Why is solving your painful problem so complicated? Did you wake up with neck or back pain? Did you bend over or twist suddenly and experience back pain or a back tweak? Did you develop hip pain over time and then start to limp without knowing why? Did your feet and ankles begin to ache over time without any accidents or injuries? Did you develop a stabbing pain in the shoulder after reaching for something? Are your hands going numb at night and you don’t know why? Do your knees crack and ache, especially when climbing stairs? When problems such as these do not self-resolve, patients in need call their doctors for help. The good news is that many of these complaints are not life-threatening, but may affect your daily activities and affect your sleep, and social life. Are you seeing the right doctor for the problem or will your doctor send you from specialist to specialist with medication being the first protocol to see if it relieves the pain? Often this includes a muscle relaxer, a pain medication, and as one patient recently experienced, a prescription for Oxicontin which is highly addictive. Your visit first can determine your experience and efficiency in resolving your problem. Medically, you can expect an evaluation of the painful part(s), a prescription, and a referral to someone who will further evaluate the painful area and may send you for protocoled therapy to the painful area. You may also be waiting for advanced imaging if this does not work. Often, this approach fails to solve painful problems as time will create chronicity, compensations, and a more complicated condition to treat. Chiropractic, you can expect the doctor to take a full history including your past physical problems. The doctor will then check your blood pressure and perform a thorough evaluation of how you move, the painful part, and how you function. In our office, we will show the patient what we see and explain things as we go along. Once the evaluation is completed, treatment commences to try to relieve the pain in as little as one visit. Who should you see first, a medical provider or your local chiropractor? While it may seem logical to evaluate the area of complaint, the truth is the cause of your pain may be in another part of the body. A frozen shoulder is typically a lower back problem affecting the upper body and years later, causing a frozen shoulder. Elbow pain may also be a lower back issue. Lower back pain is often caused by a malfunction in the upper back. You get the idea. Often the reason you hurt requires we evaluate you holistically (thoroughly) and take a holistic history. Most painful problems are due to movement issues that often begin from the ground up. You cannot fix a mechanical problem with medication and often therapies directed at the symptom result in poor results, high costs, and chronic problems. Chiropractors are doctors of movement and understand how the musculoskeletal system functions and works. The logical choice is to choose chiropractic first. Doctors of chiropractic will refer you to the appropriate medical provider if necessary. The good news is most people benefit from chiropractic care while avoiding unnecessary medications, imaging, referrals, and stress. The other good news is that by finding the cause behind your pain and resolving or improving it, three or four chronic problems are likely to improve as well. For example, your lower back problem is likely the same reason for your knee, neck, foot, and shoulder pain. Early intervention can make a difference for years to come in how you feel and function in your later years. Do you need help today? Book online now.