You’ve traded your commute for a laptop on the dining room table. It’s not perfect but it works. And so do you…
Sometimes you sit too long, and your neck aches.
Or you “move funny”, or over-do-it on that project that’s been waiting for you to be at home this much. And your back aches.
But you can live with it…
Sometimes the aches and pains stick around, and you live with it. I mean… stuff’s gotta get done…, right?
Chronic pain typically means pain that sticks around longer than 3 months.
As it happens, chronic back pain and chronic neck pain are the most common types of chronic pain.
When pain interferes with the activities you want to do, like swinging a golf club, or picking up the kids, it becomes harder to just live with it.
Pain reduction with Chiropractic care of course is part of the equation. What about quality of life..?
A significant study looked at people receiving chiropractic care in the US for chronic low back or neck pain. It was published in the journal Spine – one of the most prestigious medical journals there is.
Using patient reported outcomes (asking the patients themselves) they looked at pain interference on quality of life in six areas:
– physical functioning,
– fatigue,
– depressive symptoms,
– anxiety,
– ability to participate in social roles activities,
– sleep disturbances.
The researchers found on average significant improvements in all quality of life areas, except emotional distress, in patients with chronic back or neck pain who use Chiropractic care. The largest improvements were in pain and sleep disturbance.
Studies like this are always better at looking the effectiveness of a treatment on average. Individual results vary, and certainly not everyone responded with the same improvements. And studies in general become more valuable in the context of other published research. The value of this study is that it does help us to understand the characteristics of people who are successfully managing their chronic low back pain and chronic neck pain.
Incidentally, over 90% of the people surveyed reported that they were highly satisfied with their Chiropractic care.
The activities you do are your business.
Helping you stay active is ours.
Downsview Chiropractic.
Your life. Lived well™.
Hays RD, Spritzer KL, Sherbourne CD, Ryan GW, Coulter ID. Group and Individual-level Change on Health-related Quality of Life in Chiropractic Patients With Chronic Low Back or Neck Pain. Spine (Phila Pa 1976). 2019;44(9):647-651. doi:10.1097/BRS.0000000000002902