Should I Use Ice or Heat?

One of the most common questions we receive regarding pain is “should I be using ice or heat?”.  This is actually a very good question with no easy answer.  

There are some conditions where the answer is black and white; they either benefit from ice or heat.  On the other hand, there are many times where the stage of injury is the determining factor.  As a good rule of thumb the acute stage of an injury (the first few days after the onset) is the time to ice.  When the injury moves to the chronic stage (after a month or more depending on the nature of the injury) heat may be the more beneficial modality.  This is variable depending on what type of injury it is.  Ice is especially important after a traumatic injury like spraining your ankle or whiplash from a car accident. 

When using ice always put some type of barrier between the ice and your skin.  The barrier should be at least a paper towel sheet thick.  When using a heating pad make sure it is wrapped in a towel (unless it is a disposable pad meant to be applied directly to the skin, see package directions if unsure). 

***Note: If ice or heat increases your symptoms discontinue immediately and contact your health care provider. 

If you are unsure which to use you can contact us.  www.peyserchiropractic.com

Avoiding Opioid Pain Relievers

A recent study released by the CDC reported that there were more than 20,000 deaths due to prescription drug overdoses in 2008 and nearly 75% of those deaths were due to overdoses of opioid pain relievers (OPR) such as Vicodin and Oxycodone.  The report also indicated that during the period of 1999--2008, overdose death rates, sales, and substance abuse treatment admissions related to OPR all increased substantially. Public health interventions to reduce prescription drug overdose must strike a balance between reducing misuse and abuse and safeguarding legitimate access to treatment. That being said, it certainly makes sense to take advantage of natural types of healing such as that utilized by a chiropractic practice.  Chiropractic is the nation's largest natural healing profession.  Chiropractors do not prescribe drugs that simply mask the pain, but seek to get to the cause of a person's problem and correct this problem without the use of medicine or surgery.

Utilizing chiropractic treatment to resolve one's pains will certainly eliminate the possibility of accidental overdose or addiction to OPR prescription drugs.  For more information about alternatives to OPRs visit http://www.peyserchirorpactic.com/.

People Are Becoming All Scrunched Up

A recent edition of "The Costco Connection", the consumer warehouse giant's monthly magazine, reports that 15% of 5 year-old boys still wet their bed and one in 4 people have a case of undiagnosed mental illness.  Both of these are staggering statistics, if you believe that they are true and not some periodical's sensationalism.  I tend to think that most health related statistics are highly inflated, usually skewed towards making individuals anxious.

But one statistic that I am certain is real and may be under reported is the incidence of back pain.  The reported incidence of back pain is 85%.  This includes all spinal related pain, including neck pain.  Considering how our society has gone so immobile and has increasingly poor posture, our spine is put under constant stress. 

Our bodies evolved over millions of years (or thousands depending on how you look at it) to be upright and active.  Our ancestors spent very little time sitting as most of the day was devoted to hunting, gathering, farming and building.   It is only in the last century that this has changed.  Think about what sitting all day at a computer does to your spine.  Most of us sit forward without proper back support, crank our neck forward to get closer to the monitor, tuck the phone under our neck so we can talk while we type or use the mouse and when given a break, sit scrunched up on our IPhone. 

Chiropractic adjustments free up the spinal misalignments and compressions that these positions impose upon your spine.  Chiropractors prescribe specific exercises utilize additional physical therapeutics and explain proper ergonomics.  See your chiropractic physician to be sure that you are one of the 15% that don't suffer back pain.  For more information visit www.peyserchiropractic.com.