FAQ's History

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1. What is chiropractic?
2. What is a subluxation?
3. What is an adjustment?
4. Does it hurt to get adjusted?
5. Is chiropractic care safe?
6. Do my children need chiropractic care?
7. What causes the sound made during a chiropractic adjustment?
8. Is it bad to "crack" your back or neck a lot?
9. Once you see a chiropractor, do you have to go for the rest of your life?
10. Should I continue chiropractic care if I don't have any symptoms and I feel better?





1. What is chiropractic?
Chiropractic is the science, art & philosophy of locating & correcting vertebral subluxations through gentle, specific chiropractic adjustments thus allowing your body to function at its optimum potential.  <back to top>

2. What is a subluxation?
Subluxation is a misalignment of one or more of your spinal bones (vertebrae) which causes interference to your nervous system. If your nervous system is interfered with, your body's natural ability to heal itself & function at its optimum potential becomes impaired. A subluxation is an example of how structure affects function.  <back to top>

3. What is an adjustment?
A gentle, specific "thrust" delivered by hand or instrument. The purpose of the adjustment is to correct your spinal subluxation(s) thus removing the nerve interference in your body.  <back to top>

4. Does it hurt to get adjusted?
No. Chiropractic adjustments feel great. I am confident that once you begin receiving your adjustments, you will begin to look forward to them. They will become one of the highlights of your week. When you allow the vertebrae in your spine to return to their proper position, you will notice much less stress and tension.  <back to top>

5. Is chiropractic care safe?
Yes. Statistics prove that chiropractic care is one of the safest types of healthcare in the world. You only need to compare the malpractice premiums paid by chiropractors to those paid by medical doctors. Doctors of Chiropractic pay only a small fraction (approx. 1/20) of the price medical doctors pay in malpractice premiums. 250,000 people will die this year as a result of bad medicine, making this the third leading cause of death in the United States of America (The Journal of The American Medical Association, JAMA; Vol.284, July 26, 2000). Of the millions of people receiving chiropractic adjustments each year, only a handful will even make a complaint.  <back to top>

6. Do my children need chiropractic care?
The birth process is often the cause of your child's first subluxation. A very soft and undeveloped spine of an infant can suffer trauma during delivery. It is estimated that as much as 80 lbs of pulling pressure can be exerted to remove a baby from the birth canal. Then, as children grow up and become more adventurous, the number of injuries to their spines can become countless - the repeated falls as children learn to walk, the running, jumping, twisting, bumping and falling all over the place while playing in the yard or on an athletic field will often cause your child to become subluxated. However, children often do not show any signs or symptoms of being subluxated until later on in life as the results of continued subluxation show up in their growth and health. Chiropractic care offers your child a more responsive body, a more balanced flow of energy and overall increased performance as she/he passes through their windows of development.  <back to top>

7. What causes the sound made during a chiropractic adjustment?
That sound is not your spine "cracking" or "popping" as most people believe. The sound is created by gas (in this case, nitrogen) rushing in to fill the partial vacuum created when the joints are slightly separated. Another example of this phenomenon would be the "pop" sound you hear when the cork is taken out of a champagne bottle. Not all chiropractic adjusting techniques produce this noise. In fact, some adjusting techniques use little force and produce no noise at all.  <back to top>

8. Is it bad to "crack" your back or neck a lot?
This question is frequently asked because people associate the "cracking" or "popping" of one's back or neck with a chiropractic adjustment. The two are not the same thing. If a person has a desire to "crack" his/her neck or back, it is often because one area of their spine is fixated or jammed causing another area to move too much and "pop", sometimes by itself. It's the fixated or jammed area that needs to be properly adjusted by a chiropractor so the other parts of the spine will not be hypermobile and noisy. When you "crack" your back you may be relieving the tension for a little while. Do you notice how it keeps coming back? That is because you are not giving yourself a specific chiropractic adjustment. The cause of the spinal tension, the fixated or jammed (subluxated) vertebrae, has not been corrected. Any person who makes a habit out of "cracking" or "popping" their back or neck needs to go to a Doctor of Chiropractic to have their spine checked. Even chiropractors cannot adjust themselves and need to have the help of a fellow Doctor of Chiropractic to properly align their spinal column. 
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9. Once you see a chiropractor, do you have to go for the rest of your life?
No. The extent to which you choose to benefit from your chiropractic care is ultimately up to you. Each person is solely responsible for the quality of their own health & well-being. However, we do strongly urge all of our patients to consider lifetime, wellness chiropractic care. This is where the long-term, lasting benefits of care are enjoyed. Regular exercise & healthy eating habits are a lifestyle decision and so is lifetime, wellness chiropractic care. You need to remain subluxation-free for life.  <back to top>

10. Should I continue chiropractic care if I don't have any symptoms and I feel better?
Yes. Your subluxations are not necessarily corrected just because your symptoms have disappeared. Most of the patients seen in our office have spinal degeneration (decay) which has taken years to develop. The trauma of the birth process, slips, falls, accidents and countless other stresses over the course of your lifetime adversely affect the health of your spine. The longer you wait to have your spine checked by a chiropractor, the longer it will take to correct your subluxations. However, how you choose to use chiropractic care is ultimately up to you. It has been our experience that those who stop care when they are "feeling fine" return later with the same health problems that brought them to our office in the first place...only the problem has usually gotten worse. On the other hand, patients who commit to long-term, wellness chiropractic care find their health problems rarely return and as a result, they are able to enjoy a higher quality of life & health.  <back to top>

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