Archive for the ‘Dr. John's Blog’ Category

Have you ever heard someone say they have aches and pains because they are old?  Have you ever had an ache in your knee and said to yourself, I’m too old?  Why does aging automatically mean we have to put up with hurting all day?  It’s a common excuse in today’s world.  “I hurt because of my age” “I’m too old to do that.”  I hear these comments constantly.  And when I hear this I think of one person, Jack LaLanne.  Jack LaLanne is known as the “Godfather of Fitness” and he also happens to be a chiropractor.  Jack admits that he was addicted to sugar and junk foods in his youth.  At the age of 14 he became ill.  His mother brought him to a lecture by nutritionist Paul Bragg.  After hearing that lecture, Jack dedicated himself to eating right and exercising.  He purchased a copy of Gray’s Anatomy textbook and read it cover to cover.  He began to develop exercises and his health and fitness career is well known history from there.  Jack is now 95 years old and still writing on health and fitness.  If you look up his achievements, you will see numerous awards and feats of strength he’s performed even at age 70.  At age 70, for example, handcuffed, shackled and fighting strong winds and currents, Jack towed 70 boats with 70 people from the Queen’s Way Bridge in the Long Beach Harbor to the Queen Mary, 1 ½ miles.  At age 70, he performed a feat that most people of any age could not accomplish.

I do not suggest duplicating Dr. LaLanne’s feats of strength.  I do use him as an example that old age doesn’t mean you have to constantly be in pain.  Jack has be staying healthy and fit for 81 years; however, no matter what age you are, health and wellness can begin right now.  Eating right, exercising, and living better day-to-day are the Fountain of Youth.  Use people like Jack LaLanne as motivation and ask a chiropractor and/or fitness expert about how you can take the first step to living healthier and living longer.

I often have people come up to me and say that they have a wrist problem, but they “know that chiropractors just work on the back and neck.”  Usually my response is that isn’t true.  Doctors of Chiropractic are trained to diagnose and treat ailments of the human body without the use of pharmaceuticals or surgery.  Many chiropractors practice physical medicine.  Physical medicine can be described as conditions of the skeleton like joint pain or muscular conditions such as sprains, headaches, or low back pain.  However, there are also chiropractors that do practice internal medicine.  They may use nutritional counseling and supplementation to treat conditions like high cholesterol or the common cold.

At Ducat Chiropractic and Wellness Center, we specialize in physical medicine.  We are a sports medicine facility that uses active care (i.e. physical therapy) to treat a wide variety of conditions from Achilles tendonitis to chronic neck pain.  Oddly enough, while most think of chiropractors as “back doctors,” we see an equal number of arm or leg conditions, if not more, compared to low back or neck.

Consider this: there are 206 bones in the adult human body which means there are a lot of joints.  There are 27 bones in each hand and 26 bones in each foot.  If you do the math that means about 51% of our bones are in the hands and feet.  There are about 640 muscles in the human body and the majority of those cross over joints to allow movement to occur.  Needless to say, if chiropractors only treated backs, we would be missing out on the many, many ailments of the body that have nothing to do with the spine.

Everyone hears about what kind of fats to eat, what kind of carbohydrates to eat and how much protein we should get in our diets, but how to avoid harmful additives in our foods is not often discussed.  These days, it’s very hard to eat something that has not gone through some form of processing.  Unless you raise your own chickens and grow your own crops, you would have to rely on getting your food from your local grocery stores.  But how can you decide what is good and what is bad?

There are numerous books and articles that discuss how to eat right by avoiding chemicals put into foods.  This can be tedious and, unless you’re the farmer I spoke of above, hard to avoid all together.  Here are some things to remember when picking out your food.

1. If it’s in the aisles, be cautious.  Most of the items found within the aisles are the highly-processed and preserved foods.  Try to stick to the outside perimeter of the store where the produce and deli departments are located and go into the aisles only for your breads and nuts.
2. Avoid frozen dinners.  Notice I didn’t say frozen food.  Frozen dinners means the meals that are prepared and only need microwaving to be cooked.  These meals may be fast, but they are generally loaded with chemical preservatives.
3. Flip the box around.  I hear some joke about the shoppers that take the time to read food labels.  I do it!  If there is a laundry list of ingredients that takes up half the box, I avoid that item.  And…
4. If I can’t pronounce it, I don’t want to eat it.  Butylated hydroxytoluene may sound catchy, but it does not sound delicious at all.

I shop following those rules and some others.  Another important thing to remember is try different things.  Adding variety to your diet keeps things from becoming boring and repetitive.  Add color to your diet with various fruits and vegetables.  If you worry about how those items are grown, you can ask the store manager where they get their produce and ask them about their use of pesticides and chemicals.  Lastly, nutrition is a complicated topic.  Seek the advice of professionals like a licensed dietician, registered nutritionist, or a doctor of chiropractic like myself.

One of the most common mistakes I see with any exercise is the speed of the movement. I’m often asked why it matters and how fast should the movement be. What does it matter if I’m still getting a good burn? The speed of exercise is important for a number of different reasons. For one, inappropriate speed can lead to injury. Without proper control of the resistance muscles, tendons, and ligaments can be injured. Also, using the appropriate cadence while exercising is the best way to build muscle size and strength and create an effective workout.

There are two phases of contraction for every muscle: concentric and eccentric. Concentric is the shortening phase, eccentric is the lengthening phase. The typical weight lifter is very familiar with the concentric or shortening phase. It’s the phase where we show off our muscles. Think about when you flex your biceps and you can see the muscle bulking in the middle of your arm; that’s the concentric phase. The eccentric or lengthening phase is often overlooked and is typically where injuries occur. We are stronger in the eccentric phase than in the concentric phase. This is illustrated when you see someone performing “negative” repetitions during the bench press. That lifter will pile on more weight than they can press, so instead of pushing they simply resist the weight coming down on them. The eccentric phase is all about controlling the resistance. By letting the weight take over and push you back to the starting point, you increase the risk of injury. Therefore, speed of exercise is essential.

Now the question is: what is the right speed? There are a number of different resources that will give you a number of different answers. There is even a new fad in some gyms that teach extremely slow movements. The thing to remember is to be in control of the resistance at all times. Maintain proper form and do not break it. Move in a fluid pattern and do not allow extraneous movements to occur (e.g. extending your back to aid a bicep curl). Lastly, always remember to use the appropriate resistance. Choose a weight that allows you to perform a set of 10-12 repetitions. If you can’t get to 10, the weight is too much. If you get to 12 and don’t feel challenged, the weight is too little. The most important thing to remember is to always be in control of the resistance in either phase. It’s the difference between results and injury.