The Get Healthy Tampa Bay Podcast

E139: Chiropractic Myths, Headaches & Performance with Dr. Ryan Klepko

• Kerry Reller

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Welcome to the Get Healthy Tampa Bay Podcast with Dr. Kerry Reller! This week, Dr. Reller is joined by chiropractor Dr. Ryan Klepko, co-owner of The Chiropractic Spa in Dunedin, FL.

In this episode, Dr. Klepko breaks down what chiropractic care really means—from treating headaches, TMJ, and pediatric patients to helping athletes recover and perform better. He addresses common myths, explains how adjustments affect the nervous system, and shares why movement is medicine.

Tune in to learn how chiropractic fits into whole-person care, how to know if you need an adjustment, and what to expect during treatment.

00:28 – Welcome and introduction of Dr. Ryan Klepko
01:34 – What chiropractic care means and Dr. Klepko’s background
03:00 – Pediatric chiropractic care (adjustments for infants)
05:53 – Two schools of thought in chiropractic care
08:50 – Role of the nervous system in chiropractic adjustments
11:44 – How to know if you need an adjustment
14:47 – Chiropractic care for athletes and sports performance
17:48 – Nervous system, gut health, and unexpected improvements
21:56 – Chiropractic for headaches, migraines, and TMJ
28:55 – Busting the biggest myth: chiropractic and strokes
33:02 – Why movement is medicine & final takeaways

Connect with Dr. Reller
Podcast website: https://gethealthytbpodcast.buzzsprou... 
My linktree: linktr.ee/kerryrellermd
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kerryrellermd/
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Tiktok: https://www.tiktok.com/@kerryrellermd
Clearwater Family Medicine and Allergy website: https://sites.google.com/view/clearwa...
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Ryan:

Hi everybody. Welcome back to the Get Healthy Tampa Bay podcast. I'm your host, Dr. Kerry Reller, and today we have Dr. Ryan Klepko Thank you so much for joining us.

Kerry:

Thank you for having me. I'm, I'm really excited to be here.

Ryan:

I just want to warn the listeners I am recording from my phone for the first time in case there's an error. But anyway yeah. So you practice in Dunedin, right?

Kerry:

Yeah, so we opened up our clinic a little over two and a half years ago, and we opened up in the Caladesi Shopping Center on Alternate 19 and, and Curlew Road, and it's been fantastic ever since. We're, we're in the Publix shopping center and I always just say we're sandwich between Publix and the the liquor store. Can't miss us. We're right in the middle. So, and that's, that's always fun'cause we get to see people going in between the two shops. And my favorite is when people come in, I had no idea you were here. And you're like, well we've been here for a couple years. And so yeah. So we're right there and we're really conveniently located in right here in Dunedin.

Ryan:

nice. So we're, we're talking about Dunedin, I don't think we even said, but who you are and what you do. So.

Kerry:

Yeah, so I'm, I'm Dr. Ryan Klepko. uh, I don't go by my last name too often. It's Ukrainian. So a lot of people just they fumble it and have been called everything Kle, from Klepto to Kleptomaniac to Klepto, bmo, and. I've heard about everything in between, so I, I just, you can call me anything just don't call me late for dinner. That's usually my, usually go-to. So I am a, a chiropractic physician. I got my license from Logan University in St. Louis, Missouri. So I, I moved down here basically as soon as I could. After I graduated, I walked across the top and got my degree and moved down to Florida. And we love the area and we, we opened up in Dunedin and, and we really just enjoy helping people out. And so that's what we wanted and so far it's been great. And we are a chiropractor, so my wife and I share the practice together. We are co-owners and we do very similar treatments, but we do have different specialties. So I specialize more in your orthopedic conditions and muscle recovery and sports performance, and my wife does a lot of pediatrics and then she does a lot of functional medicine. So she's very, very involved in the functional medicine world and, and getting that and getting people fixed up from a holistic approach. So.

Ryan:

It's very interesting you mentioned the, the pediatric part'cause I mean, I didn't know that chiropractors saw pediatric patients until my niece, who lives in Missouri was bringing her baby there and as like a newborn. I didn't even know that was a thing. So, very interesting and

Kerry:

Yeah, so the youngest patient I've ever adjusted was about eight days old. So that's the youngest I've ever done and Robin has me beat because the, a mother had experience with Dr, with my wife, with Dr. Robin. And she has me beat, she adjusted a baby at, I think it was about three hours. So if you think about it is birth is a traumatic experience for both the mother and the baby. And so it just makes sense to, to check everything and make sure everything's lined up. And especially with the cranium being soft and pliable. You, you definitely wanna make sure everything's aligned and, and ready and for the baby to, to thrive and, and move along.

Ryan:

Nice. Yeah, that's really interesting. I'm so used to, you know, traditional and medicine on the other side. So tell me more, like what did, how do you define chiropractic care?

