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Body by Blower - Dr. Brian Blower DC
Backs do not "go out" - Jan 22, 2016 - 9:32:26 AM
 Contrary to popular thinking by most lay and professional people,
backs do not “go out.” Spines are driven to become dysfunctional by
some of our own energy transfer systems failing us. Some of our systems
at the very moment you wish to press them to work may be offline; they
may be weak and overtaxed and resting; they may be in a recovery or
protective mode.
Our own parts then fail to help us, they are
guilty of letting down the body’s function as a whole, causing an
inability of the nervous system and brain to correlate and properly
control the needs of not only our organs but hundreds and hundreds of
muscles as well...
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Body by Blower - Dr. Brian Blower DC
New Research for Chronic Pain - Jun 18, 2015 - 4:50:17 PM
For most of us, we stumble along ignorant of the exact state of health we
are in. Then one day we go for a checkup and get the bad news.
Perhaps
you are under the impression that you know best when it comes to
monitoring your health. You may think you know best about you and your
health because you are the one with the inside information, after all it
is your body.
Indeed you are the one with the nod of the Lord
that gives you the right to be just that, the one that is in charge, you
are the one that knows best...
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Body by Blower - Dr. Brian Blower DC
The Crack in Chiropractic - Apr 16, 2015 - 2:26:46 PM
“Crack my back for me will
you please?” Or someone will point
a finger and say, “Doc I just need you to crack my neck right here.” I hear it all the time in and out
of practice. Crack this or crack
that and I think, “If I wanted to help someone go to the chiropractor and
improve his health how in the world will
cracking his bones entice them to visit one?” I wouldn’t want my bones cracked. And why and how do they make that
cracking sound when they are adjusted?
First of all if we address
the phenomenon of sound coming from manipulation of the body parts, it is not
the bone that is cracking. In fact
nothing is cracking at all.The
noise of the manipulation comes from the surfaces of the joint itself. And not all of the body joints are
capable of giving up the “cracking sound” when manipulated. Or as we say in chiropractic, the sound
comes when the joint is “adjusted...
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Body by Blower - Dr. Brian Blower DC
Why are you looking at my back when I have foot pain? - Oct 31, 2014 - 12:56:22 AM
I first met Lori in my offices where she looked at me with
distress in her eyes and then began to tell her story. She recalled that the pain in her right foot
suddenly came upon her while she was “power walking” just a few days prior. She apparently was a fair bit of a distance
from her home and that by the time she struggled back there she had a distinct
limp in her gait so as to protect the foot from further discomfort. She had made an appointment with her M.D. but
a friend had intervened and had recommended that she first have a chiropractor
examine her so as to get to the cause of her dilemma.
Lori presented as a forty-four year old solid
individual. She regularly practiced yoga
and assured me of her caution with her lifestyle and diet. She appeared to be living well enough so that
she did not show signs of failing to thrive. (The hunched back posture of
chronic adrenal challenges)...
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Body by Blower - Dr. Brian Blower DC
Full of Beans - Jul 17, 2014 - 10:51:27 PM
I was examining a new
patient the other day to determine why he had longterm back pain and I
could sense he was just “not getting it”. He was simply unable to stay
tuned in and follow along on the same page as me. His eyes were all over
the place but mostly the floor. When I spoke with him he didn’t meet my
eyes and the “yes suh’ answers from him told me lots about his
background.
When
diagnosing the cause of lower back pain for example, first I take a
thorough case history and dig for events which may have happened in the
past that although forgotten now, could still be having lasting
functional implications. I wanted to give him one of my “Wow” exams
showing him that I was a terrific physician and he was lucky to have
stumbled upon me and my unique services. Ha, ha, ha it doesn’t work that
way as we all know. This patient had come from a referral who had told
him to go to me and get his very painful ongoing back pain resolved. I
felt like sending him to the liquor store. I am a chiropractor, I don’t
treat pain. Drugs of any kind are not in a working chiropractor’s
utility bag...
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Body by Blower - Dr. Brian Blower DC
Creepy Chiropractic Thoughts - Jan 17, 2014 - 11:11:48 AM
Mrs. Jones just left my office after having her spine adjusted. She has
had upper back, neck and shoulder pain for a long time and has found
that after just a few chiropractic spinal adjustments she feels a lot
better. So she remarked to me, “Doc. I feel so much better, I think I
will take a break from you and see what happens.”
We all know she just gave me the “kiss of death,” the “good-bye I’m quitting... it's-been-a-slice
comment.” So I asked Mrs. Jones what was troubling her about coming to
my office for the correct or proper care of her health, her spinal
column. And she replied “Doc., I don’t really like all this foolishness
with my bones.” An honest answer and in this day and age too!
