Posts by Karen
Acupuncture for Depression and Anxiety
Alternatives to prescription medication for depression and anxiety
Studies are showing that regular acupuncture treatments are effective for treating depression and anxiety; as a further consideration, acupuncture is considered safe and does not have a long list of side effects. According to Traditional Chinese Medicine, acupuncture works by correcting blockages in the body’s energy pathways. Along the way it releases natural painkilling chemicals in the brain and rebalances the central nervous system. Studies have shown that acupuncture is comparable with cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT) for treating depression and anxiety. Acupuncture is further effective as part of a plan for reducing dependency on prescription drugs such as benzodiazepines. As part of a holistic healthcare method that combines CBT, control over diet, and therapeutic exercise, acupuncture can contribute to the calming, sedative effect that people come to crave with your medication.
Treating depression and anxiety with acupuncture
Your body has a unique balance and acupuncture focuses on identifying the malefactors that are disrupting this equilibirum. At Community Chiropractic & Acupuncture, we are interested in providing our patients with the most up-to-date natural treatments for stress, anxiety and depression. If you are interested in managing your depression or anxiety with non-prescription methods, give our office in Park Slope a call to start the conversation today.
Acupuncture for the Modern Athlete: Using Acupuncture to Boost Immunity
Acupuncture’s effect on immunity
Acupuncture boosts the body’s immune response by increasing circulation and fighting off inflammation. From the Traditiona Chinese Medicine perspective, acupuncture regulates the body’s energy pathways. In Western Medicine, this effect is experienced as improving blood flow throughout the body. Furthermore, acupuncture has powerful anti-inflammatory capacities. Because inflammation is now thought to be the base of so many diseases, the anti-inflammatory effect of acupuncture is seen as an effective aid for the body’s immune response in battling off illness when energy reserves are low.
What slow’s an athlete down more than illness?
During any interval of training, acupuncture is recognized as an effective aid for improving immunity and resistance to illness. Receiving treatments in the hours following intense exercise increases circulation, oxygen and nutrient flow and allows your body to rest and recuperate effectively for the training ahead. If you are interested in using acupuncture to improve athletic performance, give our office in Park Slope a call to schedule an appointment today.
Acupuncture for the Modern Athlete: Dry Needling for Trigger Point Pain
Using acupuncture needles to deactivate trigger points
Once a trigger point is located, we use thin needles to release them. This has been found to be one of the most effective ways of treating trigger point related pain and dysfunction. By deactivating the trigger point, we restore normal function to the muscle and reduce referred pain in other parts of the body. Athletes benefit from dry needle trigger point therapy in the following ways:
- Pain relief
- Restoring normal muscle function
- Improving circulation
- Improving range of motion
If you are interested in using acupuncture for trigger point pain, give our office in Park Slope a call to schedule an appointment today.
Acupuncture for the Modern Athlete: Motor Point Needling
How motor point needling works
Acupuncture points, found along the body’s energy meridians, often coincide with crucial points in the musculoskeletal network known as motor points. Motor points are the specific locations at which nerves enter the muscle. Gently inserting an acupuncture needle essentially resets a contracted muscle at the point of its nerve attachment, allowing for relaxation of the muscle, improved joint function and less pain. This is a perfect example of how an ancient form of medicine is brought forward into the 21st century to great effect.
Acupuncture for improving athletic performance
Motor point needling is just one of the ways we are helping athletes treat their bodies using effective, holistic modalities. If you are interested in using acupuncture to improve your athletic performance in a natural manner, give our office in Brooklyn a call to schedule an appointment today.
How to Go About: Looking Confident and Feeling Your Best
How we can make this position the new norm
It begins with awareness- now that you know what it feels like to have your postural muscles engaged and holding you upright, we want to work to make this your new normal. At our office in Park Slope, we work with you to help you establish good postural health. This means:
- Providing spinal adjustment to realign the spine, improving range of motion and reducing pain.
- Focusing on stretching and elongating overly-tight postural muscles which are suffering from overuse in poor posture.
- Focus on strengething under-used phasic muscles to lend support and stability to the core.
If you are interested in changing your postural health for the better, give our office in Brooklyn a call to schedule an appointment today.
