During a bicycle ride, I have plenty of time to think. Sometimes I will have a concern or problem, only to come home with the exact solution. Sometimes I’ll solve a problem within an hour and I’ll use my cell phone to call my answering machine and leave a message. It’s during these epic rides that I might appreciate the landscape, suffer a little to improve my fitness, clear my mind of the world’s stresses…and then I notice it. There’s something on the side of the road that catches my eye. I can only wonder how it got there. You’d never notice these things in a car because you’re going too fast. For fun, I thought I’d share with you (and ask because maybe it’s YOUR fault) what I see. I’m very curious why these things are on the side of the road.
Beer bottles: I would like to know why there are so many beer bottles and cans on the sides of our roads. They’re not on our main streets, they’re on the back roads in Somis, Ventura, Ojai, and the Santa Monica Mountains. I know HOW they got there…people threw them out of their car windows when they were done with them. My bigger concern is that someone was drinking it before they threw it out. I mean, who’s going out and driving and throwing their empty beer cans on the side of these roads?
Wheel balancing metal thingies: You don’t know this, but a number of you are missing those metal things on the front wheels of your cars. I know this because I see them on the ground all the time. Your spine is out of alignment and so is your car.
Flattened animals: I know why these are there. Remember the jokes about why the chicken crossed the road? Maybe the chicken made it, but the snakes, frogs, possums, squirrels, raccoons, and other assorted fauna didn’t make it across the road.
Glass: This goes without saying, but if you can please stop throwing glass on the side of the road 25 miles away from my house I would really appreciate it. I do not like changing a flat tire.
Under garments: Now this is a funny one. Who is driving 30 mph on winding/twisting roads and suddenly decides to throw their underwear out the window? They may lead interesting lives, but geez. Also, sometimes you’ll see a single shoe. I always wonder where the rest of the body is. Is it in a bag and it’s been thrown over the edge of the cliff? I mean, how did that shoe get there?
Car tire hubs: These just fall off. If you’re missing one, I can probably tell you where it is.
Memorials: This one scares me because I don’t want to have one for myself. I know exactly why these are there. Someone died at this exact spot. It reminds me to be careful and ride safely. I remember when I was riding in Solvang a couple of years ago and the route called for us to ride up this one hill that was a popular with motorcyclists. Just on the incline of the mountain, I passed by like 12 memorials. I started thinking to myself that maybe this isn’t the place to be riding.
Tuesday, September 29, 2009
Wednesday, September 9, 2009
Sports Injuries in Kids: What You Need to Know
A recent article indicated the most high risk sports for children. It’s already September and I’ve had lots of parents bring their kids in for injuries due to sports.
Here’s the top four sports in order based upon the number of injuries per year:
Football 350,000
Basketball 300,000
Soccer 140,000
Baseball 120,000
The main injury you need to worry about as a parent is a concussion.
Concussions can have long-lasting effects. Kids can develop memory problems, headaches, trouble concentrating and even depression. In sports where ego drives the athlete (football in particular), the young person is likely told to “shake it off.” The problem is only 5% of all concussions result in the kid being knocked-out. You think they’re okay until later when they start developing problems.
You can’t “shake off” a concussion.
What needs to occur is to have the kid pulled from the game if there is a head injury. No debate necessary. Let the child complain. Let them explain that “I’m okay.” Let them fear the teasing from their peers. It’s not worth talking the risk to let them continue to play.
If you suspect a concussion, watch your child and how they act. If there’s any question, take them to the emergency room.
Here’s the top four sports in order based upon the number of injuries per year:
Football 350,000
Basketball 300,000
Soccer 140,000
Baseball 120,000
The main injury you need to worry about as a parent is a concussion.
Concussions can have long-lasting effects. Kids can develop memory problems, headaches, trouble concentrating and even depression. In sports where ego drives the athlete (football in particular), the young person is likely told to “shake it off.” The problem is only 5% of all concussions result in the kid being knocked-out. You think they’re okay until later when they start developing problems.
You can’t “shake off” a concussion.
What needs to occur is to have the kid pulled from the game if there is a head injury. No debate necessary. Let the child complain. Let them explain that “I’m okay.” Let them fear the teasing from their peers. It’s not worth talking the risk to let them continue to play.
If you suspect a concussion, watch your child and how they act. If there’s any question, take them to the emergency room.
