No Miracles-Just Results!

There are three proven steps to take in order to avoid an early death. #1- Don't smoke. #2- Wear your seat belt. #3- Have a healthy body weight. Sound simple? Yes, but simple isn't always easy. Gena Kay Shealy, of WorkLife Solutions, explains the principles behind achieving a healthy body weight. Gena Kay is a Certified Health Coach with Take Shape for Life.

Follow the B.E. S.L.I.M. approach.

Breakfast- You must eat within one hour after waking up. Your body needs fuel to kick start your metabolism, otherwise it will slow down, and you will not lose weight.

Exercise- If you are not in the habit of exercise, then just start off walking more each day. Build up the intensity over a 4 week time period, but remember- you cannot simply exercise your way to a healthy body weight- you must eat right too.

Support- Be accountable to someone who is knowledgeable about healthy eating habits and wants you to succeed. It could be your partner, a friend, your chiropractor or a Certified Health Coach like Gena Kay.

Low Fat- Some fat is necessary to sustain our health, but we eat too much of it. We need to feed ourselves frequently with low fat and modest calorie foods. This will keep our blood sugar level and put us into a higher metabolic state for losing weight.

Individualize- Feeding yourself six times a day takes some thinking and planning. Take a look at your life, and figure out what can work for you. Take Shape for Life uses Medifast Meals to help make choices easier.

Moniter- You have to keep track of how you are doing, if you make sure you get there. Helpful monitoring tools are a tape measure, a scale and a pair of jeans that you want to fit back into.
Blood pressure, blood sugar and cholesterol measurements are important, if you have issues with hypertension, diabetes or cardiovascular disease.

Cold Weather Chiropractor

Many of us in Atlanta got slammed by the cold and snowy weather. Did I let it stop me? Maybe a little bit. But soon I was back in action! Last Saturday I brought my portable chiropractic table and my friend, Mr. Bones, to the Float the Boat Bouldering Competition in West Atlanta. For those of you unfamiliar with the sport of bouldering, let me explain. It is like rockclimbing in that you try to scamper up the face of a cliff. Instead of using a rope and safety gear to catch you if you fall, you simply place a padded mat (known as a crash pad) at the base of the rock to cushion your fall. Most people only climb 10-20 feet high when they boulder.

So what, you may think, can a chiropractor do to help climbers in a bouldering competition?

A chiropractor can help stretch tight muscles and joints to make climbers more limber. You have to be able to reach far with your arms and legs when you boulder. A chiropractor can balance body mechanics, so a climber has better leverage when they make awkward moves. A chiropractor can increase muscle strength by adjusting the spine to free up the nerve supply to muscles. It takes muscles strength to hang on to tiny holds and hoist yourself up the rock.

Over 50 people competed in the cold weather, which began in the 20F's and barely creeped into the 40F's. Whether it is hot or cold, you can count on me to get the job done!

Outside Your Comfort Zone: Flying Doctors Mission to Cambodia

"How will you explain to people what your are going to do? We don't speak Cambodian." Dixie asked me. "Just lie down on the table, and I will start working on you. They'll get the idea." I replied. Soon we had people crowding around, eager and curious to be next. Folks on crutches, wheelchairs, there was even a fellow without any legs in a wagon encircling the portable chiropractic table. We had set up an impromptu chiropractic clinic in the courtyard of the Siem Reap Hospital in Cambodia. Dixie and I were part of a 19 person health care mission with Flying Doctors of America in November 2010 providing free medical, dental, surgical and chiropractic care in the impoverished Southeast Asian country of Cambodia.
Chiropractic is a wonderful healing art. It also make great entertainment on mission trips. People love to see and hear the groans, moans, winces, cracks, pops and smiles that emanate from our treatment table.

For five days we travel to villages on the outskirts of Siem Reap. Siem Reap is the primary tourist destination for travellers to Cambodia. It sits just outside the entrance to the UNESCO World Heritage Site- Angkor Wat. Highlights of my trip included adjusting blind villagers, diagnosing Parkinson's disease in a farmer, improvising a splint for a little girl who was run over by a motorbike, performing acupuncture on an ailing monk and exploring the archaeological ruins.

Traveling the world to alleviate human suffering is exciting, exotic and exhausting. Getting back to work helps me recuperate. Where will my next mission take me? Stay tuned!

One Friday night when I was 15 years old, my friend Rob Feldman brought over a book of poems by Alan Ginsberg called "Howl". Illustrating the book were images of a statue of Buddah wrapped in a Banyan tree rising from the jungle floor. I was entranced by these images which were from Angkor Wat, the largest temple complex in the world. Angkor Wat sits at the outskirts of Siem Reap, where our Flying Doctors of America Mission will land at the end of this week. 20 American doctors, nurses, dentist and support personnel will arrive, equipped to triage, examine, diagnose, and treat men, women and children in and around Siem Reap, Cambodia. All of our services and medicines will be supplied for free, courtesy of the volunteers and those who have supported us. We will also tour Angkor Wat as part of our mission, thus achieving a goal that I first conceived 40 years ago! After our mission is completed, Dixie and I will travel to Singapore and Malaysia. In Singapore we will visit with Charles Lee, a former intern at our practice who is now married, expecting a child, and practicing chiropractic in Singapore. In Malaysia we will tour the newest chiropractic college in the world located in the capital city of Kuala Lumpur. We arrive back in the USA just before Thanksgiving.

Can your Health Savings Account help pay for chiropractic healthcare products & services?

