Pain can disrupt our entire lives, impacting everything from our jobs to our relationships.

But too often, getting relief is a challenge.

Next, on health matters, we're sitting down with local experts to learn about alternative ways to treat and end pain.

I'm Aaron Luna.

Alternative pain treatments are usually a last resort or even considered a luxury for some.

But what if they weren't?

Tonight we're exploring how things like chiropractic care can not only treat pain, but stop it before it starts.

Joining us tonight, Certified Structural Integrator Emily Jones and doctor Amanda Clark, a chiropractor with The Adjustmeant Chiropractic.

Thank you for being here.

Let's start by diving into what each of these treatments really are.

Emily, let's start with you.

Structural integration.

Probably not something most of us are familiar with.

Can you explain it to us?

Yeah.

So structural integration is a type of hands on body work that focuses on aligning the body and enhancing function by manipulating fascia, which is a type of connective tissue.

Fascia surrounds and attaches everything within our body bones, muscles, tendons, ligaments, nerves, arteries, organs.

So a good example of fascia is a piece of raw chicken.

If you've ever seen a piece of raw chicken, there is a white film between the skin and the meat holding it together.

And that's fascia, connective tissue.

That's a superficial layer of fascia.

As you cut deeper into the piece of raw chicken, there's more of that white film between the meat, the muscle and the bone.

That is an intrinsic layer of fascia, a deep layer of fascia.

So structural integrators focus on fascia, and we do that through a series of sessions called the ten series, which is a series of ten sessions where we focus on aligning the entire body throughout the series.

So each session focuses on a different part of the body.

Each session builds upon the last and prepares you for the next.

So at the end of the ten sessions, we've literally worked almost every single part of the body, almost every single layer of fascia and connective tissue.

I also teach clients movement, education and the movement.

Education is ways that we use our body on a daily basis.

And if we're not using our body in ways that honor alignment, the benefits of the hands on body work is less likely to be long term and sustainable.

So I teach client new movement lessons along with the hands on body work.

What are some of the ways that you can damage fascia damage?

Rashes.

So injuries, major falls continues.

And surgery.

Surgery is a big one.

Repetitive movements that are don't on our alignment can cause adhesions and fascia.

So when I think of damaged fascia, I think of adhesions and adhesions are where the fascia gets sticky and gunky and it lacks differentiation.

It's not as mobile as healthy connective tissue.

Healthy fascia.

And Amanda, when people think chiropractic care they often picture neck adjustments in those dramatic popping sounds.

Is that an accurate, accurate representation?

I mean, I've been adjusted before.

There is some popping.

Yeah.

You also see things on maybe Instagram or social media where they're like, turn the sound up here, listen to this.

This is where the action happens.

I would say that chiropractic did start, with more of the popping noises.

Chiropractic actually had it start with even just upper cervical is where you probably wouldn't hear a lot of the popping.

I would say it's turned into a little bit of clickbait.

It's what the YouTube chiropractors are doing.

It's what, TikTok stars are doing.

There is a whole realm of chiropractic that doesn't use any popping that still gets amazing and significant results.

So I don't want the public to think that chiropractic means that you have to be popped.

There are different tools.

Not every patient is a good candidate for popping or manipulation, esp But we're just trying to increase joint range of motion with any technique that we do.

So we can do the popping or manual adjustments.

It's called VLA adjustment.

High velocity, low amplitude, or there's different techniques using an activator or spring loaded instrument.

It looks like a little clicker.

And then we even have the drop table.

And all of those help to increase range of motion in a joint.

And so when you talk about manipulation, you are physically moving your clients.

Yes.

I mean, it takes a lot of participation on their part because they actually have to relax a ton for me to be able to do the work that I do.

But if a patient can't relax, they're probably not a good candidate for the popping adjustments.

Yeah, we use our other tools and techniques for that.

And how can each of these treatments help in pain relief?

They all kind of work different aspects of the body.

Sure.

I would say that pain most of the time is your body yelling at you from decreased range of motion injuries in the past.