Kerry:

Oh, that's a, that's a great question and, and I, this is one I struggled with in school because there's so many different thoughts and, and theories on chiropractic care. And the definition that I came up with is it means something different to everybody. And what it means is. What it means to you and how it relates to your body and how you function. For me, it's about performance. It's about functioning at my highest level and continuing to perform. I'm a competitive power lifter and I know if I don't get my chiropractic care. I struggle, you know, and it's, it's hard for me to maintain that performance level if I don't have the maintenance in there, it mixed in with I do chiropractic, I have a massage therapist that I love and, you know, if I don't do those little things, then I struggle. I don't, I don't make the gains that I want and I don't move forward. So for me it's about sports performance. For some people it's about just wellness care and feeling great and having that release. You know, some people just love to get away for a minute and, and experience that because there is a release of endorphins and for some people in the chiropractic world, it means life itself. Right. I've, I've met chiropractors who believe it, it cures everything, which I, that's not my world, but you know, I, there's basically two schools of thought in, in chiropractic, and they're, they're kind of at battle with each other. There's the one side that believes chiropractic cures everything, right? Like, I'll adjust this, this seizure out of you, or whatever it is. I, I don't know. That's, that's not my world. And then there's the side that's totally science based, right? They, they believe that they don't do anything that's not supported and backed by science. I kind of fit right in the middle. I, I think there's a lot that I can't explain, right? I've seen things, I've seen things happen in my chiropractic career where I've seen people heal and recover from things, and I just sit back and think, wow. I, I. I didn't know that could happen. But at the same time, I think we also need to explain how that happens and, and be able to understand how the body interacts with the adjustment and things. So for me it's, it's producing function and reducing inflammation and reducing the burden of life, right? Because we're all involved in it. We all get our aches and pains, and we all have our injuries or traumas or whatever, and chiropractic really does help to relieve a lot of those burdens. So.

Ryan:

Yeah, I mean, absolutely. I think we know that at some point in your life you're gonna have an injury, right? And that'll need to be helped and I rather than just you managing it at home, but it usually, um. I have, you know, a burning question. So there doctors of osteopathy, like there's osteopath, osteopathic manipulation. How is that different than the kind of manipulation that you do as a chiropractor? Or is it different?

Kerry:

Oh, there's a, I mean, there's a lot of similarity. Osteos, osteopathy and chiropractic care have roots very similar to each other. One just decided to, you know, osteopathy decided to go a little bit more with the traditional medicine route, which is totally fine. And chiropractic kind of stayed with their roots of the osseous adjustments. And one thing, I, I actually have a good buddy who's a, an osteopathic physician, and, and he kind of thinks it's shame that a lot of them have gone away from the adjustments. He still does'em in his office and he says it's, it's powerful. Sometimes that's the best medicine he has. But there are some differences in the osteopathic adjustments and some people have shown me a few of them and I'm like that's really cool. I wish we learned that one in school, you know, and so it's just, it's a little bit different. Even in the un, under the umbrella of chiropractic care, there's over 130 different certified techniques of chiropractic. So you probably see the ones on TV or you know, or on YouTube or TikTok or whatever. And everybody loves the poppies and, you know, the, the sounds and all that. And that's, that's the general umbrella of Diversified. That's what we call it. It's diversified. And so they, my school taught a subset of Diversified, that's called Reinart Diversified, that's his last name. So he kind of pioneered it. And so we follow Reinart Diversified. Different schools have different techniques that they teach as well. My, my school was founded off of the Logan Basic Method, which that's what pediatric, pediatric care is actually based off of that Logan basic technique, pediatric, and before the birth, so the treatment care of the mother before birth. So that's all based off of Logan basic technique. And then there's, there's schools of thoughts that they only adjust the upper cervical vertebrae. So they only do C one, C two and, and the suboccipitals. And so they, there, there are different schools of thought from that standpoint. So you see an adjustment, it all kind of looks similar. As far as that goes. We have pretty similar techniques, but there are some, some differences in there. I know, especially for osteopathic medicine. There's one in the upper back that I had a mentor of mine who actually learned from an osteopath and I was like, yeah, no, they definitely didn't teach us because they actually used their knee to drop the patient down onto their knee. And I was like, that's actually really neat. And it is, it was really, really effective. There were a lot of patients who. Wouldn't adjust any other way. And he found that technique, he learned it and, and used it on several patients, and it was the only thing that worked for him. So for me, I, I think it's just what works better for, for the patient is really what, what matters, right? So

Ryan:

Yeah. Yeah, for sure. So what role does the nervous system play in chiropractic care?