Thursday, August 27, 2009
How we fix elbow tendonitis
For most people the pain is on the outside of the elbow. A minority of the time it is on the inside of the elbow. If it’s on the outside of the elbow, it’s called tennis elbow and if it’s on the inside, it’s called golfers elbow. You don’t have to play tennis or golf to get tendonitis in the elbow. In fact it’s often caused from typing.
Most patients will complain of pain, fatigue, and tenderness in the muscles. X-rays are not necessary unless there’s been a forceful injury that caused it. How we come to the conclusion of muscle/tendon pain is by stretching the muscle and having you pull against it. Normal muscles and tendons don’t produce pain when you do that. If there’s tendonitis it will be painful.
The way to get rid of it is to perform cross friction massage. With my thumb I will rub the tendon 90 degrees to the direction of the tendon. This can last up to 10 minutes. Within the first 3 minutes you will usually feel the tendon become numb to any pain. Often we will see a patient twice a week for 4-6 weeks. That’s usually enough to resolve it.
Ultrasound and cold laser therapy can help this condition. Athletic taping is helpful but only if there is not an excessive amount of hair on the elbow. The tape doesn’t stick to the skin otherwise.
Exercises for the elbow include doing extension curls. You would use a 5-10 pound weight and rest your forearm on a table. You would lift the weight using both arms and then slowly lower the weight to the bottom position. Three sets of 15 repetitions done twice a day for three months often is enough to fully rehabilitate the condition.
Most patients will complain of pain, fatigue, and tenderness in the muscles. X-rays are not necessary unless there’s been a forceful injury that caused it. How we come to the conclusion of muscle/tendon pain is by stretching the muscle and having you pull against it. Normal muscles and tendons don’t produce pain when you do that. If there’s tendonitis it will be painful.
The way to get rid of it is to perform cross friction massage. With my thumb I will rub the tendon 90 degrees to the direction of the tendon. This can last up to 10 minutes. Within the first 3 minutes you will usually feel the tendon become numb to any pain. Often we will see a patient twice a week for 4-6 weeks. That’s usually enough to resolve it.
Ultrasound and cold laser therapy can help this condition. Athletic taping is helpful but only if there is not an excessive amount of hair on the elbow. The tape doesn’t stick to the skin otherwise.
Exercises for the elbow include doing extension curls. You would use a 5-10 pound weight and rest your forearm on a table. You would lift the weight using both arms and then slowly lower the weight to the bottom position. Three sets of 15 repetitions done twice a day for three months often is enough to fully rehabilitate the condition.
Monday, July 27, 2009
Should you reduce inflammation?
I told a patient to use ice to reduce inflammation and she was hesitant to do so. She brought up an interesting concept. This patient felt that if inflammation was a natural response to an injury, wouldn’t it make sense to let it happen? Doesn’t reducing inflammation prevent proper healing?
To some degree she has a point. If the inflammation is tolerable meaning that you can tolerate the pain, it may be worthwhile to allow the natural process to happen. Inflammation is how the body initially handles an injury.
However in many cases inflammation becomes excessive. This happens for a number of reasons. Firstly many foods we eat are fuel to the fire of inflammation. Go to the zone diet website to learn more. Food allows our body to produce more inflammatory hormones that cause an excessive amount of inflammation.
Using ice doesn’t eliminate inflammation, it reduces it.
Lastly, people come to a doctor to reduce their pain. Ice works good for that. While it may be temporary, so is every drug you take. Ice doesn’t destroy your liver and kidneys. It’s much safer.
Clinical experience has shown that patients with new injuries have increased pain when applying heat. Ice has shown to help the pain.
To some degree she has a point. If the inflammation is tolerable meaning that you can tolerate the pain, it may be worthwhile to allow the natural process to happen. Inflammation is how the body initially handles an injury.
However in many cases inflammation becomes excessive. This happens for a number of reasons. Firstly many foods we eat are fuel to the fire of inflammation. Go to the zone diet website to learn more. Food allows our body to produce more inflammatory hormones that cause an excessive amount of inflammation.
Using ice doesn’t eliminate inflammation, it reduces it.
Lastly, people come to a doctor to reduce their pain. Ice works good for that. While it may be temporary, so is every drug you take. Ice doesn’t destroy your liver and kidneys. It’s much safer.
