East End Chiropractic

I’m referencing a study that goes back to 1994 in the New England Journal of Medicine.

The group conducting this study concluded that taking 1,000 acetaminophen tablets/capsules/caplets in a lifetime can Double your chances of end-stage renal (kidney) failure!

1) I don’t know if this study has been reproduced in any way in the past 10 years . . .

2) The methods of these statistical studies can always be debated . . .

BUT . . .

1) It makes me a little concerned about my own renal health (I lived with chronic back pain for about 7 years before going to a chiropractor)

2) If this is true, a LOT of people are in trouble.

3) It was published in the New England Journal of Medicine, which is considered a pretty reputable source.

It takes less than two years of regular use to reach 1,000 pills.  If you suffer from chronic back pain, neck pain, or headaches you should seriously consider chiropractic.  It has been proven to be much more effective than pain-killers over and over again in very reputable literature. You owe it to yourself (and your kidneys).

A 2009 study published in the journal Neurology concludes that people who consume the highest amounts of __________________ increase their risk of dementia (including Alzheimer’s) by 66 %.

A.  NSAIDS (Nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs) such as Tylenol, Advil, and Naprosyn

B.  Paint Chips

C.  Vitamin C

D.  “Water pills”

The answer is A, NSAIDS.  Eating lead paint chips is associated with dementia as well, but that’s old news.  A 66% increase in dementia risk associated with pain medication use is HUGE!  It should have been a top story on the major news networks and in all of the big newspapers and syndicated news sources!!

Chiropractic physicians offer drug-free options for restoring function and reducing back, neck, and joint pain plus many types of headaches.  It is a great way to reduce pain medication consumption, and thus, not leave you as vulnerable to developing dementia!

According to a 1999 study published in the New England Journal of Medicine, How many people will die in the next year   as a result of taking NSAIDS (Tylenol, Advil, Motrin, Aleve, Mobic, Celebrex, and others)?

A.  4oo

B. 9,000

C. 16,500

D.  245,000

The answer is C, 16,500.  And that’s just deaths.  Over 100,000 hospitalizations will occur as a result of NSAID use.

Here’s the point.  Chiropractic has a very good track record of safety.  As with any other intervention, there are risks of injury associated with chiropractic treatment.  It is very rare, though. (Less than one death per year)  In fact, premiums for chiropractic malpractice insurance are only a fraction of the cost of premiums for medical malpractice insurance.  Simply stated, Chiropractic just doesn’t harm that many people.

From time to time, I hear the words “I (or my husband or wife or ‘doctor’) don’t believe in chiropractic.”  Or, I “I believe in” chiropractic (or swear by it, or whatever).  I’m not too crazy about that phrase either.

Here’s the good news:  It exists, whether you “believe in it” or not!  More good news:  a chiropractor can help most people at some point in their lives, whether they believe it or not!

There is now plenty of evidence in the medical literature (not just the chiropractic literature) that what we do is safe, effective, and cost effective for back pain, neck pain, and headaches.  Some of these studies suggest that it is the MOST effective way of treating these conditions (with exceptions, of course).

To simply discount chiropractic because you “don’t believe” in it is simply an uninformed decision, and in some cases, a sure sign of insecurity.

Here’s a multiple-choice question for you.

What do these things have in common?:

A runny nose, fever, diarrhea, coughing, sneezing, vomiting, pain, and inflammation (swelling).

A.  They are all physical abnormalities

B.  They are all normal responses to things that irritate the body

C.  The lack of these means that one is healthy

D.  (Insert your own ridiculous wrong answer here)

The answer is B.  These are perfectly healthy responses to things that irritate the body.

Coughs and runny noses help to get rid of germs and foreign particles that enter our airways. Diarrhea and vomiting help the body to rid itself of germs or other foreign things that enter the digestive system.  Fever indicates that your body is working pretty hard to rid itself of certain germs. Pain warns you that there is a problem somewhere in the body.  Inflammation forms a natural barrier to stop the spread of an infection and in some cases forms a natural “splint” for injured ligaments, bones, or muscles.

Health people experience these things.  In fact, if your body is not able to do these things, that’s when there is a huge problem at hand!  How long would you last without the ability to feel pain?  What if you couldn’t cough/sneeze and you encountered a really dusty dirt road?

The key is to ask WHY you have these symptoms, and not to just automatically counteract them with with a drug.  I’m not totally against symptomatic pain relief.  When I had a kidney stone 3 years ago, an IV dose of morphine was a very welcomed thing.  However, the morphine did not get rid of the kidney stone (nor should I have expected it to). It simply made life livable until I could get rid of the stone.

Some of the treatments we perform in our office are aimed directly at reducing pain, particularly in the back and joints.  The goal of chiropractic, though, is to restore proper function to the back, neck, and joints.  By doing this, the pain just tends to go away without needing to rely on pain-relieving drugs to make life livable.

Often, a patient will call me a “miracle worker.”  I usually reply with the standard “I’m so glad that I’ve been able to help . . . and so on.”

Here’s the thing, though.  I’m not a magician.  I’m not a “faith-healer.” I don’t stick pins in a doll.  There is really nothing I do that could be considered a “miracle cure.”

Here’s what I do.  Like any other doctor, I examine the patient — an exam in my office consists mostly of orthopedic, neurologic, and palpation testing (using my hands to detect abnormal joint motion, swelling, misalignment, etc).  Sometimes I send patients for an X-ray or MRI study.

If the patient has a condition I think I can help, I present a treatment plan.  Every treatment modality in my office has a standard code that is recognized by other practitioners (MDs, DOs, PTs, etc) as well as insurance companies (insurance companies would never pay for a “miracle cure” — they scrutinize every type of procedure to the nth degree before they will ever agree to cover it).