Kerry:

Oh, that's a great question. Yeah, so it's the, it's the whole meaning of chiropractic, right? So a lot of people think we're bone mo movers and things, and this, you'll hear that. My, my theory and philosophy on that right now, I, if you take two x-rays, 10 adjustments apart. I, I will be honest, I, I don't think you're gonna see that much bone movement, right? So I can a, you know, I can take an x-ray, do an adjustment, take another, another x-ray, and you may see no difference, right? And you probably won't see, and that's what the most literature says. It actually takes about 30 visits for, for you to see lasting changes in the spine. And so the, but the nervous system is what we're actually working on. So I always say, we're the electricians of the body, right? And so you, everything is conducted by electrical impulses. And so sometimes those electrical impulses just get, there's interference, right? And that's, that's the whole subluxation theory is that there's interference. The way I define it or way I talk about it is actually we are, and the easy way is to say a noxious stimulus, right? So if you have a pain stimulus, that nerve fiber is pretty slow. Like the pain perception of, of pain is very slow. But the, the perception of movement is very quick. And so what we do is we dampen that pain perception enough for the body to heal itself, right? And so that's, we're basically hijacking your nervous system to get your relief so that you can restore function and then you can get back to activity. And, and it's all about, it's all using the, the body's own healing mechanisms to heal the body on its own. So it's, I love it.'cause we, we don't have to, it's, it's low invasive and we get high results and there's not a lot of, there's actually not a lot of contraindications for the adjusting too. And we have also, we have different methods like the activator that i've, I've adjusted, like I said, the eight day old, up to a 94-year-old with the activator'cause it's really, really gentle. Really, really easy. But to get back to the main question, it's all about the nervous system, right? Because without that, then we're just bouncing on bones and it, it really doesn't do much, right?

Ryan:

So how does it dampen the pain response?

Kerry:

I always tell people it's kind of like if you've ever burned yourself or gotten a cut and you rub it, it's that proprioception it's the same mechanism, right? And so we're just using that linear, that that line of of the nervous system to dampen the pain. And so it's the same thing. So. You know, as you're a kid, you know, you scrape your knee and then somebody comes and rubs it. It's just an noxious stimulus, and that's what the adjustment actually acts as. It's just we're more targeted towards the, the source of the pain,

Ryan:

Very interesting. My husband definitely always tells my kids when they like get hurt. He goes like, I'll rub it, rub it

Kerry:

right? Absolutely. Yeah. Mm-hmm.

Ryan:

So funny. So I guess how do you know if you need an adjustment or how do you know if they need your help?

Kerry:

Oh man. Well, that's a great question'cause I'm a little biased. I think we all need adjustments. And, and the, the real question is, we're actually horrible at knowing that not as chiropractors like I, that I've gotten a lot more attuned to as, as I've done this for over the past five years. But the, the reality is you can have up to a 30% reduction of function of a single spinal segment. And your check engine light won't go off. Right? And so as a human experiencing human life, we're really bad at knowing, oh yeah, I need an adjustment until. You've had adjustments and then you kind of feel like, oh yeah, no, this is how I feel when I should, what I should feel like as opposed to what I've been feeling like. So our per our perception of the adjustment isn't necessarily that great of when we need it. But I would say if you ever feel like you just feel re reduced function, you're not moving as easily or as freely as you'd like to, or if you're just feeling restricted in your everyday life or you know, that feeling of, oh man, I just can't catch my breath. I just, you know, I feel off. Those are all symptoms of, you know, that we need an adjustment. We need some corrective, you know, e either an adjustment or even just corrective exercises to get you in, in the proper flow and in the proper state of being. And, and so I would say it's, it's kind of, it's kind of a scale, right? So for your elite athletes you're gonna be adjusted more frequently, like Tom Brady. And, and this is easy, you know, this is a softball, he was adjusted twice a week whether he wanted it or thought he needed it or not. Every week, I like clockwork. Jerry Rice, he attributes his successful career to his chiropractor. You know, and so I think your elite athletes are gonna be a little bit more frequent, especially leading up to competition. Like I have a lot of a lot of triathletes that we treat. So near the end, when they're tapering off, I'm picking up because we're trying to get their body ready to, the ready to perform at its peak level. And so we wanna make sure everything holds.'cause they do a lot of damage to their body in training. So we've gotta make sure it holds together and they're ready for a race day. Because what's the point of all that training if you can't perform on the day of the race? Right. And so I have a Boston marathoner that he's, he runs the Boston every year and he's, he's case in point. You know, a couple years ago he had an injury in his calf and so I was seeing him once or twice a week just doing, just working on that calf muscle, trying to get the, the strain to go down and, and he ran the Boston and set of pr and it was, it was great, you know, it was fantastic. And it was, it was really, really eyeopening to show how much the soft tissue works. And he was co, we were co-managing with his, his, massage therapist who was another friend of mine and, you know, we were co-managing and got him there and one of the things he told him was, Hey, look, it's okay to go a little bit deconditioned into the start line rather than feeling conditioned, but in pain. Right? And that's, kind of the point we were working with him on there was to just get to the start line, but be healthy. You know, if you're 10 pounds up, that's okay.'cause you're gonna feel great on the day of the race rather than feeling like confident but you're hurt. You know? So it was, it was very interesting to kind of work on that, that case together. So.