And so the goal for chiropractic care is to increase function at each individual level of the spine, but also the extremities.

If we can increase range of motion, the brain can perceive the body in its entirety.

And it's a self-healing organism.

So if we create better range of motion, the brain will heal the body.

Does that make sense?

It makes sense.

Yeah.

And Emily, is that kind of the same process that you work through?

I would say too, even just like when you're in pain, you're depleted of dopamine and serotonin.

And so just by working to create more freedom of movement in the body, create better range of motion that itself can decrease or, excuse me, increase the amount of dopamine and serotonin that we get, decreasing pain.

And in your experience, when you talk about pain, you know, clients, I would imagine most of the time come to you when they are in pain.

At what point in that, in that process do you start seeing patients?

Where have they reached a specific point where they say, I need to try something different?

What are you seeing?

Absolutely.

So typically clients don't come and see me as like their first, you know, solution.

Typically they see me as a last resort, structural integration.

Even though it's been around since the 60s, it's not super popular or mainstream.

And so people normally find me at the end of the road when they've tried other things with little success.

And a lot of people find me through word of mouth, through seeing people like Amanda, a chiropractor, the two modalities work really well together.

And so, yeah, a lot of people find me when they have, you know, nothing else has really, truly worked long term.

Do you find that in your practice as well?

I do, yeah, I would say that most of the people that come to our office, they have tried seeing, their regular medical doctors and the solution are either physical therapy or, drugs and surgery.

I would say that in the last 20 years, the opiate addiction was really prevalent.

So doctors are trying really hard to offer alternative pain relief solutions now.

So we are starting to get more referrals from our medical doctors, which I think is great for us and the patients.

They've usually tried some type of medication, pain relief medication.

And that's a short term solution.

It's not fixing the root cause.

And so a lot of people have gone to years and years of different doctors, before they're able to come and see us.

And I think you both use the term last resort.

How do you feel about that label?

And to a certain extent, sure.

For me, it's kind of a bummer.

And I think it's just a bummer for the patients.

I think that chiropractic is a very wonderful modality that has gotten kind of a bad rep, unfortunately.

And I don't know if it's just through other people or if it's from our selves in our profession, not communicating effectively.

But I also think it's through the research where we used to think that we are doing something like taking something out of place and putting it in place.

And through the last few years of the research we've been able to do, we realize that that's not what we're doing.

We're affecting receptors in a joint that tell the brain where our body is in space.

We're trying to affect change in the brain.

And I just think that there's been some miscommunication about chiropractic.

And, I really hope that we can start sharing what it does so people can see us first before drugs and surgery.

It's already too late if there's drugs and surgery.

And that makes me really sad for the client as a last resort.

I mean, do you see people coming in too late as well?

I mean, yeah, structural integration can be really used as a preventative measure because of the fact that we go through ten sessions.

We're working to balance the entire body.

It really prevents more issues from occurring later on down the road.

And that's why I really like the ten series is because it's both reparative and preventative.

Also, I think that educating the public about what structural integration is or what chiropractic is, is very important so that we can it can become more well known and recognized so that people start to see us before.

Like Amanda said, they, turn to drugs and surgery.

And Amanda, we were able to spend some time with one of your clients.

Earlier this week.

Very nice that one of your offices, he shared how chiropractic care helped him go from walking into his first adjustment on crutches to now playing with his kids.

Yeah.

Debilitating back pain, controlled how Ross has lived for most of his life.

I personally considered myself to be handicapped for a majority of my life an active lifestyle, contact sports and a major car accident when he was a teenager contributed to much of the pain and I got hit by the car.

I'm pretty sure that's when my back went, because I also twisted when I fell on the hood.

The damage meant something as simple as bending down to tie his shoes before a flag football game caused him to throw out his back.

The pain, limited mobility and recovery time had him living in fear, afraid to do simple movements.

It put me down, When my back would go out, I'd say 5 to 7 days.

I'm no work, no getting out of the couch.

Need assistance?