An Argument Against Painkillers in the Gym Bag
Painkillers hamper athletic performance
They do so in the following ways:
- Interfering with hypertrophy
- Preventing protein synthesis
- Inhibit nutrient absorption
NSAIDs do have a role in injury recovery because they can help mitigate the pain and inflammation that prevents effective recovery from acute injuries. However, if you are using NSAIDs simply to treat aches and pains post-workout, painkillers actually prevent the efficient recovery of muscle and connective tissue. Instead, many health professionals and sports-health specialists advise a more dynamic approach to recovery: the tested and true methods of rest, good diet and therapeutic stretching and exercise. You can go one step further by using chiropractic to augment your body’s natural healing response.
Chiropractic is a smart response for injury rehabiliation
We focus on aligning the spine, mobilizing joints and preventing scar tissue adhesion in order to maintain optimal range of motion. If you are interested in using our services to promote healthy recovery from injury or simply prevent injury in the first place, give our office a call to schedule an appointment today.
Improving Hip Mobility with Chiropractic
Chiropractic for hip mobility
Pelvic misalignment limits hip mobility. As your sport chiropractic specialist in the Park Slope neighborhood, we focus on improving hip mobility in the following ways:
- Ensuring the spine is aligned through the pelvis
- Strengthening the core stabilizing muscles
- Focusing on stability of the pelvic region
Weakness and/or tightness in the hip muscles which surround the joint capsule can also limit hip mobility, which means that targeted stretching to the internal and external rotators can help improve elasticity of the hip muscles and improve mobility. Our primary goal is to resolve misalignment in the lower spine to prevent imbalance in the hip muscles moving forward.
More hip mobility means better athletic performance
If you are interested in getting a leg up on the competition, give our office in Park Slope a call and find out more about how our natural modalities help you improve hip mobility.
The Importance of Postural Transitioning
Using postural transitions to your advantage.
Chances are you don’t want to remain locked into a stiff and stagnant position. But many of us end up this way because over time, our body learns that this is what we want, and our muscles respond to make this unhealthy posturing feel more comfortable. This is a trap! Even if your body feels better slouching, you are causing innumerable damages to your spine. At Community Chiropractic & Acupuncture, we want people to overcome stagnation by awareness. An ergonomically aware person should make at least one purposeful movement every 20 minutes of sitting or standing. These can be slight, like simply raising your feet onto a footrest from the floor, or stretching the back; or they can be more purposeful like standing up and walking to get a drink of water.
Postural transitions keep your core engaged
If your job involves a whole lot of one position, make sure that you listen to the signs of stiffness before they give way to pain. If you are interested in optimizing your work life and finding more ways to keep your body healthy despite the demands of your job, give our office in Park Slope a call to schedule an appointment today.
Acupuncture versus Injection for Back Pain
Acupuncture is effective at addressing neck pain
While painkilling injections quite often achieve their goal of reducing pain and helping people live a more normal life, there is every chance that the pain will come back and the necessity for injections will continue. Acupuncture seeks to encourage the body’s intrinsic healing response and addresses pain in the following ways:
- Stimulates nervous system response in muscles and connective tissues.
- Releases painkilling endorphins and alters the processing of pain in the brain
- Reduces inflammation
- Releases muscles from stiffness and improves spinal joint mobility
- Increases local circulation to provide nutrients and oxygen to the injurious region.
Acupuncture for neck pain in Park Slope
At our office in Brooklyn, we specialize in the treatment of neck pain through holistic methods including chiropractic adjustment and acupuncture therapy. If you are interested in overcoming your long standing neck pain, give our office a call to schedule an appointment today.
Acupuncture for Overuse Injuries
Keeping an eye on overuse injuries at Park Slope Chiropractic
Here is how to discern whether that dull aching is typical post-workout soreness or an indicator of something more serious:
- Soreness sets in during activity or shortly after
- Soreness in the same area over weeks.
- Most often felt in joints or the surrounding regions
Classic example of overuse injuries include: hip and elbow bursitis, tendinitis in the wrists, shoulder impingement syndrome and tennis elbow. These injuries are primarily joint-related and respond well to acupuncture treatment.
Acupuncture treatment for overuse injuries
Acupuncture is tailor-made for athletes because it focuses on regulating the flow of energy throughout the entire body, and can be specifically targeted to account for overuse injuries. Acupuncture enhances blood circulation to an injurious region, bringing nutrients and oxygen, and carrying away lymphatic material and other waste. This works to enhance the body’s ability to heal itself. At Park Slope Chiropractic, we specialize in using acupuncture to help athletes overcome overuse injuries. If you are interested in using our services to overcome an overuse injury, give our office in Brooklyn a call to schedule an appointment today.