Ryan:

Yeah. Well that case you particularly mentioned that he was in pain. What about the other people who, you know, the elite athletes, they're not indefinitely experiencing pain, but they're doing these adjustments regularly to feel better overall or perform better. Is that like, how does that I guess necessarily help, or how do they know? I guess that

Kerry:

Right. Yeah. And, and a lot of'em, it's, it's just trial and error. You know, they've seen it before and they see how they perform without it, and then they see how they perform with it. I have a runner right now. You know, we cured his hamstring issue. He's doing great. And then he said, but I wanna maintain this. And I was like, well, then you just gotta check with your body. For him even training we're down to once every other week. So it's not even every week. And, and that's why I say it kind of depends on the person and how intense. Now he's not running, you know, marathons every weekend. He's more of your Saturday warrior. Well, he'll show up, do a 5K every now and then. But he is done the Ragnar Rock, he's done, he's done tons of races. It's just this is where he is at in his life right now. So we're maintaining that. For more of your elite level athletes, though, they, they understand that in order to perform you need to be in alignment, especially like triathletes are the easy, that's easy ones to talk about because you have so many transitions between the sports, right? Your shoulders have to function for the, for the swim, and then they have to be super mobile you, so you need thoracic extension. You have to have it. But then when you're spending six hours on the bike, you have to have thoracic flexion too. So you can't be restricted in either direction. And then if you're running, if you're one of your hips is, well, we, it's posterior inferior. You're gonna have a long leg, well, you're running on a leg that's an inch to an a half, an inch to an inch longer for 26.2 miles. That's gonna have devastating consequences in the long run. And so that's, a lot of that is just their, their pre-investment. And yeah, I know a lot of people will probably argue, well, how do you know? Like, how do you know that's actually making a difference? Well, a lot of these people tried it before without any care, and they know the difference now, and they see the difference in their performance. And for me, like, like I said, I, I've done meets where I didn't have chiropractic care and now I've done meets with chiropractic care. I perform so much better with the chiropractic care than I do without, and I'll get an adjustment the week of the the meet because that's my deload week. So I'll get a, an adjustment that week and depending on the schedule, it's either Wednesday or Thursday usually.'cause I, I lift usually on Saturdays, so I just wanna make sure everything's in line before I go up.'cause my hips, I have an interesting thing'cause when I squat, my left hip goes out. When I deadlift, my right hip goes out, out of alignment. And then on meet day you have to do both. And so it's just kind of interesting to kind of manage that and work on that. So

Ryan:

Yeah, you definitely wanna be evening out to do those movements.

Kerry:

Yeah.

Ryan:

So obviously you mentioned like chiropractic care encompasses the whole nervous system. So when I think of the nervous system, I also think of the gut and the brain, right? So do you see unexpected improvements that patients might report that would be related to the gut, the brain, or anything else?

Kerry:

Yeah, so, so one of the things that we see frequently, and it's, it's actually easier to see in children for, they just respond better is especially bowel function. A lot of, a lot of children will experience increased and improved bowel function. Infants, if they're ever locked up, you, we can do with the adjustment and within half an hour they'll have a bowel move. It's, it's really, really impressive because the nerve, the spinal nerve from the thoracic nerve eight goes straight to the stomach. Right? And so that's gastric function. So if you're locked up in that mid back and it can't move, it can't function, then you're gonna have interference into the, you know,'cause the nervous system controls, like you said, the nervous system controls the gut. It controls every function of the system, of the body. So we've seen. I've seen people, they sleep better the nights after the adjustment. They, you know, they perform better on tests. A quick anecdote on that. So there is a, a huge relationships between brain function and the nervous system, obviously,'cause the brain is the master computer. We had a teacher in school who, who told us about this experience he had. And he's Dr. Montgomery is one of those, he's just this legendary guy. You know, and his. The, one of the buildings on campus is named after his father. So it's, he is one of those chiropractic families. But he got invited to the University of California to do a lecture, and he was talking about this connection between C one and, and higher levels of function in the brain. And so they've actually done studies on this and found that after an adjustment you have an increase of prefrontal cortex firing, so your motor patterns and then also your higher critical thinking patterns improved by 30 to 45%. After an adjustment. So you're gonna have increased blood flow, which obviously helps. You're gonna have increased synaptic firing, which obviously is gonna help your critical thinking. So what he did is he actually said he, there's this correlation between adjustment and performance and the, the, the professor was like. I don't believe it, not a chance. And so he's like, okay, I'll come prove it. And so he said, I will adjust every C one in this office, in this room. And I don't know, he told us how many students there were. I don't recall. But I'll adjust all of'em the day of the test. And so he did. He came in an hour early just at everyone's upper cervical vertebrae. About two weeks later, then he gets a phone call from this professor and he goes, typically, 35 to 40% of my class fails this test. Less than 5% failed. And he was like, I don't, I don't know how that works. And he was like, well, this is exactly how it works. The nervous system controls it. So when you remove those interferences and you remove that, that provocation, then you can perform better.

