San Leandro Chiropractor San Leandro Chiropractor Page 29 San Leandro Chiropractor San Leandro Chiropractor

How Much Sleep Does Your Body Need?

April 20, 2011 by drburt

You may have this idea that you’re not getting enough sleep. Chances are, you’re not. There’s a big difference on our performance when we have adequate sleep every night versus when we don’t have enough. So, how much sleep do we actually need? About some 15 years ago there was this theory that if you get about 4 to 5 hours of sleep a night then your body will just adapt and the brain can still be able to perform well. But that was because the studies conducted then were on participants who were only monitored during sleeping time at night. They were able to go home by morning. They could also have taken a nap during daytime or they could have been drinking coffee.

David Dinges who is the head of the Sleep & Chronobiology Lab in the University of Pennsylvania knows more about this than anyone else in the world. He and Hans Van Dongen who is his lead author had assigned several dozens of people into 3 groups. In 2003 these 3 groups were given the strict rule that one group sleeps for 4 hours, the other for 6 hours while the other for 8 hours for 2 weeks. Then every couple of hours at daytime they were being tested to monitor their ability for sustaining attention with PVT or psychomotor vigilance task. They were tested to see how much time their body requires to respond after they see a number flashed on the computer screen. Even just a half a second delay is already a good indication that they lack sleep and this short delay is called as microsleep.

Based on the PVT test that lasted for 2 weeks the result show that those who had 8 hours of sleep barely suffer from any attention lapse and there was no decline on their results. Those who had 6 hours of sleep a night showed signs of delay and this declined steadily and those that had 4 hours of sleep a night had the worst result from the 3 groups. Also, this test showed no difference on the result from people sleeping 8 hours a night to those sleeping for 9 hours. While those who had 7 hours of sleep show a slower response time than the 8 hour group though the trend was not decreasing but steady at slower speed.

Coffee and other countermeasures can help but these can only help temporarily. Lack of sleep won’t show signs right away but it will after about 5 days where performance level is decreasing. But Dinges also found out that a small percentage of population, about 5%, can actually handle less hours of sleep and still maintain good performance and this could be associated to their genes.

So, with this study it is safe to conclude that our body needs 8 hours of sleep a night. You may think your body already adjusted to lack of sleep because you don’t feel sleepy. But sleepiness is not the only factor to consider as your performance and memory sharpness and time of response may prove otherwise.

If you have anything to add to this post, please feel free to Post a comment or share your thoughts through Facebook, Twitter or comment section below to join the conversation.

Back Surgery, Cost of Insurance and Ineffectiveness of Care

April 13, 2011 by drburt

As the number of orthopedic surgeons in the USA is growing so is the number of back surgeries performed on patients with back pain. Often time it is a 50/50 chance that patient will be pain free after a surgical procedure due to the soft tissue fibrosis and lack of proper post surgical rehabilitation. Did you know that over 100,000 people die each year in this country from surgery complications. This number by far exceeds the number of automobile accidents in the entire country. The ratio is 23 percent for men and 32 percent for women.

It is not the secret that the health care system in this country is the most expensive in the world. Thus all U.S. citizens must get the best educated doctors who in theory would make the healthiest nation in the world and would provide the best medical care available. World Health Organization stated that as of 2000 the U.S. ranked #1 in cost, #72 in population health, #37 in health care delivery with 48 million Americans uninsured. France is ranked as #4, #4 and #1 and only 1% uninsured. The question is why French get more medical care for their money than we are?

TIME Magazine stated that U.S. spends more to get less then any other industrialized country in the world. Why such a waste of resources? This country spent twice as much on a sick-care as it did on food in 2006 and more than China’s 1.3 billion citizens consumed altogether. Wow, we can feed countries like India and China for the whole year.

President Barack Obama stated: “Today, we are spending over 2 trillion a year on health care – almost 50 percent more per person than the next most costly nation. And yet, for all this spending, more of our citizens are uninsured; the quality of our care is often lower; and we aren’t any healthier. In fact, citizens in some countries that spend less than we do are actually living longer than we do.”

According to Forbes Magazine Back Pain cost over $40 billion for treatment alone. If we include disability, work loss and other factors the total cost would range somewhere between $100-200 billion per year. That is quite a large amount of money. Most of the countries do not even produce this much. About 3 million people went to Hospital E.R. for lower back pain which cost $9.5 billion. Low Back Pain is the number nine most expensive condition treated in U.S. Hospitals. If people could only maintain their bodies the way they maintain their vehicles things would be different. Regular Chiropractic care could prevent biomechanical vertebral misalignments and therefore save an individual from unnecessary expensive surgical procedure.