Go to the bathroom.

Eating, laying down.

Yeah.

And if I did stand and have to get up a it was about 45 minutes round trip to the bathroom and back.

His back controlled his every decision and even stole the time he enjoyed with those who matter most his kids.

There were a lot of times when they'd go do stuff on the weekends.

I go up to Green Bluff and, you know, go through the maze, and I couldn't do any of that.

I'd have to be at home because my back goes out.

When I'm there, there's an ambulance coming to get me.

And the intense regime of medication he was on to treat the chronic pain made it difficult to be present, even when he was able to join.

Attitude changes, little mood swings here and there, falling asleep a lot, and being awake at night.

The kids are awake during the day to want to do something.

I don't have the energy.

If even, you know, if my back allowed me to go out and do something with the kids, a lot of the times the meds said otherwise.

As Ross accepted the idea that surgery on several parts of his body was the only option, a friend suggested he try going to The Adjustmeant Chiropractic.

With nothing to lose, Ross hobbled into his first appointment on crutches.

When I came in, I talked about my back, of course, and then the conversation kind of went past that, and I talked about my knees and my shoulders, which I didn't come here for that.

Following an in-depth analysis, doctors Lincoln and Amanda were confident they could help with that.

I think we could fix you here.

And I was blown away.

I didn't think that would be possible.

And I'd say, for the for the first one to 6 to 8 weeks, I came twice a week and each time improvement, improvement, improvement.

And then it got better.

He started spacing out appointments from once a week to once a month, then once every couple of months with the ability to be active and move more freely, Ross lost weight and built strength.

Before I started coming here.

For years, I couldn't walk down stairs without using the handrail.

I had to take the weight off my knees after, a couple of months coming here, I was walking up and down those stairs and I was like, I haven't done that in probably ten plus years.

Now, two years later, Ross is down 50 pounds and went from walking in on crutches to walking ten miles a day and most importantly, spending time with his kids.

The fear of throwing out his back and being bedridden for days gone.

I kind of got this no fear thing going now.

And so if you're going to try it, give it a chance and just do your research, make sure you're going to go to the right person.

To try it is I am living proof.

Amanda Ross made a pretty dramatic, you know, turn around, if you will.

Can you walk us through how he got there?

I mean, originally came in for some serious back pain, but there's also issues with the knee is it did start a little bit lower and then kind of work its way up or what did you see?

Without a play by play of his entire life, we'll never know what the chicken or the egg was.

We just know that both of those problems were present when he came in our office.

The major one that people think about with chiropractors is the back.

So we started there first.

But we're a head to toe office.

I like to check every joint in the body, make sure it moves through its whole range of motion so the body can perform and heal at its optimal capacity.

We worked on the back, got that feeling better, and then his knees were just so stiff he thought he was leading himself into a double knee replacement.

Within a few years there was such a lack of range of motion, so we're just really light drop table adjustments in his knee, some soft tissue work around his knees, his ankles moving all the way up.

He was able to restore range of motion and that just almost automatically decreases pain in those areas.

But Ross is really special because he took the work that we did together and he ran with it almost literally, like he he took how he was feeling, and he changed a lot in his life.

Chiropractic isn't it's not going to be something that just fixes you in one visit.

He chose to come back for eight weeks, twice a week, right?

He wanted that change.

He felt like he was getting better.

And then he decided to eat differently, move differently, walk ten miles a day.

He changed his life.

I just kind of help them with it.

Does that make sense?

That makes complete sense.

Emily, you were talking about how respecting your natural movement do you see a lot of patients come in where they believe the pain started in one area, but it's actually a cause and effect of something else?

Well, absolutely.

So Connective Tissue, I was expl and touches everything within our body.

A lot of times where when we have an adhesion, it will pull on fascia, you know, farther away from the adhesion.

So for example, if my shirt if I have an adhesion here, you can see that it pulls all the way up into the fascia of my shoulder.

So maybe my shoulder starts to hurt.