Ryan:

That's super cool. So you mentioned, I think T eight or cranial nerve eight or what

Kerry:

oh, it's a thoracic, it is the, the nerve that exits from the T eight. Yeah.

Ryan:

Okay, so Vagus is, you know, I, I was, I have some patients who have like vagal nerve dysfunction. We think, how can that, can something like this help with them?

Kerry:

Oh yeah. Vagal nerve stimulation is a, is a big thing that we definitely see benefits of the chiropractic adjustment with because it's the, it's part of the autonomic nervous system, right? And so the parasympathetics obviously are in incredibly powerful and. Definitely with the adjustment. I've seen it and, and so I've seen both versions of this, right? Where I'll do an adjustment on someone's cervical spine and they look up at me and they just say, I just broke out in a sweat, right? Like it's just an instant vagal response from the adjustment. And it's just the, the amount of tone that they have in there. If their nervous system at that time, and some people it's too powerful, right? And so we have to back it down. As far as the adjustment and that for them, they usually need a lot of tissue work especially in the, like near the mastoid process and the, the suboccipital muscles. They usually benefit from a lot of therapeutic release of those muscles just to get rid of some of that tone.'cause once you get that tone in that upper neck, it is, it's really hard. One, it's harder to adjust. And two, the, a lot of'em will get headaches, not necessarily from the adjustment, but from the release and the response. Right. And so it's the, it's, it would be the reactivation of those, those tissues after the adjustment. So we, we definitely have to work with getting that loosened up so they can, they can get the full experience and full relief. So.

Ryan:

Yeah, that would be definitely something helpful to send those kind of patients that are a little bit difficult to diagnose and treat and medicine that could benefit from something like that. For sure. You mentioned headaches, so how do you approach things like migraines, TMJ, or other things like that?

Kerry:

These are, I mean, these are the that's our bread and butter, right? And, and so I, I read one study and it, it was 90 to 95% of all headaches are cervicogenic, right? And so they come from the neck first, which obviously that's one of the things that we specialize in is cervical adjustments, right? That's like, there's tire schools that only teach that. Palmer University is very famous for only teaching cervical adjustments. Not only, but that's their focus, right? They're, they're hyperfocused on that. And so headaches are fun because there's, there's multiple approaches that you can take. One it, and, well, first of all, you need to determine the cause of the headaches, right? And so that's, that's kind of the fun part because sometimes it's as simple of an exposure, right? Whether it's a chemical or physical or trauma, it, it's an exposure, right? So some people are sensitive to certain foods. So my wife is phenomenal with this. She had a patient in school chronic headaches, months and months and months. Went through care, went to, got acupuncture, got physical therapy, got all this stuff. And she was like, well, what are you eating? You know? And you, you're in school so you just eat what you can, right? And so the, she was like, okay, we're gonna eliminate dairy and gluten and see what happens within a week. Headache's completely gone. Right. And so it was just a, it was something he, he was intolerant to. And so it, it could be as simple as an intolerance and an exposure. It could be as complex as a, an auto injury accident that happened 20 years earlier and now it's just rearing its head, And so it really depends. And so for us, it's a multifaceted approach. We want to understand what you're taking in, and then also. Sorry, the, going back, one of the big causes of headaches is just dehydration. So the first thing we say, how much water have you had today? Or when did you last eat too? Those, those are the two big, big important questions for us. so if you're having migraines, we need to know what's causing it.'cause if it if it's restricted blood flow then the adjustment helps instantly, right? Because you're gonna get that it's the same as caffeine, right? You're gonna get increased blood flow immediately to the brain which does reduce the effect of that migraine headache, right? If you have, if you're having tension headaches, the cervical adjustment obviously helps that because the initial response to an adjustment is actually, it sends information to the nerves that tell the muscles to calm down. So we actually stimulate the muscle, tend muscle spindle fibers in the golgi tendon organ through the adjustment because it's so rapid, you can actually get that muscle, that contraction, relaxation complex stimulates the muscle to relax and calm down, which obviously for tension headaches it was very, very beneficial. Now, the TMJ is is very fascinating because a lot of headaches are originating in the jaw, right? And they just come from overactive mastoid processor, the pterygoid. And so there's some, we do a, a pterygoid sweep where we, we glove up and we'll massage out that that pterygoid muscle and that one you gotta be careful with, you know, not just'cause you're next to the teeth and you're like, man, I don't want you to bite down or anything. But but it's, you know, it's often, it, it's incredibly rewarding for people because headaches are debilitating, right? They, they really do. And, and people who experience them know that they know how pa how painful and terrible they are. I, myself, I, I get ophthalmic spasms and about half an hour later I'll have a. I'll have a migraine set on and there's basically nothing I can do to stop it once it starts. So the best thing I've found is ginger. So I do ginger, I get an adjustment and that's the best I can do. So I do. It's funny'cause i, I I don't drink alcohol, but I drink ginger beers'cause they're more, it's more concentrated ginger. And every now and then you'll get a look like, I didn't know you drank. And you're like, well, I drank my ginger. So so yeah, so herbs are, are really, really helpful for things like that too. So we do a lot of herbs and supplements and obviously the, the adjustments are really, really powerful for that. And we adjust the jaw. I have, let's see. I do three or four different adjustments just for the jaw alone and then releasing those muscles. And, and we have a massage therapist we work with who, they're phenomenal. They're the Massage Alchemist I don't mind giving'em a shout out'cause they're, they're some of my best friends, but they, she, she specializes in facial massages, especially TMJ release. And it's, I've had patients that, you know, if I can't get it, I don't mind sending you up the food chain and getting, getting the help you want, you know, and the help you deserves. The big thing is I don't have an ego or man, if I'm not fixing this, then it's no good. Right. I don't mind sending them to somebody to get, get the help you want.'cause that's what I would want for me. Right. Somebody to say, Hey, we're not getting some results here, so let's, let's send you on to this maybe physical therapy, maybe, whatever it is. So, yeah.