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Body by Blower - Dr. Brian Blower DC
The last thing you want your spine to do - Nov 6, 2013 - 11:51:46 PM
Recently as I
approached my offices one mid day, I noticed an older gentleman
patiently sitting outside our clinic waiting for the medical doctor to
arrive back from his lunch. I greeted him cheerily, and asked him, “Are
you all right?”which is a usual form of greeting to casually say hello
here in The Bahamas. He replied that he would be more 'all right' if he
were a lot younger than his years. To his remark I used my own
flippant retort and said, “You may be feeling only as young as you are
supple.”
Being loose like the young with their multiple bony joints and
structures freely moving through a healthy range of motion, (ROM) feels
great. But the truth is that same free movement of the body parts is a
“must have” to be healthy.
Most visits to the doctor are because of not feeling well; we go to his office...
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Body by Blower - Dr. Brian Blower DC
System Restore - Your Health - Oct 25, 2013 - 12:33:52 AM
My four adult children
are all geeky. In fact most of us living in the modern world are geeks
now. That isn’t a derogative, it is a fact. When I was a boy beatniks
became hippies, and the techies became geeks. We are all hip now with
the electronic world, getting it down pat on our phones, touch pads and
computers, falsely indicating that we are intelligent and able to keep
up-to-date in the rapidly evolving cyber world. That cyber world is the
information highway, the cloud via the internet and the knowledge
available through it to all of us may be easily and quickly
overwhelming.
I am a chiropractor and I am a teacher. Knowledge
is king and for all of us to now be readily allowed unrestricted access
to information via the internet is sort of like being given the freedom
to raid the king’s coffers; we can be set free with information if we
are astute enough to follow the data...
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Body by Blower - Dr. Brian Blower DC
Back to School: What's for Breakfast? - Sep 6, 2013 - 12:21:40 PM
Oh joy, oh joy, oh
joy! The kids are back in school. The roads are clearer until 3pm, the
food stores are quiet, the house is quiet, and the family pets are
resting too. This annual return to pleasant days and ordered family
times is habitually a welcomed time of year for so many. I can
understand that, having been around the return to school over the years
with my four, now grown up children. But along with the return comes
the challenges too. These will include the morning sleepy heads, the
coaxing and cajoling to get them “up and at em.”
All children have their own needs, like their own wardrobe, their own
books and carry bags, and their own preferences for hair and facial
needs which require, in most households, a time of quiet for each of
them in front of the mirror. Sometimes when the morning is intense the
quiet structured family life soon yields to the apparent chaos of...
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Body by Blower - Dr. Brian Blower DC
So what if you are “kinky”? - Jun 27, 2013 - 5:50:57 PM
Chiropractors love
kinky patients. We love the ones with their spines, legs and arms
buckled and twisted up by stress. We love it when they come into the
chiropractic office in pain, hobbling in the classic bent over position
that marks them as old, stiff and failing to thrive. Chiropractors don’t
wish this debility on their patients, but they love it when it is
presented to them, for the chiropractor knows that the suffering one is
in the right office, seeking out the right treatment and advice.
Kinky
is the word that comes to mind when viewing the disabled-by-subluxation
patient. Don’t run away here, these poor souls aren’t deviates, just
physically deviated. These poor patients are succumbing ...
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Body by Blower - Dr. Brian Blower DC
Change your thinking, change your health - Apr 17, 2013 - 1:03:22 PM
I am
going to retire some day. All of us, if we are lucky with our health,
get to a point in our aging when the energy out of us to do a job or
work activity, soon becomes more than the rewards can justify. Then it
is time to look about and take in your surroundings, like where you have
been working perhaps, and take a mental picture to remember it, even
after you close the door for the last time.
Before I go and close my door though, it behooves me to continually
try to help my friends and loved ones; and those that I come in contact
through my business or daily life. If people would just trust and then
let me, I would like to help each and every...
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Body by Blower - Dr. Brian Blower DC
Chiropractic and TMJ (Temporomandibular Joint) - Mar 1, 2013 - 9:11:15 AM
Rory McIlroy #1 golfer in the world withdrew from the Honda Classic golf
tourney today (March 1, 2013). because of problems with his wisdom tooth. He was
playing very poorly at the time. He may have what my son Nathen had. Read on to decide.
My son Nathen,
came to me the other day with a painful tooth on the upper left molar
area.
He is a tall and aesthetic young
man very active and gifted, especially in soccer which he plays midweek and
coaches on the weekends as well.
As his mother had already
booked a dental appointment for the problem, my son came to me perhaps more to
inform me of his pain and not necessarily to consult for the causes of the
painful tooth syndrome.
Having had a long history
working alongside many fine dentists in the Vancouver area during the 70’s and
80’s I was su
spicious of the pain syndrome and the clinical course of his
dilemma.
During the period of time I was
undergoing crown and on lay restorative work for my own mouth I had the good
fortune to be linked up with one of the most prominent oral surgeons and
teachers at the University of
British
Columbia in Canada...
