Getting Chiropractic Care After A Car Accident
Posted on: 4 August 2016
Even if you are in a minor car accident, you can be left with musculoskeletal pain and muscle stiffness to contend with. Here are some benefits of seeing a chiropractor for your injuries.
Catch Deeper Issues
Although you may not feel that any serious injury has occurred, the initial stages of spinal injury can be subtle. One of your spinal vertebrae may have shifted just a small amount, but it can be enough to leave the spine vulnerable. A second impact, no matter how small, might set the vertebrae out of place even further and lead to severe spinal damage.
The chiropractor will do various tests to make sure that your spine is not compromised. They will likely take an x-ray so that they can chart and measure the position of your vertebrae, looking especially closely at the small and fragile neck bones. They can also do manual and visual inspections to make sure that nothing is out of place and that there isn't any hidden pain. The chiropractor will compress your spine in various ways to see if it elicits pain; you may not have any obvious spinal pain until your spine moves in just the right way.
Relax the Muscles
For car accident patients, sometimes what's needed is to relax the muscles and allow them to readjust. Chiropractic massage therapy can be helpful for releasing tension and smoothing out irregularities or discrepancies in tension on each side of the body. The chiropractor may put you on a massage table or they may schedule hands-on massage therapy sessions with you. Neck and back pain relief can also be a major component of these chiropractic sessions.
Massage therapy has the added benefit of helping to ease pain; it can improve your circulation so that pain-relieving chemicals flow through your muscle tissues more easily. Buildup of toxins in the muscles can also lead to pain, and massage therapy helps to get rid of any blockages. Talk to a chiropractor like Crum Joseph M DC about other benefits of chiropractic massage and how it could help heal your injury.
Improving Range of Motion
After your accident, you may notice that your body feels stiffer than normal. Chiropractic care will help to restore your range of motion gradually. The chiropractor will start by taking baseline measurements to see if your reach is within a normal range for uninjured patients. If it is not, they will give you strengthening and stretching exercises to help the muscles loosen. This is especially important if you have any musculoskeletal injuries, such as sprains, that could cause scar tissue to form and affect your mobility.
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