Often I am asked is there a stress on my spine and nervous system how come I don’t feel it? The answer to that is because only approximately 10% of the nerve fibers in your body are designed for the perception of pain. But that does not make it any less easy in understanding what type of self-care or self check one can do to learn a little bit more about the nature of the stress on one’s spine and nervous system. 

When I was in chiropractic school we used to joke about the idea saying “Wouldn’t it be great if there was a button or an indicator on one’s forehead that said tilt” to alert a person when they look in the mirror in the morning that they have spinal tension or what we call vertebral subluxation. What we need is some form of telemetry, an indicator to us on the outside of what’s happening on the inside. We do have scanning technology in our office called the Insight millennium which does assess the spine and nervous system for various forms of stress that can result in ill health. However that is not something one can use at home or when out of the office. There are certain forms of biofeedback to use so one can evaluate their spine to look at a few specific markers. I went over that on a previous blog called the DIY Spinal Exam

Think about it, if there was a spaceship that NASA was sending into space it would have mechanisms of assessing on the ground. I’m sure that NASCAR has the same thing for their cars to make sure they are functioning properly. It is impractical to have something like that so I said fine that would be hooked up to one’s body as there are to machines.

So the short of it is that you should look at your range of motion. Turn your head left and right, laterally flex your head left and right, and flex your head forward and back. If you feel any stress or discomfort even slight tension on one side versus the other you may be in need of a spinal evaluation. This really mean that you will need to be adjusted. However it is one component to evaluation that we might do and if you do feel discomfort I would urge you to have your spine checked by a license chiropractor.

In fact if you want to help friend or family member you can do this assessment with them where you can visually see possibly the deficiency movement. This also can be done for the low back by bending forward, backwards, and side to side.

If you have any questions on how to do this please feel free to respond to this blog or to contact me directly at 610-935-5900.