An important message from docMIKE: “Get healthy and stay healthy! Your life depends on it.” The world changed when we suffered the COVID-19 pandemic. Until that time, our role as chiropractors was to help get people out of pain and disability and improve everyone’s abilities, all the way up to improving an Olympic athlete’s peak performance. We helped OFWs who suffered back injuries to stay on the job to support their families. We helped everyday professionals, business people, and community leaders have a greater impact on their ability to improve their performance as individuals and how they contribute to the economy and well-being of the nation. We helped moms and dads stay healthy and active while raising the children, and we helped reduce the pains suffered by Lolo and Lola (grandparents) to keep them active and less of a burden on their families.
We still perform very well in all these areas, but now we have added the URGENCY to help our communities to GET HEALTHY AND STAY HEALTHY.
Let me explain… We carefully studied the virus infection experience and came to a powerful conclusion. Only sick people died from the virus. Our chiropractors and staff were never affected. We remained 100% Covid-19 free as did almost all of our patients. Even more importantly, none of our patients died. You see when a healthy person is infected with a virus, they come down with most of the typical symptoms, but their experience is different. They got well and in record time. Except for the fear caused by the lockdown and quarantine, these healthy individuals could have just stayed on the job once they were self-quarantined and had self-healed from that flu. Of course, during high-risk seasons, we need to be extra mindful of washing our hands more often and applying responsible social distance practices. Those that can work at home have that added safety feature. But when all is said and done… the most responsible thing we can all do, as citizens of this world, is to stay healthy.
Chiropractors are trained in healthy lifestyle habits and preventive care, in helping our sicker patients restore their health naturally, so they no longer need to take medicines in most cases. You see, the result of proper chiropractic care is a healthy person; of course also out of pain, as that is commonly what originally brings someone to see a chiropractor in the first place. Imagine, that before this article, you had no idea how valuable chiropractic health care was to your community, to your family, and to you personally. Imagine that!
Before our lives were turned upside down by the pandemic experience, we more-or-less left it up to the individual patient if they were to continue restoring their health once we helped them get out of pain and rehabilitated their spine. We can no longer just settle for a good job, a job well done, and let our patients finish care and not properly address the risks of not fully regaining their health. Certainly not in today’s world.
We all understand the statement that “an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure” In the past that was a cute saying and it made sense, but many would rather hold onto their unhealthy habits and just let time slowly put them in the grave, but today the risks of being unhealthy and becoming sickly have greater consequences in today’s world. We can no longer just accept that statement as a platitude, and we need to take it seriously. The post-pandemic world will not be returning to normal as it was before, and it leaves us with an uncertain and undetermined future. You cannot rely on your medical doctor to save you here. Viruses mutate all the time. By the time a vaccine is made available, the virus has already mutated and you are still exposed to the same or similar threat. The only way to best prepare yourself for future virus seasons is to get healthy and stay healthy.
There are 5 main types of problems chiropractors are best known to help with:
Type 1. A new and recent pain from an injury overexertion or postural fatigue. In this case, we examine and find there are little to no complications. The care is completed in a matter of a few weeks of intense care.
Type 2. A new and recent injury from accidents, from work, recreation, or travel and we find there are several complications that will require longer healing time. The care is completed in a matter of a few months starting more intense and gradually spreading apart the sessions.
Type 3. Aggravated pain from earlier problems makes things intolerable now, so we help to assess the current and former aspects of the chronic condition. That care is generally completed in 3-6 months. Included in this group are those with longstanding medical problems and it is determined that an unhealthy spine and nerves are part of the underlying cause and chiropractic care of this level is required and very successful in helping to stop further progress or a reversing the condition. This patient population is the group at greater risk should another pandemic event take place.
Type 4. Conservative, non-surgical care when surgery is recommended, and a second opinion allows the patient to forgo the surgery or undertake a conservative plan of care with a high possibility of avoiding surgery.
Type 5. Asymptomatic and relatively healthy people come for preventive health because they have already been doing most of the right things and few of the wrong things. They have good health, but they want to be even better. They see us as supporting their goal to live a long and full life, healthy and vibrant. (Wow!… Shouldn’t we all want that?) Many of these individuals first came to us for one of the other 4 reasons.
It is encouraging to hear about such health-minded people and hopefully, it inspires others to do the same. The things in life that are necessary and worth doing are worth doing well. Unfortunately, too many people make short-term decisions and suffer greatly in the long run, with either a return of their problems or a premature departure from this life due to sickness. Chiropractic is an Art and a Science of natural healing. That means that nature is in charge of the healing. As specialists based on science, we know how nature heals and we make the right recommendations for your chiropractic care to help you reach your optimal health goals. That is our job! Your job is to follow everything that is included in your recommended care plan.
There are real consequences to deal with I will explain straight to the point as we look at different realities:
- We expect that you will start your care and carry through as prescribed. Only good consequences here.
- So, what happens if you start caring and then stop halfway when you decide it is too much trouble to continue (for whatever reason you tell yourself)? It is like pushing a cart uphill and stopping halfway, gravity will bring the cart right back to where you started.
- Or, imagine that you will stop care as soon as you are feeling better (since pain is the last thing to come and the first thing to go away) and you never consider the need to get healthy and stay healthy. No need to tell you there are many consequences here.
- Even worse is that you will not even start the care. In this situation, there is zero improvement and life goes on, with nature handicapped and struggling as it is, still unable to restore itself without the needed help. That leaves you at the mercy of medical options to settle for relief, temporary as that is. Think about rust or termites, when that settles into your property, there is no gain to ignore it and the damage can only get worse. Imagine just painting over rust (masking the pain with drugs or alcohol) and repeating that every time the rust breaks through again and again.
I wrote a blog years ago about procrastination and otherwise making poor choices. It starts with my quote: “My problems are the result of doing too many of the wrong things, and not enough of the right things.” Think about that statement, deeply.
Take for example smoking. Why would someone who has already been warned of the risks of sickness, disease followed by a painful and premature death keep smoking, keep doing it? 50% of the Philippines population is now at risk of Type 2 Diabetes, where after years of medical management and more years of going through the daily trouble of managing blood sugar with insulin, we can look forward to Dialysis 3-6 days a week and death within 2 years after that. We all know what causes Type 2 Diabetes… it is the combination of too little physical activity and a very wrong diet. But people are deceived that they can just take medicine and live life as they always did. Wrong! So why? Why do we do it? Psychologists have figured out this human weakness. When we do something we know is unhealthy we check our bodies and conclude that there were no immediate consequences; so, we think we got away with it. The reality has not hit them in the moment. The real debilitating problems of the future are not brought into the present reality.
What I am obligated to say to you, here and now, is that you are being advised that there are risks of not starting or completing your chiropractic care as prescribed. It is your decision, but we must inform you of the truth. One truth is that there are side effects while you undergo chiropractic care. Some days you will feel stiff or sore for a day or two after an adjustment. That is soft tissue being remolded and regenerating. Others may occasionally experience mild headaches in the early management of a neck problem. Restructuring the soft tissues of the neck may cause that; but again, self-resolving in a day or so. Then, in rare cases of aggravated lower back, this can occur if a patient does not relax during the adjustment and the resistance pulls a muscle. The most consistent side effects of chiropractic care are – pain relief, better posture, and a sense of well-being; side effects of better mobility, fewer restrictions, and good nights’ sleep.
In the end, we are confident that you are as interested in restoring and maintaining your health as we are. God Bless!
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