I go in to get my shoulder worked on and just it's not improving until I release that adhesions that that is pulling on the connective tissue, pulling the shoulder out of alignment.

You know, you probably see a lot of the similar.

Yeah.

Similar issues.

Yes.

And Emily and I are really good friends and I have also seen her for a ten series.

I think that any body worker that, wants to be the best for their patients is also receiving different modalities for themselves, learning from them, utilizing those tools to become the best practitioner.

So I've learned a lot from Emily about structural integration fascia.

And now I use that as part of my analysis to help my patients get even better.

So we do see that a lot.

We use the term last resort.

But let's also talk about preventative, like when should you start seeing someone like you or someone like you like when do you know that?

Hey, you know, I've got a little issue.

Here's where I go.

Sure.

I'll speak to that.

So, I'm really passionate about whom to to care.

I think that it is important to have a chiropractor on your team.

Structural integrator, someone on your team from the moment you're born.

Because as the twig is bent, so grows the tree.

So if you have a big bump or fall when you're a kid, it doesn't hurt yet because kids barely ever have pain, right?

But that limited range of motion, that adhesion in your fascia, persists for years and years and years till all of a sudden you wake up when you're 30 and you wonder, oh, this is just what happens when you're 30.

I get a kink when I sleep, and if we start working on increasing range of motion when it's a child all the way through adolescence into adulthood, we will have far less problems as an adult.

Yeah, I'd say the same thing that working with children, you know, that's a great, great way to prevent issues later on down the line and coming in before you're in pain.

Like, don't let pain just be the reason that you come in and just come in because you want to take care of yourself.

You want to prevent issues later down, later down the line.

Is it work better or do kind of the same?

Let's say you have a very active lifestyle and maybe you don't feel pain, but you know you're using your body to a little bit more of an extreme.

Would you see more benefit there, or is it kind of just, anyone can benefit from these types of things?

I don't see anyone can benefit from these types of things.

You know, children I worked with, kids with six years old all the way till 85 years old.

I worked with all ages athletes, people with scoliosis.

I specialized, specialized that they were at.

But I really enjoy working with clients who have scoliosis.

So yeah, I mean any anybody at any point can come and receive work.

I do see that athletes improve a lot through structural integration, just because we're helping them with their biomechanics and to move better.

And that, you know, reflects into whatever their activity or sport is.

And you to mention that you kind of refer clients to each other and tell me about the symbiosis between your different types of treatments.

Well, like I said, fascia surrounds and attaches, you know, bones and muscles, tendons, ligaments.

So it's nice for me because I'm working on what might be contributing to pulling some of the bones out of alignment.

And then Amanda is working.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but with joints adjusting joints.

And so those two are just super synergy synergistic.

Yeah.

I would say someone like Emily helps free up the body for me to actually get in and do some of the work in the joint area so that I can get the most range of motion there.

My sessions are a lot shorter, and most chiropractic sessions are a lot shorter than what someone might have the time with Emily or a massage therapist.

You know, I'm working on 10 to 15 minute session, so if she can free things up and I can get in there and get the job done in the next 10 to 15 minutes, we've created long lasting change.

Yeah.

And I want to add that Amanda, she kind of mentioned this earlier.

Amanda has stayed with me.

So I have taught her some things that she does with her clients, her patients, and they love it.

You know, they they report back to that, you know, Amanda, adding some structure integration techniques into her practice has been really beneficial for their adjustments and their sessions with Amanda.

Soft tissue work, along with adjustments I have found has helped people hold their adjustment a lot longer.

And I'm really grateful for the scope of practice I have, where I can do manual adjustments, and I can learn from so many other body workers and incorporate that into practice.

Unfortunately, I can't teach Emily how to do me.

I can't make adjustments.

But, you know, we're just working with that about.

Yeah, yeah.

And we talk a lot about, you know, physical adjustments and, and the physical aspect of the body.

This also impacts, we saw when we were talking to Ross, you know, the ability to function with the family, to function as a father.

And that has to really impact a client's mental health.

