Spinal Screening for Children

What is Subluxation Degeneration?
It is a condition in which the spine misaligns or malfunctions, or in some cases, does both, and has an adverse affect on the nervous system, setting the stage for body malfunction and loss of health, both short-term and long-term. There are 4 stages of degeneration that increase in severity leading to arthritis, fusion of vertebrae and nerve damage, which just might be irreversible at that point.

What are causes of subluxation?
Frequently, a first subluxation may occur during birth. Sometimes the doctor has to pull on the head and shoulders in order to deliver a child. This can be traumatic to the child due to the lack of muscular development in the neck. As kids get older, it’s sporting injuries, falling out of bed, falling off a bike and wrestling around. Sometimes if kids are not behaving like they should, a parent might grab them by the arm and pull on them which results in a whiplash-type of injury to the cervical spine and shoulder. Throwing and infant into the air and catching them, even a couple of inches will produce a whiplash to the spine. Clinically, it has been found that very few children have actually made it through the earlier parts of their lives without on or more subluxations or malfunctions of the spine.

A lot of people ask if the problem is always symptomatic, like a backache or another sign that something is wrong. This may well be the case, but more often than not, initially a spinal subluxation will not be associated with any major symptom or condition. Especially in children, whose bodies not only are very resilient, but where the subluxation process and resulting nerve damage may actually take years or decades before it has decayed enough that it expresses itself as some kind of symptom like a back problem.

A secondary factor is makes this even more difficult to determine in children, and that is they often have a difficult time verbalizing that there is a problem. Some parents do not pay much attention to them due to the fact that children often complain of things that prove to be very minor.

How long does it take to heal?
There are three major forms of care. The first is initial intensive care to provide relief of pain and to begin the process of spinal correction. This could take weeks to months. The second type of care, which follows the few weeks or months after intensive care, is known as reconstructive or rehabilitation care with the goal of producing long-term structural and permanent functional changes back towards normal. Depending on which stage of degeneration they are in, it may take months to years. The third type of care is maintenance care. This care begins once the spine has rehabilitated back to optimum for the individual, and depending on the patients lifestyle, probably should be continued on a monthly basis to maintain optimum structure and optimum function.

Is there any research on this problem?
The medical community has been aware of spinal subluxation degeneration as early as 1929 and there now is a tremendous amount of research that documents that the immediate and long-term effects of subluxation degeneration are extremely dangerous and obviously detrimental to a person’s health and well-being.

Spinal Screening for your Child
To see if your child may have, or be predisposed to a problem like spinal subluxation degeneration, try these simple tests at home and note if there are any concerns in certain areas that you would like checked out.

#1 Worn Shoes…Pick out a pair of hard soled shoes that they have had for awhile, the comfortable pair, and hold them together at the heels and look for wear. If one side is more worn than the other, then it might be indicative of hip imbalance that might in turn affect the spine which means that more stress is being placed on one side of the body than on the other

#2 Leg length…Lay your child face up on a table, with head and face straight up, inline with the body. Go to the childs’ feet, grab the ankles and gently pull down, then with your thumbs on the heels, press towards the head equally with both thumbs and notice if the heels are level or is one side shorter than the other side. Even 1/8th to 1/4 inch can be significant which might indicate problems with hip and spinal alignment.

#3 Hip balance…Have your child stand straight up, then go behind them and place your fingers over the top of their hip bones on each side and look for uneven hip height. They should be level, but if not, it might be an indicator of spinal misalignment.

#4 Shoulder balance…Place your fingers at the top of their shoulders and again look for level. A lot of people will have a slightly lower shoulder on the side that they are dominant. A right-handed person might have a slight drop at the right shoulder. If there is a significant difference, the upper spine might be affected and we would want to check the child for scoliosis, which is an abnormal curvature of the spine, usually side-to-side.

#5 Head Tilt…Check to see that the head is inline with the rest of the spine. If you look at the head from the back can you draw a straight line from the top middle of the head down the spine, or does it tilt to one side? If there is a tilt, then it might be an indicator of neck misalignment and/or muscle spasm.

#6 Head flexibility…The range of motion in the neck should be equal on each side. Note if the child cannot flex their head forward or backward without discomfort. Have them bend their ear to each shoulder as well as rotate their chin to their shoulders. Look for restrictions in motion.

#7 Spinal alignment…Have the child take their shirt off, then feel the protrusions of the bones down their back. Take a washable marker and mark the top of each of those bumps from the base of the skull down to the low back. Stand back and note if there is alignment. Don’t be alarmed if one or two vertebrae seem to be out of line with the others, but look generally at the entire spine. Is it straight? Does it curve to the right or left? Is there an S-curve? You can even use a plumb line from the base of the skull and let it hang down the spine and look to see if there is a spinal curvature to on side or the other. All of these points would be important findings.

If any of these tests have positive findings, then your child might have early stages of spinal subluxation degeneration. At this time, a Doctor of Chiropractic is the only professional that is trained in this type of analysis, examination and correction.
Call Dr. Overland, D.C. at the phone number listed below for a free consultation for your child.

By going over this exam with your child, I think it is an excellent statement of your desire to be the best parent possible and allow your children to grow up to be healthier, better human beings, mentally, physically and spiritually.

There are so many problems in life that cannot be avoided, and it seems a tragedy that when there is a problem that can be avoided, that we not take the steps necessary to correct the situation.

Our children are going to face many more and different problems, in growing up today, than we did. Plus, we, as parents, are passing along problems that have to be solved if they are to survive.

It also seems that, with the problems we do face in the world today, these problems seem too big and too complex, for any one individual, especially you or me, to solve. But in fact, if any of these problems are to be solved, then it is going to happen through individual people recognizing the problems and working together in an honest and productive way to make a difference in the world.

Call Dr. Vince Overland, D.C. if you have any questions regarding spinal screening of your child.

Aspire Wellness Center
2410 NE Twin Knolls Dr.
Bend, OR 97701
541-382-3563
vochiro@bendbroadband.com

Optimum Structure = Optimum Function