Connected Chiropractic Presents the Influence of the Brain/Spine Connection in Back Pain
The brain and the spine. They’re connected. They’re connected more intimately than any of us realize as we go about our daily lives. Connected Chiropractic keeps this connection top-of-mind as we treat our Elgin back pain sufferers’ spines and pay attention to their stories of pain and ways of coping. Elgin chiropractic care at Connected Chiropractic respects the brain and spine connection and use gentle, safe chiropractic services incorporating spinal manipulation to ease pain concerning both.
BRAIN CHANGES IN Elgin BACK PAIN
Pain changes the brain. A person in pain knows it. Special tests today can show it. BOLD (blood oxygen level dependent) responses were analyzed after stimulating lumbar spinous processes with manipulation and exhibited activity in the secondary somatosensory cortex, cerebellum and other parts of the brain. (1) Motor cortex stimulation triggers a spinal anti-inflammatory response to decrease pain. (2) Depression, anxiety, cognitive deficits often accompany chronic constriction of the sciatic nerve due to its effect on the medial prefrontal cortex. (3) Spinal manipulation may be a means to deal with the brain changes in chronic pain and its related issues.
SHORT TERM STIMULATION’S EFFECT ON BRAIN
Stimulating the brain even for a short time may influence the pain experience. A recent study on Euclidean distance between cortical sources and temporal dynamics of plastic changes in the somatosensory cortex of the brain had even your Elgin chiropractor’s mind spinning a little! What a topic! Without having to grasp all these terms and measurements discussed in the study, know that the study presented that the brain, even the adult brain, is pliable. Certainly, the young developing brain is most impressionable, but with the proper input, the older, adult brain can change. The researchers in this study took measurements before and after stimulation and compared their size on MRI. They saw a difference. More research should be done, but they did explain that long term experience establishes cortical organization while transient, new and different stimulation can spark cortical reorganization of the adult brain. Such changes have been noted in musicians, Braille readers, and persons after spinal manipulation and stroke rehab. (4) This understanding of the brain informs the Elgin chiropractic treatment plan!
BRAIN CHANGES WITH CHRONIC PAIN
Just how is the chiropractic treatment plan affected with such knowledge of the brain? Let’s start by looking at the brain with chronic pain. The two brain regions that encode the intensity of painful stimuli and contribute to the whole experience of chronic pain are the primary somatosensory cortex and posterior insular cortex. (5) The cortex of the brain was shown to be thinner in chronic low back pain patients. Post-treatment, the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex is thicker. To the researchers, this implied that treating chronic pain may well reestablish normal brain functions. (6) Connected Chiropractic takes care of Elgin back pain patients all day long. It’s amazing to think that treatment might modify more than just the pain response!
CONTACT Connected Chiropractic
Listen to this PODCAST by Dr. James Cox on The Back Doctors Podcast with Dr. Michael Johnson as he explains more clearly the brain and spine and pain connection, describes in more depth how the cells of the body are constantly remodeling and adjusting to their always-changing mechanical environment, and how chiropractic may help.
Schedule a non-surgical Elgin chiropractic care appointment with Connected Chiropractic for your pain, brain, and spine! The connection is there between pain and the brain. Connected Chiropractic can get in the center of those two and help you get some Elgin pain relief.