If the patient accepts my treatment plan, they usually get really good results (usually very quickly).  This is where I am often accused of being a miracle worker.  They are just so amazed that I can help them without drugs or surgery.

Most people think that the only “real” solutions to medical problems are drugs and surgery  (pharmaceutical companies do a great job of keeping this myth alive with their marketing).  Sometimes drugs or surgery are required.  For most back pain, headaches, neck pain, and other spine and joint conditions, drug-free, scalpel-free chiropractic will do just fine.

I don’t perform miracles.  I just do what I was trained to do, and I have some experience under my belt.  Don’t be overly surprised if I can help you too!

Just so you know, we (meaning me and a couple of other trusted people) write everything on this website.  Everything on this website is either written by me or very closely edited by me.

So why would I feel the need to write such a statement?  I get TONS of advertisements from website designers every day that claim to “custom-build” a website just for me.  What that means is that they have already built a website that is utterly stuffed with information (most of it is junk, or worse!!) and they want me to pay them lots of cash so that my practice will be the ONLY practice (in my zip code) to have such a top-notch, professional website, “guaranteed to drive patients to [my] door.”

I think that’s pretty bogus, and I challenge all of the other D.C.s out there to write their own content as well!  In latin, “doctor” means “teacher,” so LIVE UP to your degree!!

It’s important that I say this because my website will change within the next couple of months. I am working with two wonderful LOCAL companies to create a fresh, updated, and great-looking website for East End Chiropractic.  Those companies are Harkins Creative, and Blue Kite Marketing.  I just want to say before this new website goes live, that I will still write, or at least edit (they are better with words than I, so mostly edit),  all of the content of this site!  Even though it will look great, and have lots of great features, it will be unique!  It will still be a CUSTOM website in every sense of the term. It will neither be canned, nor will it be for sale!

John P. Olsen, D.C.

This is one I hear all of the time . . . “My lower back stays sore most of the time, but it’s just age.  I’m getting old.”  Here’s the funny part:  I hear this from people in their 30’s, 40’s, 50’s, 60’s, 70’s, 80’s, and 90’s!!  In my opinion, the only people who have the RIGHT to use this excuse are the ones in their 80’s and 90’s!  If you’re 40, your neck isn’t tight because you’re OLD!  So STOP IT!! That is not a viable excuse!  Or my favorite: “My left hip is sore, and it doesn’t let me take big steps anymore . . . there’s nothing you can do about it, though, doc.  I’m just getting old.”  I love it when people say this, because I get to be a smart-alec and say “So what you’re telling me is that you left hip is older than your right hip?”  If it was because of age, shouldn’t BOTH hips hurt?

In most cases, joints are stiff and painful because of mechanical problems in the musculo-skeletal system!*  As a chiropractor, I re-condition the mechanics of the spine and joints, thus reducing the pain and improving function.  If you want to go around thinking that you’re just old, that’s your choice.  It probably doesn’t have to be that way, though.

* Not all cases of joint pain and stiffness are a result of mechanical problems.  I perform a thorough physical examination on each new complaint to rule out other causes such as problems with the heart, kidneys, or gallbladder, aneurysms, and tumors, just to name a few.

We really enjoyed meeting everyone at the Tomato Art Fest this year. Thanks for coming to see us.

A new patient came in to the office today after reading my blog.  Not having insurance, he was a bit concerned about how much it would cost to be treated in our clinic.  This is always a difficult question to answer because it depends on many factors, including the overall health of the patient, the severity of the condition, and so on.

As with every new patient, the first thing I did is a consultation, where I talk with the patient and get an initial idea of what’s going on. (We never charge for this, by the way, even if you have the best insurance plan available) During this consultation, the patient related to me that he had been to a medical clinic where they did x-rays.  The x-rays showed “nothing,” (there’s a reason why nothing is in quotations — that discussion is destined to be the next blog) and the doctor wanted to do an MRI. If you don’t have insurance, an MRI of the lumbar spine is at least $1,000!

Obviously, my patient was concerned that I might want to send him for an MRI also.

After examining the patient, I found that his condition was significant, but definitely not so advanced that I would need an MRI scan to figure out what the problem was! I see cases just like his and much worse, as a matter of fact, and I can usually help them with out the aid of an EXPENSIVE MRI scan!!

Then I got to thinking . . . for the average patient in my office, the ENTIRE cost of their treatment plan is less expensive than one MRI scan!!  A few plans are more, but most are even LESS!!  And also, you must bear in mind that AN MRI DOES ABSOLUTELY NOTHING as far as getting you better.  It’s just a picture which, more times than not, doesn’t show what’s going on any better than my bare hands or a plain, old fashioned, cheap x-ray! I know that’s hard to believe, but recent studies show that MRI findings correlate directly with pain findings only 5 – 10% of the time!

Ok, occasionally I send someone for an MRI.  But truthfully, it’s very, very rare.  When I send a patient for an MRI, it means that  1) After the patient’s initial examination, I think they may have a condition that may require surgery or other medical intervention that is not provided in our clinic,  or 2) they are not responding to our treatment, and I’m truly worried that there is something potentially dangerous going on.  For those cases, I’m very thankful for MRI technology.

So, here’s the take-home message:  Most primary care providers aren’t that great at diagnosing and treating most spine and joint problems.  Don’t get me wrong, I love primary care providers.  I even married one!!  If you are a diabetic with a new burning sensation in your foot, or you have severe hypertension, PLEASE don’t call my office!  That’s not my area of expertise!  But, if your back or neck keeps bothering you, or you keep having headaches (most of those are related to the neck — I’ll tell you if they’re not) . . . CALL ME!!  Or, if you prefer, you can go to your PCP, PAY FOR AN MRI, try some pharmaceutical treatment which rarely works, and THEN call my office!!