Chiropractic Treatment for Headache

Chiropractic has for over 100 years offered patients a drug free alternative to painful conditions. The number one painful condition in The U.S. is, no it's not watching the congress on C-Span, it's headaches, although watching the congress on C-Span probably will give you a headache. Seriously, neck pain and headache cost the economy in The US over 13 Billion dollars a year. The pain to the patient is usually quite debilitating. Many of the medications for headache offer some alleviation but at the cost of side effects which cause liver, Kidney, Gastrointestinal, and cardiac damage just to mention a few. 

Headaches like any other condition should be treated at their cause. Many headaches are caused by tension in the muscles that connect the head to the neck. Other headaches are caused by irritation in the neck of the nerves that extend up into the head and control muscle tension and blood flow. Both of these causes come from changes in the posture of the spine in the neck. These are the types of headaches that respond the best and the quickest to Chiropractic treatment.

Chiropractic works with the muscles and the spine with its spinal bones and spinal disks to restore the proper posture. By returning the spine to its proper posture the tension in the muscles is neutralized, the irritation to the spinal nerves alleviated.

This result has been documented through MRI studies.(Peterson, Schmidt et. al.) The studies chose patients with headache and verifiable MRI findings for conditions including herniation of the disk. The patients were treated with chiropractic manipulation to the cervical spine. They found that within 2 weeks, 55% of the patients were significantly improved. After the treatments following the patients it was further found that 1 month after the treatment 68.9% had significant relief of their headache pain. At 3 months 85.7% had significant relief of headache. No one in the study reported adverse effects from the treatment. 

There are many causes of headache some are life threatening. If you have headache for a prolonged period of time you should consult your doctor for a complete examination. When the possibility of life threatening causes have been eliminated, see your chiropractor first before beginning treatment of medication with serious side effects that might not even help. As the studies have shown Chiropractic offers the treatment with the least risks of side effects of any other treatment option.