Thursday, September 29, 2011

The case of a snoring 10 week old infant

This is why my passion is so high for chiropractic. Last week a patient brought her 10 week old infant in for a checkup. He had been snoring since birth...albeit very cute, not normal. His mom also noted he was gassy and bloating after eating, and that she was "not able to get a lot done because he always wants to be held"....often a sign of discomfort. It was also noted that his head was tilted to the left which was very noticeable while in his car seat.

Examination of the spine revealed...subluxations (often a person's first trauma is done at birth resulting in subluxations) in his spine most noted in the upper neck and low back. We proceeded to adjust these areas (infant adjustments are very light touch). After 2 treatments his mom noted his snoring subsided (yep, gone!), he was not gassy and bloated like he had been, his desire to be held much of the time was "definitely" less...meaning he was likely to be more comfortable, and his head tilt to the left was no longer present. Wow! How cool is that?! A 3rd visit indicated a barely detectable subluxation in the upper neck. Infant subluxations will often clear very fast and now I will not see him for another month.

Two adjustments cleared out his snoring, head tilt, and the need to be constantly held. The gas and bloating are subsiding as the body has to do a bit of healing. Super positive changes. Very cool to say the least! Fast changes when one gets the nervous operating interference free. Simply stated developing without nerve interference is key to attaining optimum health as all functions in the body are controlled and coordinated by the nervous system. 

This is why I got into the profession!


Wednesday, September 21, 2011

Development Of A Child's Nervous System

When you were just an embryo at about 3 weeks after conception your nervous system started to form. This was your first system and all others came after that because the nervous system is your foundation. And your nervous system, consisting of your brain, spinal cord, and nerves controls and coordinates ALL functions of your body. So let's say you are suddenly roused out of your relaxed environment of your mother's womb with what feels like a squeezing or pushing sensation. "What is happening to me? Why am I being forced out of this comfortable, chill place? And where am I going? And what's the rush?" After what seems like hours of being pushed and squeezed you finally go through an opening where these enormous hands (or if you are really unlucky...forceps) greet you and start pulling. As the doctors hands pulls from your head sometimes twisting to get those shoulders to come out you just try to hang on and suddenly...your new life begins. "Whoa!" you might say to yourself. "That was a bit violent don't you think? My neck hurts!"

The reality of the birth process resulting in subluxations (see previous blog for definition) is very likely in much of the population. Subluxations at birth can cause lifelong issues. Remember the nervous system controls and coordinates ALL functions of the body. Growing and developing with subluxations can sometimes have devastating effects leaving a parent to wonder why their child is developing slowly.

"90% of the stimulation and nutrition to the brain is generated by movement of the spine. This would be analogous to a windmill generating electricity." Whoa! Do you get that? So movement of the spine is needed to stimulate and get nutrition to the brain! That is huge! If your spinal segments are not moving (subluxated) you are not generating the electricity at the capacity you are capable of producing.  By the way, a really smart person figured this out and won the Nobel Prize for it in 1981.

So what do you think will happen to an infant who is subluxated from birth and has areas of his or her spine not moving? For one, their brain may not develop in an optimum state which may lead to speech delays and learning disability. What else? In one of my patients who is 8 years old they came in with the inability to balance on one leg along with learning issues. After just 4 adjustments to his upper neck he was able to start balancing. After another 4 adjustments he was able to balance on one leg in a steady fashion. We removed the subluxation and his body's nervous system started operate more optimally. Both his brain's balance centers are getting the stimulation and nutrition they need to operate and the muscles that are needed to be strong for balance are also receiving that stimulation. He's elated with the results so far. Other issues that may occur are ear infections, colic, gas, burping, bloating, constipation, etc.

Do your child a favor and get their spine checked by a chiropractor today. If there is nothing there you only spent an hour of your time. Should there be a subluxation you can either head off a potential problem or allow the healing process to begin on a known current issue. Infants and children respond fast to care. For all of my patients I screen their children for free. Detecting and correcting subluxations when they are young can have a very significant impact on there quality of life.

Thanks for reading.
Steve Noble, DC















Monday, September 19, 2011

The POWER Of The Chiropractic Adjustment

Imagine going through all of your teen age years with acne covering your entire face. Those kids did not fair too well in the dating circles back when I was in high school. Imagine having acne that actually caused your face to swell and have pain associated with it. And now imagine looking at yourself daily in the mirror, seeing acne where some are the size of a quarter staring back at you as you apply another hopeful treatment to rid your face of those red mounds filled with puss. This was a 19 year old patient who came into my clinic about four months ago.

Three months after having come in his acne was all but gone. I'm a chiropractor, so naturally I did not treat his acne. What happened though?