Clinical experience has shown that patients with new injuries have increased pain when applying heat. Ice has shown to help the pain.
Monday, May 25, 2009
Changing your posture
A question I get absolutely all the time is, “Why is my posture so bad?”
The answer? It’s the little things you’re doing over a period of years.
It’s hard to influence your posture with exercises. Most of the time it’s due to things you are doing outside of the gym.Imagine a person that sits all day. Their hips are constantly in flexion, their upper back and shoulders are slouched over, they get up every two hours to go to the vending machine. Even if you gave this person the absolute perfect exercises they may not change their posture much.Why?It’s because what we do everyday for hours and hours. A half-hour workout just isn’t going to change your posture.
Think about it – do you really expect 1 ½ hours in the gym every week to counteract the fact that you sit at a desk or in your car for 40, 50 or even 60 hours every week?It’s not going to happen. Those constant postures manifest and develop into something much bigger than you give them credit for. Muscles tighten in as little as 20 minutes; that means if you’re sitting at a desk for 8 hours every day, your muscles are adapting to that position by getting shorter! On top of that remember that you drove to work, you sat down for breakfast, lunch and dinner. All these postures were the same!
If you are really serious about changing your posture, look at every aspect of your day.
If you sit at a desk, get your hips in extension by performing frequent lunge stretches. Get a stand-up desk. Move around a lot. Try to be constantly moving.
If you drive all day long, set a timer on your phone to go off every 15 minutes that will cue you to sit-up straight and move around a bit. Fidgeting is not a bad thing!
The answer? It’s the little things you’re doing over a period of years.
It’s hard to influence your posture with exercises. Most of the time it’s due to things you are doing outside of the gym.Imagine a person that sits all day. Their hips are constantly in flexion, their upper back and shoulders are slouched over, they get up every two hours to go to the vending machine. Even if you gave this person the absolute perfect exercises they may not change their posture much.Why?It’s because what we do everyday for hours and hours. A half-hour workout just isn’t going to change your posture.
Think about it – do you really expect 1 ½ hours in the gym every week to counteract the fact that you sit at a desk or in your car for 40, 50 or even 60 hours every week?It’s not going to happen. Those constant postures manifest and develop into something much bigger than you give them credit for. Muscles tighten in as little as 20 minutes; that means if you’re sitting at a desk for 8 hours every day, your muscles are adapting to that position by getting shorter! On top of that remember that you drove to work, you sat down for breakfast, lunch and dinner. All these postures were the same!
If you are really serious about changing your posture, look at every aspect of your day.
If you sit at a desk, get your hips in extension by performing frequent lunge stretches. Get a stand-up desk. Move around a lot. Try to be constantly moving.
If you drive all day long, set a timer on your phone to go off every 15 minutes that will cue you to sit-up straight and move around a bit. Fidgeting is not a bad thing!
Results that last?
Do you want results that last a long time? What a silly question, of course you do. When it comes to back and neck pain, most people suffer constantly.
The key to long term pain relief in the lower back and neck is to improve muscular endurance. It’s not to increase strength of the muscles, it’s to increase the time that the muscles can contract. This means that it is not important to lift heavy weights for your spine, but rather you must be able to lift light weights for a longer period of time. In fact many exercises don’t even require weights. Your own body weight is enough.
The goal is to hold a position and be able to maintain that position without movement for a couple of minutes. Think of it this way, stop doing crunches but rather hold the top position for one minute.
People that lift heavy weights all the time still can suffer with back pain. Strength appears to have a very weak correlation with lower back pain. Just because you can lift heavy weights doesn’t mean your back may not hurt. You have to be able to do an exercise that lasts a long time to help the correct muscles in your lower back.
The correct exercises are extensions on a gym ball, stability exercises on the floor, higher repetition deadlifts, squats, and good-mornings. We can show you these in the office.
The problem is that most people that have repetitive constant back pain have weak muscles that get quickly tired and have shrunk. To compound the problem, the muscles don’t contract at the right time. For example, when you go to lift a box in the garage, the back muscles should work, but they take a split second too long to contract. Just enough time to sprain your back. OuchThey also had abnormal activation patterns.
The muscles of your lower back quickly shrink after an episode of lower back pain. The muscles don’t recover after the pain is gone. This sets you up for the next episode of back pain.