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Body by Blower - Dr. Brian Blower DC
Like Your Spine - Sep 14, 2012 - 11:28:07 AM
This picture is an interesting look at the triad of
supporting structures our vertebral column mimics. In our spine we
mostly have two facets and one disc at each motor unit, a triad.
Suppose one or more of the
small pebbles in this picture are softened or moved off line even very slightly; now we have failure to stack.
Subluxation reflects stresses upon the joint structures and leads to an
ensuing precarious inability to move that motor unit further through
its normal range of motion (ROM). When a spine is subluxated, weight
transfer and load bearing on...
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Body by Blower - Dr. Brian Blower DC
FEAR, False Evidence (education) Appearing Real - Sep 6, 2012 - 3:09:38 PM
Billy, my chiropractic office assistant
came to me the other day a little disconcerted. She related to
me how she had booked an appointment with a new mother for her infant
daughter. The mom had just called to cancel the appointment, for
the second time.
Apparently the mother has scoliosis
and Herrington rods surgically implanted into her back to reduce the
distortions. Further the infant daughter had been diagnosed with
scoliosis too and the mother wanted the child to have a chiropractic
spinal examination and second opinion. Then possibly have manipulation
of the child’s pelvis and spine if necessary in an attempt...
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Body by Blower - Dr. Brian Blower DC
His Posture Showed his Pain in the Neck - Aug 30, 2012 - 12:37:12 AM
It
was so great to have the kids home for
the summer! My two youngest were with me for a month or two, and with
them came all of their friends, along with the driving, the
sleepovers, the dishes, the shopping and more washing and cleaning than
should be allowed. But I love it and give it all for the children,
my daughter and son are 16 and 18 years of age.
I know full well they won't be coming down from Canada as often in the future.
I live and work on Grand Bahama Island,
one of over seven hundred islands in The Bahamas. Weather is great,
beaches are perfect, the sea is gorgeous and the livin' is easy here.
Traffic is light and usually moves briskly...
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Body by Blower - Dr. Brian Blower DC
Lost Among the Living - Eating for Life - Jun 20, 2012 - 6:14:15 PM
Recently I was appalled at a situation I witnessed in a
supermarket parking lot. In a car parked lackadaisically askew in the slot
beside me were a mother and her friend sitting in the front seats.
They were grossly overweight, and there were two small
children unbuckled in the back seat. That wasn’t the show.
The entertainment was the mother behind the wheel feasting on her box of French
fries, gooped with sweet ketchup, making sure she was wiping the
cardboard clean and greedily pushing the fries into her mouth. She did not seem to be chewing
them, just stuffing and swallowing furtively as she sucked and licked her greasy fingers.
The two children in the back seat, not
unlike apples falling far from the tree, were busy following suit.
One of the children had the dregs of a hamburger in its wrapper and
appeared to be smearing her face with it. The other younger child
had ice...
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Body by Blower - Dr. Brian Blower DC
Chiropractic and that Pain in the Neck - May 30, 2012 - 11:14:35 PM
Your neck pain may be of many types and varieties. Many causes
of neck pain are generally overlooked and when untreated then inevitably
lead to degeneration of the discs, bones and joints. Early arthritis
and pain ensues.
Knowing this outcome is inevitable and practicing as a chiropractor
for many years I was more than just interested the other day by an article
in a prestigious Medical Journal which revealed that the degeneration
of the spine, particularly of the neck, is strongly associated with
osteoporosis at that site as well.
Osteoporosis, the loss or lack of structural integrity from a loss
of bone density is a common finding especially among the North American
population...
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Body by Blower - Dr. Brian Blower DC
Children and Chiropractic - Jan 24, 2012 - 11:20:18 PM
As the sapling is bent so
grows the mighty oak.
Taking it for granted that
our children are growing well and will
be attaining the full potential of their bodies may be foolish.
Look at their posture, others do.
If you find yourself
constantly reminding your child to “sit up straight” or poking your finger in
their back with the “quit slouching” command, maybe it is time to seek out a
professional’s opinion about their growth progression.
Chiropractors are trained to
evaluate posture and are experts at measuring and grading your child’s
growth.
They can also do something
positive to stop and change many of the shortcomings which lean the body over
and cause slouching and poor posture...
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Body by Blower - Dr. Brian Blower DC
Down but not out - Nov 24, 2011 - 2:13:04 AM
A young woman arrived outside our clinic
the other day and couldn't get out of the car for she was having acute
lower back muscle spasms and pain. That in itself isn't too uncommon
here on Grand Bahama Island for like anywhere back muscle spasms and
lower back pain are ubiquitous in nature. But what made this case
of immediate interest was that she was crying out and shrieking loudly
as her husband tried in vain to help her. We don't get that much
vocal screeching with our patients and their pain so I was paternally
alerted.
Somehow her husband got her to stand
and by holding on to his back she was half carried down the short hall
to my treatment room. No case history, get that as we go along,
this girl had ...
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