Pran Manga, PhD. MPhil health economist stated: “ There is an overwhelming body of evidence indicating that chiropractic therapy of lower back pain is more cost-effective than medical management.” Many other studies proved that chiropractic manipulation for none specific low back pain is far more effective than other forms of treatments. Millions of patients are satisfied with the results that they are getting with chiropractic care. Watch several video testimonials on this blog. Only 42 out of 131 military treatment facilities have access to a chiropractic care due to the medical bureaucracy within the Department of Defense.

What would you do if you had low back pain?

Go To a Hospital and Get Pain Killers and Possible Referral for a Surgery?
Go To a Chiropractor?
Do Nothing and Wait Till the Pain Goes Away On Its Own?

Medical Care Cost and its Relationship to Medical Education

April 12, 2011 by drburt

Many never think about Medical Care Cost and its Relationship to Medical Education. Recently I have come across a very interesting article about the cost of Health Care in the USA. Every American citizen thinks that US Health care system is best in the world. The reality is very different. The cost of the health care system in this country is the most expensive in the world. Many countries have as advanced medical care system as the USA with much less cost per citizen.

Many want to know when is the change going to happen? People are sick and tired of drowning in medical bills. It is never ending cycle. The cause could be, in my own opinion, is the high cost of education in this country and privatization of medical care. It takes about 11 years to become a medical doctor, and that is just being a general practitioner. If one wants to specialize in something, additional 4 years are required. The amount of loans these doctors take sum up to over $250,000 plus or minus. Most of it depends which school you go to and if you live on campus or not. It took me about 8 years before I saw the license of Doctor of Chiropractic on the wall in my office.

About 4 years of undergraduate studies, and almost 4 years of chiropractic school education. The verdict was over $100,000 in cost and that does not include undergraduate studies. These numbers were not this high before the birth of student loans.

Recently spoke to a 67 year old gentleman who is a retiring Chiropractor. He told me that back in days Student Loans did not exist. You pay out of your pocket for tuition and that was the end of the story. The cost was about $500 a quarter. Ten years ago I was paying over $5500 a quarter. Don’t really want to know what it is now.

One must understand that in order for a Chiropractor, Medical Doctor, Dentist or any other medical care provider to recoup the cost of Education process, one must be charging insurance companies for the services. This is a never ending process that can not be stopped unless the cost of education will significantly go down and health care will be free. That is communism and something I escaped 20 years ago and despised it all my life. Free does not necessarily means good. It is a human nature for an individual to excel at certain fields. People will always look for a better medical service around the block. Medical Care is just like everything else has become a business and each Hospital and private clinic treats it as one. The fuel for a medical facility is the amount of patients an institution is seeing and the type of Coverage an individual has. This is just my personal opinion and something that I have been observing for the past ten years working in a medical field.

What do you think the medical care should be like in the United States? Feel free to add any information in a comment area.

Four Causes Of Poor Posture

April 8, 2011 by drburt

POSTURE THEORY DIOGRAM — Designed by Max Banfield

Many people around the world are affected by a poor posture. Poor posture can affect your appearance and how a person feels about him or herself. It can contribute to a pain in a cervical and lumbar spine, cephalgia, intervertebral disc problems and even occasional chronic pain and breathing problems.

Here are the 4 Major Causes of Poor Posture

Soft Tissue Injury or Pain

Every time an individual has soft tissue injury an antalgic posture iS an inevitable result. This can become a programmed habit. Holding yourself differently or walking differently can be caused by an injury or pain in just about any part of your body so it is not limited to back or neck injuries.

Muscle Imbalance

Every day activities can develop larger and stronger muscles on one side of the body. A recent example was a patient of mine who was carrying heavy bag on one side of her body. Her upper trapezium became more developed on one side of the body. This imbalance caused a subluxation in her cervical spine and as a result shooting pain down her left upper extremity has happened. She though it was a heart attack first and called 911. Medical Doctors could not find anything wrong with her. These symptoms assimilate hear attack. More detailed about this episode is in this post: “Heart attack or Thoracic Outlet Syndrome.”

Low Self Esteem

Individuals with low self esteem keep their head down and shoulders forward. This can result in a loss of a cervical lordosis curvature. This can become a bad habit and can lead to a chronic bad posture.

Obesity

Carrying extra weight around the abdominal area can have problems with lower back being pulled forward by the weight of the stomach. Scientific term – Pendulous Abdominis.

These four cases are the most common causes of a bad posture. This is a learned habit that can be unlearned by an individual. It can be difficult to correct your posture on your own. Considering chiropractic care is a good start. You may also consider using posture aid till you learn how to stand correctly on your own. There are a variety of different aids on the market including back and neck supports and posture pumps.