Treating the Bark

You walk into your chiropractor's office, hop on a table and point to where it hurts... expecting to get adjusted right in that very spot.  But the chiropractor starts working on a totally different part of your spine, not even close to where you feel the pain.  Why is that?    

There's an old saying that goes when you step on a dog's tail, it barks out the other end.  In chiropractic that means where you hurt (the bark) isn't necessarily where the problem is (the tail).  Many times the pain you feel in one area is actually a referred symptom from somewhere else.  For example, someone with sciatica may feel  pain down their leg, but the source of their problem is a subluxation (vertebral misalignment) in their spine. 

Chiropractors recognize that if you remove the cause of someone's symptom, the body will no longer have a need to produce it.  That's why the main focus of a chiropractic visit is to locate and correct the underlying problem, and not the superficial effect.  Chasing after symptoms is like a dog chasing after its own tail.  You only end up spinning around and around until you get dizzy, confused and frustrated.  It's much smarter to address the underlying cause.

Content provided by Principle33.

---