervical spine adjustment to a person with a history of neck problems can cause changes in the brain that lead to improved functional movement of the neck and upper extremity.

#neckpaintreatment #chronicpaintreatment #improvefunction #chiropractic #chiropractor #drchestencantrell #newdaychiropractic #rockymountva #franklincountyva #proprioception #wellness #getadjusted

Here are more details about the research:

Taylor HH, Murphy B. Altered sensorimotor integration with cervical spine manipulation. JMPT. 2008;31:115-126.

All participants had a history of neck pain or stiffness. However, during the time of the experiment all of the participants were pain free. The researchers wanted to see changes in corticomotor measures that had nothing to do with processing pain. Instead, any changes observed would be the effects of spinal manipulation on a dysfunctional joint*.

The same participants were used for both the adjustment group and the control group. The participants met the researchers two times. One time, the participants were in the adjustment group and one time the participants were in the control group. The researchers made sure there were enough weeks separating the two times to ensure there wasn’t inaccurate data. When the participants were in the control group, they had the cervical area palpated without receiving an adjustment. When the participants were in the adjustment group, each participant was evaluated for dysfunctional cervical joints and a single adjustment was performed by a chiropractor. The technique used was manual adjusting of the cervical.

Data collected included EMG of the abductor pollicis longus and extensor indices proprios muscles of the right hand and transcranial magnetic stimulation of the head on the side opposite of the right hand. This is because the left side of the brain controls the right hand.

In the control group, there weren’t any statistically significant changes in data. In the adjustment group, there were significant changes that support the theory “that specific intracortical inhibitory and facilitatory pathways are altered in a muscle-specific manner after spinal manipulation of dysfunctional spinal joints.”

The results of this experiment may help explain why a cervical adjustment leads to pain relief and improvement of functional abilities in a patient.

* For this study, a dysfunctional joint is when there is restricted motion between two cervical vertebra and palpable tenderness at the restricted area. Both are found to be reliable methods of determining a dysfunctional joint.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18328937