How We Help with Scoliosis Pain

Scoliosis is a condition that is very near and dear to me.  If it weren’t for my own scoliosis, I wouldn’t be a chiropractor.  Because of the pain relief and improved function I received thanks to the NUCCA chiropractic method, I chose to make NUCCA my life’s work.

Most cases of Scoliosis are said to be idiopathic, meaning they don’t know what causes it.  However, I’ve come across a couple studies that showed when rats’ and rabbits’ (poor critters!) side-most part of their brainstems are intentionally injured, there is a high correlation of of Scoliosis development, even though they’re not walking around upright like you and me.

Our work is NOT known for straightening Scoliosis curves; however our work is very effective at correcting a small misalignment in the top of the neck.

It just so happens that the most common way for the top vertebra in the spine (called the atlas or C1 vertebra) to misalign, is by a side-slipping motion along the joints of the skull.  This may cause an interruption in the nerve signaling of the side-most part of the brainstem.

This is important for the scoliosis sufferer because it is the side-most part of the brainstem (called the “spinocerebellar tract”) that controls the tonality of the muscles that run longitudinally up and down both sides of your spine.  At our clinic we often explain this biology by making two references:

• The spine is like a string puppet.  The crossbar at the top of the puppet is like the top bone in the spine; when it is moved, the strings or muscles going all the way down the spine immediately changes
• You were formed from the top-to-the-bottom, unlike the building you’re in right now.  Therefore, like a Roman archway, the most important engineering concept in the spine is to know the shapes of the surfaces of the top/key stone and make sure it is in the correct place
• Just like a guitar, when the spine is out of tune, you don’t bother with the middle of the string; you go to the top of the guitar to fine-tune the tension and sound of the strings

Most peoples’ scoliosis is the result of conflicting or confusing nerve signals which often result as a compensation for nerve interference occurring at the level of the brainstem.  There may be other factors involved in most cases of Scoliosis but a trend that we see immediately after the adjustment is the leg length discrepancy and hip tilt (due to unequal tensions side to side in the spine) normalizing, even though we’re applying the spinal adjustment to the opposite end of the body.