It takes 8 weeks of endurance training to increase endurance ability by 100%- 150% in patients that are out of shape. This means that AFTER the back pain is gone, it can take 8 weeks to fully recover the muscular endurance to prevent the next episode. As you can imagine, some patients never follow this advice. They figure that the pain is gone so they must be alright only to experience pain again. It’s a vicious cycle.
Exercises can be done daily or even twice daily because they don’t produce muscle soreness. Usually with chiropractic, the pain will begin to reduce within 1-6 weeks depending upon the case. After this, it is important to continue with the treatment while exercising for at least eight weeks.
This is the reasoning for the treatment recommendations that we make.
The key to long term pain relief in the lower back and neck is to improve muscular endurance. It’s not to increase strength of the muscles, it’s to increase the time that the muscles can contract. This means that it is not important to lift heavy weights for your spine, but rather you must be able to lift light weights for a longer period of time. In fact many exercises don’t even require weights. Your own body weight is enough.
The goal is to hold a position and be able to maintain that position without movement for a couple of minutes. Think of it this way, stop doing crunches but rather hold the top position for one minute.
People that lift heavy weights all the time still can suffer with back pain. Strength appears to have a very weak correlation with lower back pain. Just because you can lift heavy weights doesn’t mean your back may not hurt. You have to be able to do an exercise that lasts a long time to help the correct muscles in your lower back.
The correct exercises are extensions on a gym ball, stability exercises on the floor, higher repetition deadlifts, squats, and good-mornings. We can show you these in the office.
The problem is that most people that have repetitive constant back pain have weak muscles that get quickly tired and have shrunk. To compound the problem, the muscles don’t contract at the right time. For example, when you go to lift a box in the garage, the back muscles should work, but they take a split second too long to contract. Just enough time to sprain your back. OuchThey also had abnormal activation patterns.
The muscles of your lower back quickly shrink after an episode of lower back pain. The muscles don’t recover after the pain is gone. This sets you up for the next episode of back pain.
It takes 8 weeks of endurance training to increase endurance ability by 100%- 150% in patients that are out of shape. This means that AFTER the back pain is gone, it can take 8 weeks to fully recover the muscular endurance to prevent the next episode. As you can imagine, some patients never follow this advice. They figure that the pain is gone so they must be alright only to experience pain again. It’s a vicious cycle.
Exercises can be done daily or even twice daily because they don’t produce muscle soreness. Usually with chiropractic, the pain will begin to reduce within 1-6 weeks depending upon the case. After this, it is important to continue with the treatment while exercising for at least eight weeks.
This is the reasoning for the treatment recommendations that we make.
Monday, May 18, 2009
Diet Cola or Coffee?
I’m switching from diet cola to coffee. Is that healthier?
I’m not so sure that coffee can be considered “health food” but when you compare the chemicals in diet colas to coffee, coffee can be considered healthier.
There have been some studies showing that caffeine taken prior to exercise can stimulate energy from fat cells. This is only for infrequent ingestion of caffeine. It’s not to say that coffee is a weight loss drink. When those people ingested caffeine regularly, the results were not as good.
Coffee the way some people drink it should be sold at 31-flavors rather than Starbuck’s. The studies were done with coffee…beans with hot water…not cream, sugar, caramel, chocolate sprinkles, etc.
Lastly, you are likely to get a dirty look from your dentist, with a speech about teeth whitening.
So while it’s unlikely that coffee is the holy grail of health, it seems to be considered by some to be “healthy” this week.
We’ll see what happens.
I’m not so sure that coffee can be considered “health food” but when you compare the chemicals in diet colas to coffee, coffee can be considered healthier.
There have been some studies showing that caffeine taken prior to exercise can stimulate energy from fat cells. This is only for infrequent ingestion of caffeine. It’s not to say that coffee is a weight loss drink. When those people ingested caffeine regularly, the results were not as good.
Coffee the way some people drink it should be sold at 31-flavors rather than Starbuck’s. The studies were done with coffee…beans with hot water…not cream, sugar, caramel, chocolate sprinkles, etc.
Lastly, you are likely to get a dirty look from your dentist, with a speech about teeth whitening.
So while it’s unlikely that coffee is the holy grail of health, it seems to be considered by some to be “healthy” this week.
We’ll see what happens.
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