Washington Park Chiropractic

By: Jennifer Bell, RMT

The skeletal muscles in your body are responsible for moving your bones, enabling you to perform a variety of movements.  When a muscle contracts it pulls on a bone to cause these movements.  The structure that transmits the force of the muscle contraction to the bone is called a tendon.  Tendons are primarily made up of collagen fibers with a small number of elastin fibers woven into the structure to lend some limited stretch.  A healthy tendon appears hard, shiny and white.  Tendinopathies, or injuries and damage to the tendons, include tendonitis and tendinosis. The injury processes in these pathologies are similar to strains and sprains.

Tendonitis or inflammation of the tendon, is the body’s response to an injury and can produce pain, heat and swelling in the area. Read the rest of this entry →

By: Dr. Jake Simpson, DC

Anatomy of Sports Injuries:

Sports injuries encompass a wide range of conditions with varying degree of severity.  Realistically, sports injuries are no different than other injuries; like car accidents they just happen to occur at higher speeds, forces, vectors, etc. often making their degree of severity higher.  The most common type of sports injuries are sprains (ligament) and strains (muscular).  Both ligaments and muscles have varying degrees of tensile and elastic properties specific to their relative function.  Muscles tend to be the powerhouse behind movement, with ligaments and tendons being the support and stabilization for the movement.  Further, all tissues are connected in a complex web of fascia, a big web of tissue that runs throughout the entire body.  This web when injured can affect tissue both near and far from the initial injury site.  In fact with fascia in mind, an injury of the lower extremity can result in an injury to the upper extremity through altered biomechanics.  If you feel like one injury was the start of ongoing problems and injuries, fascia is likely the culprit.  With respect to any aspect of health, prevention is always the key but sports injuries are often unavoidable.  For sports injuries, proper acute care and management is the key. I’ll go over a several things you can do for yourself to help heal quickly and properly. 

In treating sports injuries remember the acronym: PRICE

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By: Ashley Bennett, LMT

This is normally the time of the year we reflect on our health and personal improvements. This is also when there is a huge influx of people in the gyms.  Sometimes when I am at the gym and I see the amount of people I think of ways to get out of there as quickly as possible to avoid the crowd.  One thing I never skip on is stretching.  Stretching should be an integral part of your daily routine.

Benefits of Stretching:

• Stretching increases flexibility. Flexible muscles can improve your daily performance. Tasks such as lifting packages, bending to tie your shoes or hurrying to catch a bus become easier and less tiring.
• Stretching improves range of motion of your joints. Good range of motion keeps you in better balance, which will help keep you mobile and less prone to falls — and the related injuries — especially as you age. When your body loses full range of motion the femur (thigh bone) is not moving any fluid around in the socket so the rest of the joint is not getting the full amount of nutrients needed to keep the cartilage healthy.  
• Stretching improves circulation. Stretching increases blood flow to your muscles. Improved circulation can speed recovery after muscle injuries.
• Stretching can relieve stress. Stretching relaxes the tense muscles that often accompany stress.

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By: Ashley Bennett, LMT

Massage Therapy during injuries can help speed up the healing process.  A great example of an injury that is at a higher potential during the winter season is a lift and twist strain.  This is when you have been lifting or shoveling and your back goes out or is limiting your range of motion.  The muscles in your back are in a spasm and the surrounding tissue is compensating for the injure area.  This is a great opportunity to come in and get it checked out by your chiropractor and add in a massage to help calm down the area so that range of motion can be restored.  Massage can help decrease swelling, pain and loss of range of motion in any area that is related to soft tissue.  If there is a more severe injury where there is scar tissue involved, massage can help break up the adhesions and create a more functional and potentially less visible scar.  I am not saying massage should replace your physical therapy or doctor, I am saying that it can help the process move faster so you can get back to your healthy lifestyle!!

By: Dr. Jake Simpson

Just about everyone on the road knows about or has heard about “whiplash.”  But what is it exactly?  What happens to our bodies during whiplash?  What are the short and long term effects of whiplash?  And what can a chiropractor do to help with whiplash? 

What Is Whiplash and What is Happening to Our Bodies?

Upon impact, your body pushes deeply into your seat.  Your head, momentarily isolated by your neck, delays its reaction while your body quickly reaches the limits of your seat.  The, your body instantly and violently changes direction, moving forward as your seat belt works to keep you stationary.  As your seatbelt engages your head then starts to move backward in the opposite direction of your body.  Unlike your body being restrained by the seat belt, your head is free to move being jerked back and forth…most of the time beyond its normal limitations anatomically. 

Outside of our normal anatomical limitation is when injury occurs.  In the case of whiplash, we are tearing muscles, tendons, ligaments, other connective tissues and in some cases breaking bones or causing brain damage. 

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Source

By: Dr. Jake Simpson

‘Tis the season to be golfing.  The weather is warm, the golf courses are green, and the golfers (much like myself and Dr. Goodman) are striving to shoot a personal best.  You can find golfers out on the tee box from sun up to sun down…. This all sounds great, just thinking about being on the course gives me goose bumps, but there is always a catch.  None of us can golf, or golf at our optimal abilities if we are injured from the very game we love.  According to some estimates, there are approximately 27 million golf injuries every year!!!  Golf is generally not thought to be highly physical or a sport that will cause injuries because of the lack of violent impact.  So what causes so many golf injuries?  I wish I could tell you there is one reason you get injured but I can’t.  All injuries are multi-factorial, meaning there are generally several underlying causes for your injury.  Some of these include

• no warm-up, no cool down
• poor flexibility
• postural dysfunction or instability
• improper swing mechanics

  Let’s help you prevent future injuries and keep you playing golf pain and injury free:

Warm-Up and Cool Down:

Along with proper posture and swing mechanics, simple warm-up and cool down exercises can go a long way in the prevention of golf injuries.  Warming up must be an essential part of your golf routine.  Warming up brings blood flow to your muscles, and lengthens the muscles to help prevent them from strain.  Much like cooking pasta, you begin with stiff and breakable noodles out of the box and boil them in water ending with a soft and flexible noodle. 

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By Dr. Jake Simpson

The Healing Power of Low Level Laser Therapy

Washington Park Chiropractic is excited to add yet another high quality treatment technique to complement our top notch care.  Theorized by Albert Einstein in 1917 and invented in 1960, lasers have proven their worth from compact disc players, to measuring the distance from the Earth to the Moon and now… healing the human body.  More and more doctors and researchers around the world have realized that therapeutic doses of laser light can have profound results in the treatment of a wide range conditions from slow healing skin ulcers to arthritis and other musculoskeletal conditions.  Dr. Jake Simpson utilizes the impressive Microlight ML830 laser which was the first low-level laser to be FDA approved after researchers conducted a double blind study at General Motors and Baylor college of Medicine in the treatment of Carpal Tunnel Syndrome. 

What is Laser Therapy?

LLLT (Low level laser therapy) is a painless, sterile, non-invasive, drug-free treatment which is used for a variety of pain syndromes, injuries, wounds, fractures, neurological conditions and pathologies.  LLLT is the application of low levels of laser light to an area of the body that has been injured.  This is not the same as high powered lasers utilized in other medical procedures that cut tissue, remove hair. 

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