Good Neighbor Podcast South Charlotte
Bringing Together Local Businesses and Neighbors of South Charlotte.
Good Neighbor Podcast South Charlotte
Ep. # 134 Unlocking Health: How Chiropractic Care Prevents Problems Before They Start
Wondering if you should wait for pain before seeing a chiropractor? Dr. Kyle Jones challenges this common misconception, revealing why early intervention and regular maintenance are keys to spinal health.
Most people visit a chiropractor only after exhausting other options, often months or years after their injuries occur. Dr. Jones explains why this approach makes recovery significantly harder for both patient and provider. Drawing a compelling parallel between spinal health and dental care, he asks: why do we accept routine teeth cleanings but wait for pain before addressing our spine? The research is clear – chiropractic adjustments every four weeks provide optimal benefits for preventing issues before they escalate.
What many don't realize is that finding the right chiropractor matters tremendously. Dr. Jones specializes in spinal disc disorders, equipped with advanced technologies like decompression tables and class four lasers. Other practitioners focus on pediatrics, pregnancy care, or functional medicine. A quick call to inquire about office specialties can match you with the right provider for your specific needs. The assessment process is thorough and science-based, designed to identify underlying issues that might hover just below your pain threshold. These "weak points" often flare up during times of emotional, chemical, or physical stress – but with regular maintenance, they can be moved further from that threshold back toward optimal function.
Ready to rethink your approach to spinal health? Listen now to discover how chiropractic care fits into a comprehensive wellness strategy that keeps your nervous system functioning optimally. Your body's mechanic is waiting to help you move better and feel better – don't wait until you're broken down on the side of the road!
Carolinas Chiropractic and Spinal Rehab
Dr. Kyle Jones
Waxhaw Office
(704) 243-1010
101G Waxhaw Professional Park Dr
Waxhaw, NC 28173
Pineville Office
(704) 243-1010
11940 Carolina Pl Pkwy Suite 102
Pineville, NC 28134
contactus@carolinaschiropractic.com
carolinaschiropractic.com
This is the Good Neighbor Podcast, the place where local businesses and neighbors come together. Here's your host, Regina Lee.
Speaker 2:Good morning everyone and welcome to another episode of the Good Neighbor Podcast, and I'm super excited today to talk to a doctor that I know personally, and it's Dr Kyle Jones from Carolinas Chiropractic and Spinal Rehab in Waxhaw and Pineville. Welcome, dr Kyle.
Speaker 3:Thanks for having me, Regina.
Speaker 2:Absolutely. I think this is our third or fourth episode, so I'm really excited to get you back on and talk to you a little bit about spinal rehab. And you know, I was just thinking to myself my first visit to a chiropractor was pretty scary. Do you run into that a lot, where people just really don't understand what to expect and don't understand when they should see one?
Speaker 3:Absolutely, and I'm glad you brought it up because I mean, ultimately, when you look at the research, we're one of the safest forms of healthcare there is, and so, if you're willing to get in your car and drive to our office, you should not have any concerns once you get to our office, because what we do inside of the office, like I said, is extremely safe.
Speaker 3:It's researched, non-invasive and, ultimately, extremely effective.
Speaker 3:And so, you know, I continue to my hope as we continue to go forward, and one of the reasons that I love to do things like this is because I can share information with people to ultimately help them make good quality decisions. And we continue to do to. Yes, we do have people that come to us as first line of defense if they do have an acute back pain, acute neck pain, but we also get those people that have failed every other form of health care, and there they get to us three and six months a year later down the road, and it makes our job and their job very difficult. And so, yeah, we're willing to help them and a lot of times we're successful, but we're the most successful whenever people utilize us early in the injury phase or even as a prevention I mean honestly, chiropractic is the most effective at preventing, where you stay on top of something to avoid injury or avoid injury all together, or if the injury takes place. It shows that basically you recover faster and your actual duration of the problem is significantly less.
Speaker 2:Well, let's say you're not dealing with an injury. What would be some early warning signs that people sometimes overlook and you go? You know this is the time you should come.
Speaker 3:I mean honestly, if you have a spine, you should come, but it's the same thing with a dentist. Is that you know? We no longer question when we should have our teeth cleaned, right? You get your teeth cleaned every six months. It starts when you're young and it's just a part of who we are as an overall health and wellness regimen.
Speaker 3:Routine Chiropractic care is the same way is that our spine is extremely resilient. It's amazing at what it's able to accomplish. But if you think about the positions we're in or the activities that we partake in throughout our day, you do cause stress and strain on different areas, and so the chiropractor can evaluate those. We can determine areas of the spine that aren't functioning correctly. We can restore normal function and then, ultimately, one, prevent you from having an issue or two, prevent it from amounting to where it does become a chronic issue later in your life, and so that's where we try to make sure that everybody understands that you just you want to take. You only get one body, you know, and we're basically a body mechanic, and so you just need to do that oil change, you know, every 5000 miles. It's a good thing to have a chiropractic adjustment multiple times a year, whether that's monthly or quarterly, the research shows that every four weeks is probably the most beneficial. So that's kind of where we are.