Contrary to what we are often told and have learned your body will actually self-heal and self-regulate. Your body is actually really smart, much smarter than most will give it credit. The nervous system is the first system to start development when we are just an embryo. This is because the nervous system controls and coordinates ALL functions of your body: thoughts, movements, digestion, bowel movements, etc. To build a house we do not start with the refrigerator we start with a foundation (your nervous system) and go up from there and if that crumbles so goes the house (your body). The brain, spinal cord and nerves make up your nervous system. If your nervous system shuts off so goes your body...i.e. quadriplegic. For your body to function at 100% optimum health it must be free of nerve interference (subluxation). Nerve interference is similar to static on a cell phone. "What? I can't hear you?" If the signal becomes too weak the line goes dead. If the nerve impulse slated for the organ or muscle is not at 100% the organ or muscle also will not be operating at 100%. This is what was happening to my patient with acne. They had nerve interference (subluxation) (unbeknownst to them because unless there is pain associated with the subluxation we will not always know it is there...which is the case probably 97% of the time) causing an organ to not operate as it was intended. The result was a toxicity of sorts that was most likely responsible for their acne.

As the brain sends signals down the spinal cord to its final destination of an organ or a muscle it must pass through the spinal column (vertebra). If there is a section not moving or moving in a manner not designed to do a nerve interference will be result. Meaning the nerve flow is interrupted or compromised creating static in the line. The magic for my patient was this...once we got the area of the spine associated with the intestines (ileocecal valve or ICV to be exact) moving and doing so in a proper way their acne started to clear. Once we restored movement, the static was no longer there and their ICV started to work again. After three months not only was their acne cleared by 95%, but their confidence and outlook on life had improved a great deal as you might imagine it would.

We did not treat the acne but we did remove the nerve interference that was inhibiting nerve flow to their ICV which was creating the toxicity. All the creams, pills, food elimination, supplements they tried could not do what adjusting their spine did...remove the nerve interference or subluxation and allow the body to self-heal and work as it was designed. Now imagine how their life would be had they been adjusted and had proper chiropractic care as a child. Yep. Seemingly no acne. Probably would have been a different high school experience.

Thanks for reading.
Steve Noble, DC, CCSP

Next blog: what CAUSES the subluxation of nerve interference.





Tuesday, January 4, 2011

Aging Athletes...Have No Fear

Ned Overend prior to winning another National Championship
Remember the movie that Sylvester Stallone put out in 2006 named Rocky Balboa? If you grew up in the 70s and 80s and you were not living off the grid in some far off place you remember all the Rocky movies and were probably more than a little stunned, shocked, "serious Stallone?", when he released "Rocky Balboa" 30 years after he first took to the ring. A "mid-fifties" boxer stepping back into the ring against the heavyweight champ...seems a bit far-fetched. But maybe not that far-fetched according to this study/survey which found that living a sedentary lifestyle was the biggest reason for physical decline in athletic performance not aging as many of us would (like?) to believe.

So could Rocky Balboa really have been able to compete in the boxing ring against a much younger opponent? Many will remember George Foreman reclaiming the Heavyweight boxing title 20 years later at the age of 45 against a 26 year old opponent. At 42 years old Baseball Pitcher Nolan Ryan found himself on the American League All-Star Team and play in the major leagues until he was 46 years old. Ned Overend, mountain biking legend, in 2010 at the age of 55 won the US National Single Speed Championships....that is a mountain bike with only one gear. Finally, there is Ed Whitlock who at the age of 72 ran a sub 3 hour marathon; 2:59:10. Amazing! And then at 74 ran a 2:58:40...lowering his time. Perhaps Rocky could have reentered the boxing ring against a much younger opponent and not get beaten senseless. 

Aging does appear to favor the endurance athlete as opposed to the power athlete. The study mentioned above which focused on marathon runners, reports there is no significant age-related decline in performance before age of 55 and after that only moderate decline. They also reported 25% of the 65-69 year old runners were faster than 50% of the 20 to 54 year olds. Nice! This study showed there is a faster decline in strength. It does not give age breakdowns other than to say the age group was between 30s and 90s and that a decline is seen faster in weight lifting as opposed to endurance and sprinting events.

Those athlete in their 40s and 50s can hopefully rejoice at the prospect of being able to remain competitive with the younger generation for years to come. Decline is natural but that decline is something that we have more control over than we tend to think possible. This is really exciting! The human body adapts and want to exercise and move. The "Godfather of fitness" Jack Lalanne is living proof of what an aging body can do. This man at the age of 96 stills shows up at the gym for 30 minutes of cardiovascular work and 90 minutes of lifting weights. In his 60s he did feats of strength and endurance that surely anyone can appreciate such as swimming across open water pulling boats while handcuffed. And I would bet at 96 he can still outdo a great deal of the population in number of pull ups and push ups.

Thanks for reading.