Athletes

Many professional athletes choose to incorporate chiropractic care into their training routine as they feel that it helps enhance their athletic performance. While most of us do not compete at this level of competition, it doesn't mean that we cannot benefit from chiropractic care. Our office provides several services that can help athletes of any level.

Spinal Adjusting - maintaining balance within the spinal column enhances athletic performance in several ways.

• Structurally - When your spine is aligned properly, the extremities are able to function as they are designed and do not need to compensate from poor alignment.
• Muscle Balance - once the spine is properly aligned, then the muscles can develop with appropriate symmetry and balance.
• Muscle Strength - with the structural and muscular systems balanced, then the muscles can develop optimally and to their highest functional potential.

Trigger Point Therapy - Poor postural positions or assuming positions that are not ideal create stress within the muscles that can cause trigger points to develop. These trigger points can cause local pain, referred pain (pain felt in other parts of the body) and decrease muscle function. Trigger point therapy can help reduce these trigger points and help restore the body back to a more normal level.

Active Release Technique - Muscles are constantly being stressed, strained and injured, but have the capacity to regenerate and heal. The problem is that the body is not designed to heal the most efficiently, but rather in the quickest manner so that you can survive - the end result are small adhesions within the muscle fibers that prevent the muscles from functioning up to their highest potential. Active release technique is a method of combining deep muscle work with the normal ranges of motions that muscles and joints are designed to function within, and is very effective at restoring near normal muscle function. Athletes tend to prefer this type of treatment so that they can realize the highest potential that their body can perform at.

Stretching - A global assessment of the body can identify which muscles need to be strengthened (shortened) and which muscles need to be stretched (lengthened). Specific analysis and treatment can help balance the body quicker and increase your athletic performance.

Extremity Adjusting - one thing that separates our office from other offices is that Dr. Tom has specialized in adjusting extremities - a treatment option that assesses whether the joints of the body are working within their proper range of motion. Often times, athletes will encounter an injury which will fixate a particular joint. This creates a strain on the joints and causes the surrounding muscles and joints to compensate, preventing optimal performance. Chronic shoulder problems and repeated sprained ankles are the classic examples of this condition being present, but this can happen in any joint of the body.