A sedentary lifestyle has recently been coined the new smoking.
Can you imagine! The negative effects of sitting for a living are now rivalling the known health dangers of regularly inhaling deadly poisons! Wow. Let’s do something about it!
Yes, many of us have jobs that require us to sit long hours at a computer, driving, sitting in meetings, sitting at our desk, or sitting on the subway or train.
Let’s take a few minutes every hour or two, to move, stretch, and get our blood flowing. It will not only help your body feel better, but your mind will also reap the benefits of added oxygen flow and feel the joy of movement and stretching!
It is important to be mindful of your posture while at your desk or sitting in various positions. Try to sit up as straight as possible, and don’t lean in toward your computer.
If you are straining to see your monitor, make the font larger or reposition it, as the very last thing to want to be doing is tilting your neck forward to see your screen.
Over time, this can cause your neck to begin to curve forward and create a ‘forward head posture’. This is incredibly problematic for your body because your brain must be able to send all of the information your body needs to be able to function through your central nervous system. If your bones in your neck have shifted forward out of alignment from straining to see your screen, it puts an immense amount of pressure on your nervous system (which is encased by your spinal bones) and makes it very difficult for the information to get to all of the places it must reach to have your body function and heal at 100%.
Focus on stretching your neck and back muscles, arms, shoulders and legs when you take a few moments regularly to move that body! Get your coworkers involved, as they are in the same position as you – hunched over your screen for hours on end!
Stretch your arms and shoulders.Can you do this? Can you balance a book on your head and continue working? This will help to train you to sit up straight and correct your posture.Stretch! Move your arms, reach for the ceiling and feel your blood circulating.Arch your back and stretch your arms up, reach your neck back and up and hold for 10 seconds.Stretch your arms and use your chair to rest on, extend your legs and feel a stretch.Stretch your arms out and forward, and let your arms reach back to stretch your shoulders and expand your chest with your breath.Move your body side to side and let your spine move freely and stretch.Stretch your legs and hamstrings with the support of your desk and feel the blood reach down to your toes.Take a moment to centre your thoughts with a mini meditation over lunch. Focus on your breath and bring your thoughts back to your breath when they flit about to other ideas.Stretch your arms and wrists regularly throughout the day and remember to smile often!
Jo-Anne Richardson has almost a decade of experience managing a chiropractic office and educating patients on how chiropractic can allow your body to express optimal health. She is a Registered Holistic Nutritionist and holds a Degree in Communications. She loves to experiment with raw vegan recipes, loves to salsa dance, travel and learn new holistic health information to share tips with everyone who visits the office.
Over 80% of the population experiences significant back or neck pain at some point in their lives. In fact, it is the second highest reason for missed work days right behind the common cold and flu.
With back and neck pain at such epidemic levels, sadly, traditional medicine still has dismal success rates with treating the more difficult cases. Many patients have been through the gauntlet of medical and alternative therapies and have still not found a lasting solution.
If you are in this position, you are definitely not alone. The problem though is not medicine itself. It is the fact that the majority of back and neck pain has a physical cause. It requires the appropriately applied physical solution.
Mechanics of Back Pain
Through injury, and as the spine begins to age, some people begin to lose space between the spinal bones. This creates damaging pressure on the discs, joints, bones, nerves and other associated structures. This pressure creates swelling or “inflammation.”
Research is showing that the presence of this inflammation is the number one predictor of pain. If pressure and inflammation are the major reasons for pain, then the solution must focus on these factors. The logical solution becomes employing effective methods of directly removing the damaging pressure (or cause of inflammation) and directly removing the inflammation itself by enhancing circulation or flushing out of the affected area.
Focus On The Cause
There was no solution that focused on both causes of pain present in difficult back and neck pain patients, so at Spine Advanced, we set out to create it by concentrating on the cause.
This solution would combine Non-Surgical Spinal Decompression to reduce the physical pressure on the damaged structures and Class 4 Laser Therapy to increase circulation, clearing inflammation and reducing pain.
This simultaneous combination of therapies perfectly addresses both major components of back and neck pain systematically. It reduces both pressure and inflammation while stimulating healing. The Spine Specialist Laser Assisted Spinal Restoration (L.A.S.R.) system was born.
Technology is Progress
Technology is greatly enhancing doctors’ capabilities in every field of medicine. This is great news and it bears in mind that doctors must work hard to keep up with advancements to offer the best care available.
For you as a patient, it also means you have many more solutions for your pain than ever before. New treatment technologies are changing the face of healthcare and even evolving in their own spaces. The lasers of 10 years ago are obsolete technology in comparison to those released in the last 3 years. In the tech heavy world we live in it isn’t surprising that advancement moves so fast.