Absolutely.

Yeah.

I mean, I think when you're in pain, you isolate yourself.

You know, you stay at home, you refrain from going out into the world.

Maybe the pain is, affecting your sleep, so you're not sleeping as well.

And all of those things are going to affect your mood and your mental well-being.

So if we can, you know, reduce that pain and that person can go back out into their life, it's going to yeah, just overall make them feel better and more connected to others in the world and feel like they're really living.

And Ross was on a pretty strong regimen of painkillers.

And that is also mood impacting.

Yeah, mood impacting, gut impacting, which we know the gut also affects brain health and things like serotonin and dopamine.

It's like the second brain.

And so and it also affects your liver health when your liver is the detoxify for your entire body.

So if we can keep ourselves off of those drugs and get ourselves feeling better, it's a win.

Great.

And often care like this isn't covered by insurance or providers.

Don't take insurance.

What are the barriers for people to get this kind of this kind of level of care and then keep it as well?

Sure.

So with insurance, it's challenging to take insurance.

You know, I wish it was easier.

I wish they made it more accessible so more people could have access to this work.

But I have other practitioners that I refer to that take insurance or, you know, I can do certain things like payment plans, like I really try and work with my clients, maybe a shorter session for less money.

I really want it to be accessible to people who might not be able to, like you said earlier, afford an expensive session that they might consider luxury.

So I an insurance is in that let you don't want to take it.

There's there's levels of involvement that you have with insurance that we talked about when we were talking with Ross.

Yeah.

So insurance is it's hard.

So it takes a lot of time to bill and call and work with insurance companies.

And as a small boutique practice that's not a luxury I can afford.

I don't have the staff or the time, you know, being a mom myself, I don't have the time to run all that insurance.

But something that I think is really important is that in the moment, it might feel like something like chiropractic care is a luxury, but it's a lot cheaper than surgery, and it's a lot cheaper than.

Yeah, I would say, I mean, insurance covers drugs, but yeah, it's kind of funny too, because, you know, you really have to look at your priorities.

I had to do that myself with my own, you know, alternative health care journey will pay for things like getting our nails done or.

I mean, I don't really do my nails, but I like getting my eyelashes.

But then we don't want to go in and put the money into seeing a chiropractor or seeing a structural navigator.

And I'm not saying that to, you know, be like dog on anyone, but it's it's true.

I see it all around.

I've been guilty of it myself.

So also, looking at your priorities and where you want to put your money is important.

And hopefully it shouldn't last forever, right?

The intensity of the care plan we recommended to someone like Ross was because he had lived in that pain for 30 years, and even the fact that he saw a significant change in eight weeks compared to 30 years is a really big change.

So someone who wants to maybe take a pause on their every six weeks of getting their hair highlighted for $200 just to fix their chronic neck pain, arm pain, shoulder pain.

It might be really worth it for just a couple months, and then you can go back to that lifestyle.

Once we've gotten the root of everything kind of fixed up, then you come in every couple months just to maintain.

Yeah.

Also, that's one of the reasons that I like the ten series is because the goal is at the end of the ten series to send our clients back out into their life, and they don't have to continually come back in to rely on a practitioner.

Yes.

If they want to come in for a tuneup every so often, they're more than welcome to.

But the goal is that the benefits of the ten series are long term and sustainable.

It's a recovery plan, absolutely.

We kind of talked about, you know, maintain prevention should if people are thinking, okay, I'm thinking about it, I'm not sure if it's for me yet.

What are some red flags that you might say, hey, let's start really thinking about an alternative method to kind of treat something that could possibly come down the pipeline.

What do you see?

And then same question when when Amanda's done them.

Oh boy.

I don't even know if it's down the pipeline thing.

But when people say, that their neck and shoulders feel really tight when they tell me they have plantar fasciitis, oh, my knee kind of hurt.

Those things are telling me that the joints are supposed to be shock absorbers of the body.

It's telling me that the shock absorption is not happening, and pain is one of the last things to show up.

