Childbirth Epidurals, Headaches and Back Pain

Recently, a nice young woman we’ll call Mrs. X came in to Chiropractic Advantage for some help. She was complaining of severe headaches and back pain. The headaches had started two years earlier, when Mrs. X received an epidural injection during childbirth. Evidently, the procedure did not go off ideally, and there was some leakage of spinal fluid at the injection site. Many of our patients have gone through...

Lavender Works Like Estrogen

Last week, I treated a ten-week-old infant boy who had been crying excessively for seven straight weeks. Up until the time his mother decided to bring him in for a chiropractic adjustment (which helped tremendously!) she had tried every home remedy she could think of. She had even tried rubbing her baby with lavender body cream. I’m glad she mentioned that fact–I told her to stop the cream immediately....

What Causes Heart Palpitations? Eight Common Causes

One of my patients, who works at Starbucks, says some customers ask for up to ten added shots of espresso in their morning cup of coffee. Others prefer the canned energy drinks found at gas stations. If one of those is you, go ahead and skip the rest of this article. You know why your heart is racing. However, if you’re confounded by your heart skipping, jumping, missing a...

A Little Common Sense Beats Too Much Health Care

In today’s Los Angeles Times, there were three articles with a common theme: too many people are being sold medical tests and procedures that do not promote better health. In the first Times article, we learn there are 220,000 bariatric surgeries performed a year. Originally it was hoped that, by undergoing this drastic procedure, people might be spared from obesity-related diseases such as diabetes and arthritis. Alas, the ongoing...

Shingles Facts and Shenanigans, Part 2 of 2

In part one of my shingles discussion, I describe my concern about drug companies marketing a vaccination for shingles. It’s up to you to decide if you should be super concerned about shingles. I am not. It’s painful, but usually resolves on its own in several weeks. My greater concern is that people who have been vaccinated might be unknowingly spreading shingles to their friends and co-workers. If that...

Movie Night at Chiropractic Advantage: “Doctored”

I am looking forward to seeing “Doctored,” the movie. I have ordered the DVD and we’ll have a free showing here at Chiropractic Advantage on the following dates: Tuesday, November 13, 6:45 p.m., and Wednesday, November 14, at 4:00 p.m. Please RSVP to 909 483-5295 or email us at [email protected] if you would like to attend. Please come! Our health care choices determine, to a great degree, the quality...

Statin Stats

Someone with math skills tried to figure out the percentage of people on the planet who have eaten a McDonald’s burger.  The figure was 61%.  I am sure that number is on the rise;  my friend Nikhil tells me he was shocked to see McDonald’s restaurants had popped up everywhere in his home city of Mumbai, India since he last visited.  Also on the rise are the number of...

Vertigo: Take Two

The Alfred Hitchcock movie, “Vertigo,” is a classic mystery thriller. Benign paroxysmal positional vertigo (BPPV), the description given to symptoms such as dizzy spells, sudden loss of balance, and a sense that the world is spinning or dropping away, is not so much of a thrill. Nor is it as much of a mystery as doctors sometimes make it out to be. Here’s the deal: you’re feeling terrible; your...

Numb Feet, Jittery Hands, and Losing Your Hair?

Back in chiropractic school, we were taught that nutritional deficiencies were something you’d see in poor countries where people didn’t get enough to eat. As a chiropractor who has been practicing over 20 years, I wish there was a way I could have known then, what I know now. Vitamin deficiencies resulting from malnutrition are common in people right here in Rancho Cucamonga. There are several reasons why this...

Sharon Martinez, Chiropractor vs. Prilosec for Stomach Pain

$13,900,000,000.00. That’s 13.9 billion dollars spent in the U.S. on prescriptions for proton pump inhibitors, or PPI’s, yearly, according to a 2010 Archives of Internal Medicine report. Drugs like Prilosec give temporary relief from heartburn, indigestion, or, if you like medical terminology, “gastro-esophageal reflux disorder.” People in the U.S. are the top consumers of prescription drugs, using 40.6% of the global market supply of these drugs. In comparison, Canadians...