“Simon’s treatment of my shoulder injury was spot on and I saw quick results – he played a pivotal role in enabling me to regain my title- “UK Endurance Lifting Champion 2013”. I didn’t think I’d be able to compete to a high level again, but thankfully Simon proved me wrong.”
“I’m a professional Personal Trainer and I need to be working to 100% fitness as my clients include internationally ranked tennis players. Effective and timely treatments when I need them keep my shoulder on top form, and prevent recurrence of my injury.”
“After injuring my back playing rugby, Simon helped clear things up quickly and got me back out on the pitch. His attention to detail, treatment skills and expertise in building an aftercare training program have made a real difference!”
Hip and Knee pain can be frustrating, using orthopaedic tests and movement analysis our Chiropractors can diagnose the cause of injury and improve your function, dramatically decreasing future injury susceptibility.
Our Chiropractors have a vast knowledge of what can cause symptoms at the wrists and hands and how to manage them. Sports Chiropractors are particularly adept at treating extremities.
At a meeting of the Privy Council on Wednesday, the Queen approved the grant of a Royal Charter to the College of Chiropractors, the first Royal Charter to be granted to a complementary medicine organisation in the UK.
The College is an academic, professional membership body, established along the lines of the Medical Royal Colleges, which over the past 13 years has sought to ensure quality, safety and excellence are at the forefront of chiropractic practice in the public interest.
Chiropractic is regulated by statute and although chiropractors provide their services largely within the private sector, NHS funding for chiropractic treatment is now emerging region by region under the Department of Health’s new commissioning arrangements. Chiropractors specialise in the diagnosis and treatment of problems affecting the joints, muscles and nerves and are probably best known for treating low back pain, a condition which costs the equivalent of between 1% and 2% of the UK GDP and has a significant impact on people’s lives.
Rarely granted, a Royal Charter signals permanence and stability and, in the College of Chiropractors’ case, a clear indication to others of the leadership value and innovative approach the College brings to the development of the chiropractic profession. The Royal Charter essentially formalises the College’s position as a unique, apolitical, consultative body, recognising its role in promoting high practice standards and certifying quality and thus securing public confidence.
Tim Jay, President of the College, said, “The College of Chiropractors’ Royal Charter emphasises to the public and other health bodies that chiropractic is a healthcare profession with parity in the field of musculoskeletal health, providing a viable and recognised option for patients.”
What a fantastic yet exhausting week at the paralympics! The response for the massage was brilliant everyone kept coming back for more!
Most clients were media people carrying cameras all day long who were looking for relief for their shoulders. Firstly I would ask them to take 3 deep breaths in to relax. Then I started on their lower back to make sure they felt a release of tension all over the back, not just at the shoulders. Every person I saw had shoulders up by their ears with tension and the muscles that run parallel to the spine (Paraspinals) were solid too. I would use broad techniques with the palm of my hand to begin with to warm up the muscles, then move onto using my thumbs (butterfly technique) to increase the pressure to release tension. I then moved onto specific stretch technique, in which I apply pressure down into the muscle as the client stretches out the muscle that has been pinned by me. This is a fantastic technique that has instant results, however it is sometimes quite tender. I used this technique on the paraspinals, upper trapezius, and neck muscles with which you can see visible increases in range of movement of the cervical spine (neck) straight after the technique has been used.
The therapists I got to work with at the paralympics were fantastic, it was lovely to meet new faces and learn from other people. All in all it was a great experience and I even got to meet some famous faces!!
We are pleased to announce to all NHS employees that we have joined healthstaffdiscounts.co.uk and are giving 10% off consultation and treatment charges to those NHS employees who hold an NHS staff card!
Within this post I’ll explain why seeking treatment for your back pain earlier will potentially save you a lot of money.
Take a quick look at these well researched statistics:
80% of the population will experience back pain at some time
40% of the population are affected by back pain currently (16 million)
2.5 million people have back pain every day of the year
119 million working days are lost
1.2 million people are affected by musculo-skeletal pain and 500.000 by work related stress
The Hard Working Citizen
The sooner a person with back pain sees a well trained therapist such as a Chiropractor, the sooner they will get better, simple. Recently I and my colleagues have noticed how patients are presenting with incredibly chronic (>3weeks) back pain. People seem to be putting up with pain without seeking help for longer than ever before, we think this may be due to the recent recession (or double dip recession as it is for us Brits). People are really feeling the pinch, but if you think you are saving money by not getting your back pain treated now, you are very mistaken. In fact, it’s not cost effective at all! Its actually uneconomical! I’ll explain why.