If you feel like you’ve tried everything for your pain look towards embracing new treatment technologies and seek out doctors that offer these advancements. From laser therapy to spinal decompression to the perfect combination of both on The Spine Specialist L.A.S.R. system, technology offers a solution for many patients that thought they just might have to live with their pain. Seek out treatment technology and NO PAIN WILL BE YOUR GAIN.
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Blog by Guest Author: Dr. Mark Jagger, (H) B.A.(Kin),DC
CEO Spine Advanced
Creator of the Spine Specialist
“Dr. Mark Jagger is a leader in medical therapeutic technology innovation. He is the CEO of Spine Advanced Inc., the manufacturer of the world’s first and only patented treatment device combining automated laser and spinal decompression, The Spine Specialist LASR Treatment Table. Dr. Jagger is also the active Clinical Director of Spine Advanced Clinical Headquarters in Mississauga, Ontario. He has a passion for achieving the best possible patient outcomes and a special interest in work with difficult spinal conditions previously non-responsive to other therapies. He is the founder of Laser Enhanced Spinal Decompression (L.E.S.D.), Laser Assisted Spinal Restoration (L.A.S.R.), and Laser Assisted Meniscal Decompression (L.A.M.D.); therapies aimed at enhancing patient results through the unique combination of technologically advanced treatment methods. He received his Bachelors Degree in Kinesiology and Health Science from York University in 1998 and his Doctor of Chiropractic degree from New York Chiropractic College in 2002. In addition to his medical device design endeavors, he has been in private practice since 2002 managing multiple clinical facilities and treating thousands of patients per year.”
Jo-Anne Richardson has almost a decade of experience managing a chiropractic office and educating patients on how chiropractic can allow your body to express optimal health. She is a Registered Holistic Nutritionist and holds a Degree in Communications. She loves to experiment with raw vegan recipes, loves to salsa dance, travel and learn new holistic health information to share tips with everyone who visits the office.
Have you ever been adjusted? Or are you terrified of going to a chiropractor because they will make you go forever?
Here, we’re going to break down what chiropractic is, how it can help your body, why you would go in the first place and if there are any legitimate reasons for going ‘forever’.
Let’s start off by explaining what the whole point of chiropractic is.
Your nervous system consists of your brain and spinal cord, which is protected by the bones of your spine. All of the messages that your brain must send to the rest of your body travels through your central nervous system and out to every single cell, tissue and organ in your body to tell it how to function properly and how to heal.
If there are any bones in your spine that have shifted out of position, from injuries, car accidents, falls, sports, stress, sitting on the couch, leaning forward to look at your computer monitor, and any other daily activity that we participate in, the bones put pressure on your nervous system and the messages can’t reach their final destinations to have your body function and heal at 100%.
A chiropractor locates these interferences and adjusts the bones back into place.
So I have to ask you, for how long would you like your nervous system to be free of interference?
Long enough to get you out of pain?
Long enough to allow your body to heal from the flu?
Long enough to prevent cancer, a heart attack, digestive dysfunction?
Or long enough to keep you living a healthy, thriving life through your retirement years?
So you can go to the chiropractor for as long as you’d like to express optimal health. The choice is yours.
[I’m not sure about you, but I’d like my nervous system functioning at 100% forever, so I have a standing appointment with my chiropractor. And I go more often if I ever get sick or run down, to support my nervous system and allow it to help me heal more efficiently and much more quickly.]
But I also have to ask you, how long are you going to brush your teeth for? For as long as you’d like to keep your teeth, right?
You must care for your body or your body begins to degenerate. Your teeth will rot and fall out if you don’t brush them, floss them, visit your dental hygienist for a deep cleaning and get checked by your dentist.
Thankfully our teeth are visible and easily accessible for maintenance.
But our spines are hidden, both on the back side of our body so it’s a little bit ‘out of mind’ but also on the inside of our bodies, where we can’t actually see the bones. This is why it is so important to find a local chiropractor that you are comfortable with and trust, to care for your most important health asset.
Remember, your body can go weeks without eating, days without water, but it can not function for even 1 second without your nervous system. So take care of it… forever!!
Jo-Anne Richardson has almost a decade of experience managing a chiropractic office and educating patients on how chiropractic can allow your body to express optimal health. She is a Registered Holistic Nutritionist and holds a Degree in Communications. She loves to experiment with raw vegan recipes, loves to salsa dance, travel and learn new holistic health information to share tips with everyone who visits the office.
Blog by Guest Author: Dr. Mark Jagger, (H) B.A.(Kin),DC