Ryan:

Yeah, I mean that's important to, you know, kind of think outside the box, maybe no limitations so that you could work with other providers out there to get the patient the best care that they need. I think that's kind of the idea of, well, hopefully the idea of many of us, why we still practice any sort of type of medicine.

Kerry:

And I think that's kind of one of the things you're doing with this podcast, right? So people know who they can refer to and they can know like, hey, it's not just up to your primary care. Right? Like my, I, I'll be honest, I, I loved my primary care physician and, and he was my, my primary from eight to 26, right? Like, I saw this guy for 20, 20 years and I love him. But he was not the guy for my low back pain, right? He, he really wasn't. He gave me, and that's actually how I got started. Sorry, a little, little sidetrack here. But that's how I got started into chiropractic care. I was in high school, I was playing soccer and I went down awkwardly and I stood up and couldn't stand up. You know, I went to stand up and I was hunched over and I'm like, I'm like 17, dude. I can't be, I can't be in this kind of pain. Went to him and he, he took one look at me and he goes, well, you have scoliosis, but that's not a problem. And I was like, well, it sounds like a problem, you know, that sounds like no good. And then he gave me muscle relaxers for two weeks and he is like, yeah, just take these. You'll be fine. Right? And. Well, a week later I'm not feeling fine. I'm still in tons of pain, but I'm taking this heavy, you know, heavy dose muscle relaxer. My, my schoolwork wasn't going great'cause I was basically high, you know, and so I'm, I'm struggling. And then my mom actually, of all people it took me to took me to the chiropractor for the first time and within two visits I was playing again and I was kinda shocked, like I couldn't believe it. I had no idea. And so it, that's how I got into chiropractic care. I was like, man, there might be something to this, so.

Ryan:

Yeah, that's an amazing story. And of course, you know, obviously I think a lot of chiropractors that I have spoken with have some sort of story like that, right? Where they may have not been getting what they need from traditional medicine and, you know, found a chiropractor. I feel like we could discuss a lot of different things that you guys offer and continue discussing, but tell me like what's a common myth about chiropractic care that you like to bust?

Kerry:

Oh man. Oh, there's, there's a lot of'em. But the, I think the most common one, and the one that bugs me the most is, man, you guys cause strokes. Like, that's, that's one of the one that like, that gets me fired up'cause I'm just like, you know, it's just not that common. Right. Like, you hear about it because. It when it happens, it's rare. Right. And that's the, that's what I always tell people when it happens. It's rare. It's just like shark attacks. You don't hear about'em very often because they don't really happen that often. Right. They do. But, you know and so I, I read an article not too too long ago and they said the incidence of stroke is one in every 3 million adjustments, which is, that's not that much considering less than 12% of the US population has been to a chiropractor. And then I think, I think actively it's closer to four or 5% of the US adults or US population actively go to a chiropractor on a regular basis. So it's not very common. And the, the story I always hear is, I have a friend whose friend works in the ER and their doctor tells them never to get adjusted because they've fixed so many strokes from a chiropractor and, and I just, I don't buy it because I feel like if it was that common, we would hear a lot more about it. And the other thing I always tell people, Hey, look, if, if I was really that dangerous, my, my medical malpractice would be a lot more expensive. If we're just, you know, stroking people out all the time. But that, the other part of that is. The, the other caveat to that is yes, there is danger and risk involved in any procedure, right? Even though we're outside of the body, we're, we're, we're not doing anything internal. We're not doing anything like that. There is risk inherently involved, and that's why we, I was taught, and I'm, I hope all of'em have been taught different techniques and different methods. To avoid those problems. Right. And so we, there are certain tests that, like orthopedic tests that really diminish your risk. And so that's what I, I use those, it, it's funny because you patients that they're like, well, I have low back pain. Why are you checking my neck? And it's like,'cause I'm doing the same test. On everyone, regardless of what they came in with, because I wanna ensure that we're safe, right? And so there are a few tests that I do in the neck for every patient, regardless of what their pain is, just because I wanna be safe. And so that's my, the biggest myth is that we cause all these strokes and, and all these issues and, and I just. I don't see it. Right. I, I haven't seen it and I've done, I calculated it once in five years of practice. I've done over 25,000 adjustments. And so it's just, I, I don't think it's as common as, as your neighbor would say it is. And, and that's, I, I think the other myth is that we can't work together with MDs. That we're at battle. And what that really is. It's the individuals who think that chiropractic is the one all be all. They're the ones that are at battle with the MDs. Right. And for me, I have lots of friends that are DOs, that are MDs that are, that I work with Ortho, you know, orthos are, are really, really important to me because that's what I specialize in is orthopedic conditions especially shoulders, hips, and knees. Like that's well and ankle. I say ortho, I do it all right. I do all of the joints. That's, that's my thing is the extremities are, are kind of my, my bread and butter. So yeah, it's important and vital for me to work with orthopedic surgeons that know and understand the body. And so I'm not battle with any of them. So that's, that's one of the common myths that I hear. And I guess it is kind of true to an extent, but I, I want it to be gone. Right? Because I think we, we are all part of the continuum, and the best part is taking care of patients. That's what it matters. It doesn't matter who does it, right.

Ryan:

No, I agree. I think there is this like disconnect between the different professions, if you will. And I think when we talk to your wife next week, we'll, you know, hear a lot more that you guys are I guess I say you guys, but you know what I mean you're able to bring practice more than, you know, perhaps we are in traditional medicine just because of the rules, I guess, you know, we have to follow and things like that. So that'll definitely be an enlightening conversation on the functional medicine side of things too. But what, what other things would you like to leave with the listeners today? Any words of advice, and then I will obviously ask where can they find you?

Kerry:

Okay. Yeah, so I, I think a, a few of the important things are in, in my career. So I started off so I, I went to Brigham Young university and got my undergraduate degree in exercise and wellness. Because I wanted to specifically learn more about the body and the mind and how they interact, right? And how they go back and forth. And one of my favorite courses was Mind, body, spirit. And, and it talked about the relationship between your thoughts, your beliefs, and your feelings and your emotions. And it is very interesting because those thoughts and beliefs and emotions have physical manifestations, right? And that's, it's, it's true people that are chronically sick I find a lot of times they have a psychological connection to those, those pains. And there are patients we've tried and we've done everything we can to get better and we just finally, we just say. Look there, there's something here like a barrier and it's mental, you know, that, that's stopping us. And so I, I think the beautiful thing about chiropractic is that it, it kind of addresses in a fashion all three facets of that, your mind, your body, and your spirit. Which is, which is a beautiful thing. I think it is, it is incredibly powerful when you can connect with people on a personal level. And that's, that's something I get asked all the time is why do your patients talk to you? And I was like, well, first of all, I listen. So that's, that's a big one. But I mean, for me, I create an environment where they want to talk. And it's funny'cause I have a list of dad jokes that I share with people when they walk in just to break ice, right? Like I just, I love telling dad jokes. It's just fun for me. So it's a way to break ice and, and get them to open up to me. And me specifically. I don't, I like, I'm not trying to toot my own horn, but it's just something I do to get people to open up. But the big thing in my experience,'cause I graduated with the exercise and wellness and I went and worked at a physical therapy clinic for a couple years. I actually managed a, a therapy clinic in Memphis, Tennessee where we did speech therapy, occupational therapy, and physical therapy. I thought I wanted to go into physical therapy, so it was a perfect fit. And as I was there, I was a, it was a retirement community and we had all levels of care. So we had a memory unit, we had a skilled nursing facility, assisted living and independent living. And it was, it was like an in-house thing, so you could actually, the people who were in independent could go to assisted when they needed it and then go to skilled nursing if they needed that. Right? So you could go up and you had priority. So it was, it was an amazing thing. But I, I, I will never forget this lesson that I learned really, really young. The people who were engaged performed better 100% of the time. It wasn't 50% of the time, it wasn't 25% of the time. The people who were engaged, they went to bridge, they went to the pumpkin carving activities in the fall, they went to the, the dances that they had, they got better quicker if they ever had a setback. And that's, that's kind of been my theory and my, my approach to chiropractic care is. Get, get active, stay active, stay busy. People are like, you need to rest, you need to recover. Yeah. There's, there's truth to that, but I believe in active recovery. That's what I want. And, and so when I, when I adjust people, and this happens all the time, they're like, oh man, my chiropractor told me not to move after my adjustment. I'm like, no, no. That's terrible. You, we need you to move.'cause we need those muscles to get engaged. We need you to, to function. Or after an injury, they're like, oh, I don't wanna use that. I don't, I don't wanna hurt it. And I'm like, well, no, you, you have to use it now because if you don't then it's gonna become a problem in the long run. And so I, it's, there's one lady in particular that I just, I'll never forget her because we had this test that we performed, and it was just, it was a series of six or seven tests. It was like the up and go test. The, we had a squat test, like they would squat to a chair up and down for 30 seconds, see what many they could do. She crushed everybody and, and everybody hated her. Right. And it was just so funny because all the, all the people in the, in the building hated her because she was active. Like she would wake up in the morning, she would go walk around the campus. When she would finish that, she would go swim 10, you know, 10 laps or whatever it was. And she was always constantly engaged. Well, she had a trip and fall. She recovered 90% faster than anybody else I had ever seen recover from a similar injury. And it was just astounding to me that she had prepared her body for that. And that's, that's the thing that I love, is we prepare your body whether you believe that chiropractic care is preventing something or if it's helping you to perform better. It's, it's helping your body. Right? And that's, that's the beautiful thing is it's, it's gonna enable you to keep doing what you want to do.