According to the IRS Publication 502 Medical and Dental Expenses a good number of chiropractic services and healthcare products are eligible for coverage under a Health Savings Account or to be listed as Unreimbursed Medical Expenses

for tax purposes. Please note that the items described that are available in our office must be prescribed by Dr. Schantz for a specific condition or disorder for which you are being treated.

Items and services that are for promotion of your well-being are not considered eligible medical expenses. Here is a partial list of items that you may have been prescribed or may be appropriate for your condition. Please ask Dr. Schantz or our staff if you have questions. Consult your tax advisor and/or your HSA administrator for specific allowances and limitations.

CUSTOM-FIT ORTHOTICS THERAPEUTIC MASSAGE T.E.N.S. UNITS

NUTRITIONAL SUPPLEMENTS & NATURAL MEDICINES EXERCISE DEVICES

CERVICAL PILLOWS LUMBAR CUSHIONS SUPPORTS/BRACES/SPLINTS

HEEL LIFTS TMJ DEVICES CHIROPRACTIC ADJUSTMENTS

X-RAYS DIAGNOSTIC PROCEDURES MASSAGE CHAIR

How does a 5 year old know if he needs a chiropractor?

Most 5 years olds don't walk into our office on their own. The most dramatic episode in my professional life was when one was carried in by his father.

I was working as an Associate in an established chiropractic office in Sandy Springs in the late 1980's.

On Saturdays I saw all the patients in the practice. I was getting ready to leave for the day when our receptionist told me that we had one more patient to see. There in the doorway was a man in his mid-30's clutching a young boy wheezing and gasping for breathe. I exclaimed to the father, "This boy belongs in the Emergency Room-not a chiropractic office!". The man replied, "We have tried that route before, but it doesn't work-please help my son!" I couldn't say no, so I had him place the boy on the chiropractic table. I palpated his spine and found several vertebra associated with the nerve supply to the lungs misaligned. I carefully placed my hands in the proper position and performed a swift thrust. The vertebra popped in to place. The boy immediately began breathing rhythmically and regularly with no sign of respiratory distress. He fell asleep in his father's arms, and together they left the clinic for their home.

The clinical experience of most chiropractic doctors will show that children tend to respond to chiropractic treatment for internal disorders. This is because their nervous system is more sensitive than adults, and subluxations of their spines will more commonly result in nerve disruption to internal organs, rather than trigger pain.

By the time a child has reached the age of 5 they have grown 500% or more since birth. They have learned to crawl, sit up, stand, climb, walk and run. Along the way they have had an opportunity to accumulate spills, falls and upsets that can result in subluxations of the spine.

The subluxations may cause nerve interference-even in the absence of pain.

44% of patients surveyed at our practice felt that it would be OK to bring a child to a chiropractor after the age of 5.

What do you think?

Chiropractic & Infants- Safe? Necessary?

Our August patient survey, "When Should a Child Have Their First Chiropractic Visit?", revealed that 36% of those surveyed believed that "Anytime after birth" was an appropriate time to bring a child for a chiropractic visit. Among the comments we heard were, "The younger you get started, the better chance you have of staying healthy", and "If an infant had some kind of trauma, and wasn't getting better under medical care, then of course I would recommend chiropractic".

The International Chiropractors Assocation (ICA)recommends the earliest possible evaluation, detection and correction of chiropractic lesions (subluxations) in children, especially infants, to maximize the potential for normal growth and development. The ICA points to research indicating that vaginal deliveries, especially when forceps are used, can lead to excessive force on the cervical spine, leading to trauma and subluxation in newborns.

Some patients expressed concern about the safety of adjusting infants, since their bones had not hardened enough.

Let's look at a 2008 study from Great Britian, "Adverse Effects of Spinal Manipulative Therapy in Children Younger Than 3 Years", published in the Journal of Manipulative and Physiologic Therapeutics. The objective of the study was to identify any adverse effects to chiropractic care occurring in the pediatric patient and to evaluate the risk of complications arising in the pediatric patient resulting from chiropractic care. A 3-year review of pediatric case files from the Anglo-European College of Chiropractic teaching clinic were evaluated. The results showed that out of 697 children receiving 5,242 chiropractic treatments, 85% of parents reported an improvement. 7 parents reported an adverse effect. There were no serious complications resulting from chiropractic treatment (reactions lasting >24 hours or severe enough to require hospital care.

Infants don't complain about back pain.

If your use of chiropractic care is limited to reducing back pain, then you probably would never conceive of a situation where an infant could benefit from chiropractic treatment. If you take a closer look at what chiropractic treatment does- improve the function of the nervous system- then you may be able to see how chiropractic may be appropriate for infants.

Case Study from Our Practice- 11 month old baby with painful bowel movements becoming less and less frequent, from every other day to every 4 days. Increase in medication from using up a whole bottle of maltsupex once a month to every two weeks, even while increasing fruit and vegetable intake. Incredibly hard stools and rectal bleeding.

One treatment improved the baby to having soft movement every day. She needed another treatment the following week, and now she's having 2-3 movements regularly, every morning with no medication at all. No more tears and screaming.

This baby had subluxations in the lower spine and sacral region resulting in decreased nerve stimulation to the bowel. There was inadequate musculature contraction to initiate normal bowel movements resulting in chronic constipation. Infants typically respond quickly to chiropractic treatment (1-2 visits), because their nervous and musculoskeletal system is less mature.

Other Conditions of Infants that May Respond to Chiropractic Treatment

Ear Infections

Respiratory Distress

Breast Feeding Problems

Digestion and Elimination Problems

Developmental Delays- Lifting head, balancing, crawling, standing, walking

Colic