Scary but (potentially) true
I’m going to use a common lower back problem as an example, a lower back disc bulge, a disc bulge usually occurs because the underlying supportive back structures are working incorrectly. The forces within the lower back are therefore repeatedly falling upon structures that cannot cope with the increase in load (the discs, among other things). This leads to failure, if the bulge is not correctly managed and the forces continue to be incurred in a region that has already failed then its ability to heal is diminished. It may take months or years to get better with a very high chance that it will recur in the future due to the mechanism of micro tearing in the outer layers which heals incredibly slowly, if at all (Read more here on disc bulges). Disc bulges can progress and in a lot of cases may even lead to surgery, the likelihood of this increases if you do not seek effective advice and treatment. The earlier you seek treatment, the quicker your disc bulge will resolve itself and with the correct prevention strategy provided you will have a lower back that will be less susceptible to having disc bulges in the future.
“And financially this affects me how?”
The financial implications of this are simple, by letting your back pain progress and possibly worsen it may end with you requiring surgery and months off work with no guarantee it won’t recur. Due to the reasons above you may even require multiple surgeries in the future. Therefore, costing you even more in lost wages with time off work and possibly even your job! This is all theoretical of course and I’m not trying to scare you well, maybe a little lol… as more than likely if it is your first episode of back pain it may be nothing serious but for the price of a consultation fee it’s still best to get it checked out now to be better safe than sorry. The best way to treat the problem and find out the cause is to seek help from a well trained manual therapist such as a Chiropractor. A good therapist will offer you a variety of treatment and prevention options (or referral if required) and an insight into how your problem could progress if left untreated. So what I would recommend is to save yourself money and seek help now rather than later, trust me, your future pain free self will be thanking me in the long run.
On the 25th and 26th of August 2012 Danny Adams volunteered to provide sports therapy for the competitors at the Gloucester Rowing Regatta, Hempsted Meadow. The Saturday was the busiest day of the two with the Junior and Masters events being held and the seniors competing on the Sunday. The rowing in Gloucester was fast and furious with competitors from all around the country attending the event.
On the Saturday Danny provided treatment to competitors from a small marquee attached to the side of the main marquee. He saw a wide range of different injuries which made it very interesting – he was prepped and ready to see some chronic Rowing problems!
It was a great atmosphere on the Saturday, which turned almost festival like when the heavens decided to open, turning the soft grassy meadow into a flip flop eating mud field. He says that from time to time he felt like Ray Mears or Bear Grylls treating in extreme conditions, as often muddy, bare footed competitors made their way to see him in his humble tent! The great thing was that other than the odd grumble, the muddy conditions made the event even more enjoyable as everyone seemed to be having a great day, Danny included!
The Sunday was a little quieter and shorter, with Danny choosing to treat on a much dryer wooden floored area in the corner of the main marquee. As expected, due to the lower number of competitors on the senior’s day, he treated a lot less people but none the less enjoyed the fantastic hospitality and atmosphere that Gloucester Rowing club kindly provided.
A big thanks to Ben Rodford and all at Gloucester Rowing Club for organising this thoroughly enjoyable event. Danny looks forward to treating the competitors again at the Autumn Head event coming this November.
***If you would like us to support an event that you are attending or hosting, whether sport or work related, please get in touch!!***
In August, Chiropractor Danny Adams and Massage Therapist Kate West from the Longlevens Chiropractic & Sports Injury Clinic proudly attended the first ever UK hosted Hockey Masters World Cup, a great opportunity to meet and treat athletes from all around the world.
Our Therapists’ adventure began with the assistance of the RAC, but once they had safely arrived, they very successfully worked as part of the Hockey event’s Sports Medicine Team with 7 other manual therapists, including Osteopaths, Physios and Chiropractors. The set-up of having a team of professionals in one area at one event worked very well at the Hockey, presenting the international Hockey players with a range of knowledge and experience. Hockey injuries were delegated evenly between the group and the competitors were treated on a first come first serve basis.
Danny and Kate were able to take the time to shadow other treatment techniques and found that they came away having gained an incredible amount through observation and learning as well as experience. The hockey players themselves were extremely enthusiastic about receiving treatment making the event all the more rewarding for Practitioners. What a great success. Well done to all who took part.
The first visit is an important one. This visit is the opportunity for the Chiropractor to discover everything important about your injury. It is also the time when the Chiropractor will make a detailed examination of the problem area and then sit down with you to discuss the findings and recommend the best course of action. This is known as a ‘Report of Findings’. The Report of Findings will clearly outline to you what your injury is called (diagnosis), how you got it and how the Chiropractor can help. Treatment involves a number of different techniques. If suitable, the primary technique used is joint manipulation, which involves gentle specific adjustments of the joints, done by hand, to mobilise restricted or stiffened areas of the body that are not working properly. Treatment is also supported by various types of soft tissue work and other physical modalities, all carefully selected to suit the particular injury. All courses of treatment are individually constructed to get you back on your feet as quick as is possible. Every course of treatment is supported by self-help instruction programs to follow at home or at work which aids your recovery and ultimately prevents recurrence of the initial…