Speaker 2:So how would you recommend someone go about finding the right chiropractor for them?
Speaker 3:You know, all of us are trained. The beauty about the state of North Carolina is it's the one of the most difficult states to get licensed in as a chiropractor, and that benefited us tremendously during COVID is because we have physician status in the state of North Carolina, so they couldn't shut us down unless they were shutting down all of healthcare where other states don't have physician status because of the requirements that it takes to become licensed in those states, and so ultimately they were treated like let's call it like a massage therapist and they were shut down during COVID, which was a huge disservice to patients because they didn't have anywhere to go with a lot of these musculoskeletal issues. But I guess the reason I'm sharing that with you is because all chiropractors that are licensed in the state of North Carolina are qualified to evaluate you and provide treatment. The one thing that I see is that Chiropractors have different. Every individual chiropractic physician has a different specialty and a different passion. Right, and so for me, I love spinal disc disorders. It's what I've built my practices on and it's what we have. You know we have the equipment to withstand that with spinal decompression tables, flexion distraction tables. We have the class four laser in order to help with acute pain. We have the class four laser in order to help with acute pain, whereas somebody else may be more into a holistic type of treatment where they're doing more functional medicine, nutrition and just wellness.
Speaker 3:We've had providers in our office over the years that prefer pediatrics or pregnancy, and so I guess the way that I'm trying to share is it's not should you try a chiropractor, it's finding the right chiropractor for your current problem, and that just takes where you know. You call the office, you ask them what, what is this, what type of office is this and what type of conditions do they prefer to treat? And usually the front desk is very well versed on these types of questions. Because, because, ultimately, not only do we want, we want the right people to fill our office, that's we're. We're kind of selfish. I mean we like to do what we like to do. Right, I learned very early on I love kids. I have two of my own, but I don't want to fill my office treating pediatric patients. That's not what I. It's not what my passion is. My passion is spinal rehab in cases with, you know, degenerative spines or disc issues and things of that sort.
Speaker 2:So describe if you come in and you're back. You know not feeling great, but you don't know what's wrong. Describe your process of assessing what's going on with the patient. Yeah, you're going to, it's going to feel very much like a standard medical office.
Speaker 3:You know you're going to come in, there's going to be intake paperwork, you're going to meet with our clinical staff in order to get vitals and then a brief history, and then you know the doctor will come in, discuss your, your full health history. People all the time they're like I don't need to give you that information, I'm just here for an adjustment. Well, we're a health care provider, I need it all, and so if you truly want me to help you, then I'm going to need as much information as you have, because it does matter. And you know, like I said, we're we're chiropractic physicians and we're here to treat the whole process, but anyway. So we take the history and then we do a thorough examination, which includes orthopedic neurological tests and then x-rays if necessary, which obviously it's. It's very beneficial to be able to see what we're looking at, but not always a requirement. And then it's the discussion with the patient of how do we approach this type of thing.
Speaker 3:You know, the biggest thing when we're talking about truly healing the body, it takes time. It doesn't matter what you do. If you have a cut on your hand, you're looking at two, three, four weeks for it to fully heal. That's healing that takes time, right. And you're looking at two, three, four weeks for it to fully heal. That's healing that takes time, right. There's no medication you can take. That's going to make a cut go away tomorrow. And so that's what I try to explain to people is, usually I can get them better if they're willing to give me the time, because if we restore normal function to the spine, we teach them lifestyle modifications on ways to sit and ways to stand. That tissue can heal from the inside out. So, and then it goes through into a treatment process where we start, you know, implementing our specific treatment modalities that we have in the office.
Speaker 2:Well, you know, as a patient I've learned it's definitely not a one and done kind of thing and I have actually gone in years ago where I felt like my back was locked up and you know you want to have that immediate relief. But what you just shared, it's a process. And then you know you are really into the maintenance because I know you lead a very healthy lifestyle. So how does regular chiropractic care integrate with that healthy lifestyle?