Ryan:

Yeah, I so many, so many good comments that you just said there. I don't know if I can comment on it all, but well, one you were talking about like physical engagement, like moving and being active, and then the social engagement. I think that part is super important too. Like you said, patients and people who, as they grow old that do that social engagement do tend to do better. I mean, we know it from, you know, the blue zones and the longevity studies. Everybody is, you know, very more social active and has, has better you know, less risk for dementia and less risk for, or better recovery, like you said too. And then as far as recovery, I mean, obviously being in your best health before you have an injury or clearly best, like if you're gonna be on a hospital bed for three days or something, you'd lose so much muscle mass. And if, if you had something to begin with, you're gonna be doing better, obviously. But. Those are, that's a really good course that seems like you had back at BYU. So that is a great early time, like you said, to be learning those lessons. I don't feel like everybody comes across those kind of I guess experiences, thoughts, training programs for that. So that's really neat. any last words where could people find you to work with you guys?

Kerry:

Yeah. Excellent. So yeah, we are the Chiropractic Spa, so I'm Dr. Ryan and my wife's Dr. Robin, and she'll be on here next week, so that's exciting. And so I get to watch her podcast and see what she says about me or whatever. But we're, yeah, so we're conveniently in Dunedin we're located right between Palm Harbor and Dunedin right on Curlew. You probably passed us by a million times. You can call us or you can book online. It's, it's really, really streamlined. It's just the chiropractic spa.com. So it's really, really easy and functional and it's a great website. And the, the big thing I just leave with people is movement it really is and I think I sent this to you in the the email that movement is medicine. It really is. It, and function is medicine because it, when you move, you feel better. And, and like, have you ever been sick and been at home for a couple days? You automatically feel better just going outside for 10 minutes, right? Like, it just helps. And so I, I think of that in so many different scenarios in, in life, in, in function, in work, the people who move, feel better, function better, perform better. So

Ryan:

I agree. I I do have one more question. What is your dad joke?

Kerry:

Oh man, my favorite dad joke. I, I mean, I've got a couple loaded up, ready to go. I, I heard one of my, one of my favorites is, why is it so expensive to fill up your tires? Inflation.

Ryan:

Oh.

Kerry:

And then, you know, the one that that's more recent is, have you heard about the, the new corduroy Pillows? Oh man, I am surprised you haven't heard of'em'cause they're making headlines. Nobody knows about corduroys anymore. They're the pants with the lion in'em. So yeah. So that's a li You gotta, you gotta have a little memory of corduroys from the seventies there.

Ryan:

my daughter's very into the dad jokes, and sometimes it just takes me a pause to get them, and so.

Kerry:

Well, I'll give you one more for her then. All right. Somebody broke into my house and they stole all my fruit the other day. I'm peachless.

Ryan:

Oh, that's good. That's more of her alley. Yeah.

Kerry:

Perfect.

Ryan:

All right, well thanks everybody for tuning in. Thank you so much Dr. Klepko for coming on the podcast today. And please tune in next week for next week's episode and I think it will probably be Robin Klepko.

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Dr. Kerry Reller

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