If you are in your 40s or 50s and suffer from back, neck, knee, hip, or even shoulder pain, you may have been shown an X-ray or an MRI by your doctor who said that you have arthritis and sent you for therapy to address the complaint. It is also likely that when you were very young, you may have been part of the generation that grew up taking Tylenol or Advil for their aches after playing sports. Some of us have had falls or injuries, which may have even broken a bone, that have healed over time. Often, the achiness can be traced to imbalances in the way we walk, which can be easily diagnosed by looking at you in your early years. These imbalances, if addressed early, may prevent the development of scoliosis, knee pain, back pain, and other maladaptive conditions that are often treated for the symptoms, but rarely is the reason for the problem explained. In the world of medicine, musculoskeletal problems are often shuffled from doctor to doctor, even though none of them will admit that they lack the expertise to evaluate and treat you. This results in referrals to specialists who look at where you hurt rather than why, and the muscle relaxant/pain killer combo prescription, proven to make you drowsy, which rarely helps. Many years later, your X-ray or MRI will show the damage done to the knees, back, hips, and other joints of the body. This is what happens when you manage pain without understanding why the patient in front of you is in pain. Years ago, I attended a 2-hour continuing ed. seminar in pain management, which our office sometimes works with. After an hour of listening to a lecture about burning and disabling nerves to relieve pain, rather than how they use their understanding to improve the mechanisms behind why you hurt, I walked out. This was more of the same specialist talk about doing things to people that either end with generalized exercise protocols, injections, medications, and procedures that may reduce pain as you are managed into further chronicity. You can do plenty of damage with a scalpel and anesthesia if the procedure is performed poorly or for the wrong reasons. This is why my mother is wheelchair bound after the doctor performing a hip replacement hit a nerve years ago. I have personally seen this thousands of times over the years. The problems are reinforced by high insurance costs and deductibles, large hospital systems that now own many of the practices you have visited for years, and a system that is incentivised to do more but not solve your problems. Is it any wonder more people think drugs can solve their problems? They can’t. Managing vs. solving your problems, which results in most of us aging with chronic problems, damaged joints, and other preventable issues, can be solved more effectively if you had visited the proper musculoskeletal provider. That provider is a sports chiropractor. Less is more in healthcare. Does the benefit outweigh the risk? is something you must always ask yourself before submitting to a medical practice or procedure. Why have so many of us normalized chronic pain as a part of aging? What is normal? Medically, there are normal parameters, but for most people, normal is how we usually feel, and abnormal is a symptom that is worsening and not self-resolving. Most of us will not go to a doctor for things that self-resolve. What if we are just trying to ignore the symptoms as they are inconvenient parts of our active lives? Many people I know will always be taking non-steroidal anti-inflammatories such as Advil, which solves nothing but may offer temporary relief as our problems become more chronic. We may not realize that this is how we are aging while we are raising our children, and are torn in multiple directions at once, but it comes at a cost that is not only financial but can affect our healthspan, which is the healthy part of our lives. Medically, they have us worrying about our parts, our cancer risk, our prostates, our blood pressure, and again, nobody is solving anything, but they are managing it. This is why so many of us are taking so many pills: because we are managing our condition to reduce risk. On a typical Sunday during my office hours, emergencies are rarely new problems but are often chronic problems that become acute. Most patients, such as the one I saw this past Sunday, were not prepared to hear that their foot problems from when they were young were the reason for their back pain in their 30s they are now suffering from. This is when you begin to understand that years of Tylenol, Advil, and other pain relievers caused chronic problems that are now affecting how you work, function, and feel on a day-to-day basis. When you normalize chronic pain, which has a cause that you did not understand often results in a physical health crisis. Sometimes, you learned this from your parents who had similar genetic traits and similar experiences. Life is full of learning experiences, but in the practice of healthcare, they seem to have learned nothing from the Opioid crisis, which required medical practice to have happened. The current Gabapentin overuse crisis, and the continued over-reliance on OTC medications, because healthcare has been made to be so costly, but is it? Drugs do not solve mechanical problems. Chiropractors do. Why think chiropractic sports medicine first? A much younger Dr. Charschan is working a track and field event. Chiropractors are the primary care providers for the musculoskeletal system. While it is true that not all providers practice this way, we are taught to be physicians and to diagnose. Chiropractic sports physicians have additional training in orthopedics, neurology, and in on-field triage and evaluation. Some of my family learned this when I was the chiropractor for the Jersey Shore Wave professional women’s tackle football team this past year. When a patient visits for the first time, I take a full history, including their past problems, which may offer clues into why they hurt. We check their blood pressure and then perform a thorough functional evaluation, different than anything they are probably used to. During the evaluation, I explain my findings and what they mean as I develop an understanding of why they hurt. We may take an X-ray if needed, and if the patient has a problem related to their feet and pelvic mechanical function, an off-the-shelf foot orthotic, which is an insert they wear in their shoe, may be recommended during that visit. Many patients improve from their first visit, but often, due to inflammation, relief may require a number of visits. Follow-up visits are designed to improve how you move and function as well as stabilize the problematic area to resolve the problem causing your symptoms. Slow vs. fast healthcare: know the difference. Healthcare and healthy lifestyles are a lifetime pursuit. Solving a chronic problem that is causing many symptoms can require a number of visits. This is a slow process, but over the years, you will appreciate your investment in your health. Fast healthcare, such as I want the injection, the fix often results in either temporary relief only or problems worsening over time. Waiting for a mechanical problem to self-resolve is like waiting for your ticking car engine to cease. When it does, you are stranded on the side of the highway. When your body has a crisis, this gets expensive and may even result in poorer outcomes after specialists recommend their procedures that may harm more than help you. The choices are always up to us. We can choose to pay for chiropractic care, which is affordable for most of us. Perhaps this is why so many patients will visit us even though their insurance is inadequate in helping them solve their problems, which is a growing problem. More insured patients have high copayments and deductibles, yet they continue to visit because their health is invaluable to them. Our health is ultimately our responsibility. If we allow insurance to dictate the terms, we often are left with chronic problems because we played the in and out of network game of finding the right person to help. Starting chiropractic care younger in life helps us prevent many of the problems our parents are having now. Have your children been evaluated by the chiropractor yet? In pain? Need help today? Book online now.