Speaker 3:No, that's a great question. And so you know, just to reiterate your point, when you were locked up, your muscles were spasming, protecting an underlying injury is that there's nothing wrong with your muscles. They were actually doing exactly what they are supposed to do. They lock you down so you quit moving that segment, so you don't continue to hurt yourself worse, right? And so what we need to do is slowly reinstall normal function to that area. So then the muscles go back to what they're supposed to do, and that's relax. You know, counterparts in health care will immediately give you a muscle relaxer and tell that muscle to shut off. That muscle is doing what it was designed to do, and so if you shut that muscle spasm off, then the function of that muscle spasm off, then the function of that that you know, without the function being restored yet, is that then that motion segment is taking on the, the major pressure again, uh, too early, and so you can cause further damage down the line. Um, so I'm so glad that you got it restored the way that it was supposed to. Okay, so how does you know? Once we resolve the issue, well, then we go into maintenance mode, and that's to hopefully prevent this problem from ever, uh, surfacing in the first place Right. And how does that combine with overall wellness maintenance?
Speaker 3:Um, or just a health model? The body's meant to move. It's very, very simple. We can't be stagnant, we have to be mobile Right. And so, um, the best movement is medicine. Everybody's heard that term or that saying or whatever and so that's all we're doing is we're maintaining normal function and normal motion to your spine. Your spine is a series of joints. They don't have direct blood supply, and so a lot of them don't, and then the discs don't have direct blood supply. So we, as we move them, as we keep them unlocked, then ultimately they're able to keep themselves healthy the way that they were designed. If, for instance, one of those segments along your spine starts to lock up or not move correctly, then you're susceptible to injury. There's nerves that come out of that area, so then the nerve irritation can cause nerve compression, which prevents the communication to that body part, wherever it's traveling. So that's where the overall systemic wellness comes, is that we basically keep your spine, which ultimately affects your nervous system, functioning the way that it's supposed to.
Speaker 2:I've always felt stress is a big trigger for me and the locking up you know how do you deal with that with a patient.
Speaker 3:That's what triggers your actual injury, or you get in pain, the tightness.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and you know there there are many types of stress chemical, physical, emotional, right and I think if you're breathing in the United States, you probably have a lot of that. It's just the way that we are. We're all trying to do bigger and better and all those types of things and then throw on some physical stress, whether it's physical activity, repetitive movements or stuck at a desk all day. We have all kinds of physical stressors that are taking place and yeah they they. Your body has weak points. And yeah they they.
Speaker 3:Your body has weak points and very commonly, whether it's from you know, the way that you use it or if the way that you have an injury prior in your past Basically we see this over and over and over is when somebody goes through an emotional stressful period of their lives or a chemical stressful period of their lives where they're not eating correctly or they're consuming much alcohol or they're exposed to environmental toxins or whatever it may be.
Speaker 3:It's amazing how those weak points are the ones that always become. You know it's it's the chronic areas that constantly flare up Right, and the way I describe this to people is you know, pain is is just an indicator. It's, it's an alarm system, and so it's not a predictor of of true health of something, because you can, you can actually um, live just below that pain threshold, but the function of that area is not good, or the the the overall health of that area is not great. So the reason I'm telling you this is because those areas that you're talking about, those weak points, they live just below the pain threshold at all times. And then once you have that chemical stressor, that emotional stressor, that physical stressor, it immediately bumps you back above that pain threshold. And now, all of a sudden, it kicks in and you're like I've got a problem again. Well, that problem's always been there.
Speaker 2:That makes a lot of sense. I think you've just described me.
Speaker 3:And that's that's why maintenance is so important, is because we identify those areas and we keep moving it further away from that pain threshold back into health.
Speaker 2:What do you love most about what you do, Dr Kyle?
Speaker 3:All of it. I'm just passionate about helping people and the you know. I think that there's a ton of opportunities to be able to provide people with not only information, but also just a path guidance. You know, if we can put them on the right path in order to get them where they need to be to be able to be as healthy as possible and live the life that they want to.
Speaker 3:And I just was training a new staff member this morning and I explained to him is that we can't help everyone, but we can help everyone, and so what I mean by that is, every person that walks in our office is not a chiropractic patient. Fortunately, we only refer out about 5%, but we can actually help every single one of them, because if they're not supposed to be in our office, we can get them where they need to be. And that's why I feel that the chiropractor is the best place to start is because it's a conservative form of treatment. We have great success. It's very safe, but we also have the knowledge to diagnose, order further imaging or refer you to somewhere that you need to go, whether that means it's back to the primary care physician or off to a neurosurgeon or physiatrist or orthopedist, whoever that may be.
Speaker 2:Well, I've been super impressed with your staff, from the front desk to the doctors that I've worked with. They spend time with you and I can see where they get their knowledge and passion from. Thank you so much for today. I really appreciate your time.
Speaker 3:Oh, I love being here. Regina, thanks for having me, absolutely. Thank you for listening to the Good Neighbor.
Speaker 1:Podcast. Thank you for listening to the Good Neighbor Podcast. To nominate your favorite local businesses to be featured on the show, go to GNPSouthCharlotte. com. No-transcript.