If you’ve looked into chiropractic care in the past, there’s a good chance you’ve done so seeking treatment for back pain or neck pain. It’s fair to think of chiropractors as back pain specialists, since chiropractic places quite a bit of emphasis on the spine and surrounding soft tissues. But a chiropractic treatment plan can actually address far more than musculoskeletal pain. That’s because the spine is also the site of the central nervous system, and pressure on the nerves caused by alignment problems in the spine can lead to a whole host of problems. Here are three things you probably had no idea chiropractors could treat:
- Allergies
If all the beautiful plants of summer are causing you misery because of seasonal allergies, you may be able to get some relief from at your local chiropractor’s office. That’s because improving communication between your brain and nutrient supplies in your body — which improving overall spinal health can do — can help your body to better regulate itself so you’re not as reliant on drugs such as antihistamines to control your symptoms.
- High Blood Pressure
Several studies have showed that adjustments to the vertebrae at the top of the neck can result in lowered blood pressure for patients with hypertension. The medical reasoning behind this is complicated (and, for some, controversial), but those results have held true even in placebo-controlled studies — meaning that even though all the patients in a trial thought they had received a chiropractic adjustment, only the ones who really did get a chiropractic treatment saw a drop in their blood pressure.
- Fatigue
All the energy throughout your body is governed by the central nervous system; impulses are sent out from the brain, down the spinal cord and through a branching network of nerves. But when the nerves get pinched in the spinal column, those energy impulses are blocked, causing both mental and physical fatigue. So correcting these pinched nerves by realigning the vertebrae can result in reduced fatigue.
Did you know that chiropractors could treat complaints such as allergies? Join the discussion in the comments.
