Nobody wants to be in a car accident, but if you are in one, you probably want to do everything you can to recover as quickly as possible. Most of us have jobs and family to support, so the longer we are injured, the worse it is. Taking care of your injuries and improving the speed of your recovery needs to be a main concern, but many of us don’t know what to do after an accident to get better.
While we all know to go to the ER or doctor after our accident to get our injuries checked out, you might be surprised to learn that one of the most helpful places you can visit after a car accident is the chiropractor. In fact, there are several ways that a chiropractor can accelerate your recovery after a car accident.
Why See a Chiropractor After Your Car Accident?
The injuries you can suffer from a car accident can be quite severe and even life altering. What you might not realize though is that many of the injuries that people suffer are related to the joints, their position and alignment, and the structures that support the skeletal system. While a doctor may be able to diagnose many of your injuries and prescribe some forms of treatment, chiropractors are specialized in taking care of the joints and fixing problems that occur with them.
In fact, your doctor may refer you to a chiropractor to help manage and treat some of the injuries you have after your car accident rather than just using medications alone. Chiropractic care can even sometimes be used in combination with rehabilitation to help improve the movement and function of joints and ligaments to speed overall recovery.
Types of Injuries a Chiropractor Can Treat
Here are some of the different injury types that your chiropractor may be able to treat:
Whiplash
Whiplash, one of the most common car accident injuries in Colorado, occurs when the force of an accident suddenly jerks the neck forward and then backward. This causes pain and extension of the vertebrae in the neck and can cause a wide variety of symptoms if left untreated. A chiropractor can help realign the vertebrae and take tension off of the muscles and ligaments to relieve pain and restore function.
Disc Compression
Sudden impacts in a car crash can cause discs in the back to become smashed together. Over time this speeds up the rate at which the cartilage in the vertebral spaces diminishes. If left untreated completely, it can lead to disc fusion, pinched nerves, even pain radiating from one area of the back or the neck. By realigning the vertebrae and stretching the back, the chiropractor can reduce the disc compression and relieve symptoms like pain, nerve tingling and joint compression.
Herniated or Bulging Discs
A herniated or bulging disc occurs when one of the spinal vertebrae is pushed out of place by a hard impact, outside force, or trauma. A chiropractor is especially well suited to treating this condition because they know just how to manipulate the vertebrae to reposition them to provide relief of pain and other symptoms.
Pinched Nerves
Pinched nerves occur most often when the space between a nerve and the bone becomes too narrow and the nerve gets squeezed or “pinched”. This is most common along the spinal column, where the vertebrae can be pushed out of position and put pressure on the spinal cord. This can have a wide range of effects on the body from pain to numbness and tingling. A chiropractor is well suited to treating this condition as chiropractic adjustments can relieve the pressure and reposition the vertebrae, unpinching a nerve and restoring function. These are just a few of the ways that a chiropractor can help accelerate the healing process after you have been injured in a car accident.
Written by guest writer, Bryce Laney.