Dysfunction has already been there for a long time, so if you're not listening to those whispers, it's going to scream and then it's going to hurt and your body is yelling at you, saying, I've been trying to tell you for 30 years, why are you getting there?

So it's those little things, if you're feeling, like your neck is really stiff, if your hips feel stiff and there's not a lot of pain there yet, please come see a chiropractor.

See a massage therapist.

Go do an exercise at a gym.

Like your body is yelling at you that it needs movement.

So if I'm reaching up to the top shelf and I don't use my left arm because it just doesn't want to go, that way consistently using my right, that's maybe a possible red flag.

Yeah, I would think so.

Yeah.

Same thing on your side.

Do you see the same sort of.

Yeah.

An issue.

Sometimes I hear people say that, you know, they saw a picture of themselves or they looked in the mirror and they're like, oh, my posture.

It's just terrible.

And so they come in because they want to, you know, work with their posture.

But even if you don't have pain, you know, and your posture is out of alignment, come in.

Or if somebody lacks in awareness of their body, they lack the ability to tap into their proprioception, their sense, their body and space and internal space.

That's also a good sign to come in and get some sort of treatment that helps you connect to your body in a different way.

We only have a couple of minutes left, but I want to give you the opportunity to kind of dispel some some myths or some stereotypes that you might see in your practices.

So with me, a lot of times another name for structure integration is Rolfing.

Rolf Harris go to a different school then, just all structural integrators, but there's a superstition that it's super, super painful and it's not as painful as people make it out to be.

There has been a lot of research done over the last decade about fascia research.

Congress did research about fascia, and we're realizing that it's really about the layer that we're on, not the amount of pressure and depth that we're applying.

And so it doesn't have to be painful.

And that's a that's a big thing I hear often.

I was wondering when this question is going to come up.

So there's lots of things that have been said about chiropractors over the years.

Some things that you might have heard of is the term quack or the term snake oil.

For that, we're not real doctors.

And so what I really want people to know is that we are not medical doctors, but I have a doctorate of chiropractic, which means that I did go to school for eight years.

I have a four year undergraduate degree in exercise science, and I have a four year degree, is a doctor of chiropractic.

So it's the same level of education as someone who's a physical therapist and same level of education as someone who went to further schooling and became a doctorate of education.

They still get to call themselves doctor.

They're real doctor.

They're not a medical doctor.

Totally different things.

And then just unfortunately, with some bad, maybe some bad blood.

Over the years, there's been lots of really big care plans that have been sold.

Our profession really likes to our scope is pretty large.

That means that we really start to, like, dive into doing blood work and offering supplements and and our scope gets kind of muddled around the side.

And I think people get confused about that.

And I would say if we really stay in our lanes and we are just the best practitioners for the neuromuscular skeletal system, I would say that people might see us less as snake oil or quackery.

Does that make sense?

That makes complete sense.

And, you know, just real quick, you oftentimes turn away clients that you realize that they need actual surgery or something a little bit more invasive.

Yeah, I'm very honest with my clients about what I think they'll get from the ten series or what I can help, you know, them with.

If if something is if there is something that I don't trust, you know, like if they have excruciating pain in, let's say, their neck or their back where it's, you know, worrisome.

I send them to the doctor.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Great.

Even similarly for me, if I don't see with conservative management a significant change in just a handful of visit, I recommend and refer them to go see that their primary care physician.

They might need further imaging that I can offer them.

I don't like to offer MRI or CT scans because I don't take insurance.

I want that to be covered and with their medical doctor so that they have a good follow up of care.

I also refer very frequently to functional medicine, doctors, and natural paths to help manage the internal inflammation, because that's going to help my job in the long run.

So well.

Emily, Amanda I switch that around.

Emily.

Amanda, thank you so much for your time.

Been sharing your expertise and your knowledge and your experience with us tonight.

If you'd like to share this episode of Health Matters with a friend or family member, you can find it on ksps.org/healthmatters Matters I'm Aaron Luna.

We'll see you back here in January.