Compass Chiropractic

Compass Chiropractic and massage is now accepting Cigna open access and open access plus.  We hope that joining Cigna will help make care more accessible to our current patients  and remove obstacles for our new patients who have Cigna.
Call Whitney to find out you specific coverage - 257-2800

For more information about Cigna, visit their website: www.cigna.com

For general help with insurance you can visit our Help with Insurance Page

I recently became aware of the Environmental Working Group (EWG) and have been very impressed with their work.  The first iPhone application that I downloaded from them was a list of the best to least healthy sunscreens and now they’ve added another app that will help you decide which foods to buy organic.  There is also a pdf version of their list that is available on the EWG website.

Buying organic is best, but it is also expensive.  There are some foods that hold the pesticides in more than others.  When buying these foods you should opt for the organic.  The list produced by EWG list the foods that contain the most pesticides and foods that have the least.

Happy eating

How much harm can popping a couple Advils do?  According to a new study out of Denmark, more than you would imagine.

A group of very common over the counter pain medications known as NSAIDs (Nonsteriodal Anitinflammatory Drugs) have been shown to increase the risk of death due to stroke.   Typically we assume that anyone who has an adverse reaction to medications like Advil has been taking them for an extended period of time, but the researchers in this study found that many of the people who died had only been taking the drugs for a two week period. The doses that were measured in the Danish study were similar to what someone would take for treating chronic pain, about three tablets per day. “We found that most NSAIDs are associated with increased cardiovascular mortality and morbidity,” says researcher Emil Loldrup Fosbol, MD, of Gentofte University Hospital in Hellerup, Denmark.

My take…

Couple days ago I had a person call the office because he had questions about his back pain.  He told me that he spoke with his MD who told him that he could take 10 tablets of ibuprofen a day, without any limitation to the duration.  I also spoke with a friend who was told by an orthopedist to “take them (NSAIDs) like candy.”

For too long we have taken medications such as ibuprofen with disregard for the side effects associated with these medications. You can see the side effects associated with ibuprofen by clicking drugs.com.  Most people are surprised that an our the counter medication such as ibuprofen can cause such serious sides effects.

Ibuprofen has it’s place, but it is meant to be used for pain relief in the short term and not to rely on for ongoing pain relief.  Pain is a message that something is wrong with the body, much like check engine light in your car.  Ibuprofen is a way to mask the symptoms, but it doesn’t fix the underlying problem.  Use ibuprofen for acute pain relief if you have to and fix the problem that is causing the symptoms.

Chiropractic addresses the cause of the problem and eliminates the need for harmful medications.  If you’re experiencing pain, speak to a chiropractor and see if you’re a candidate for chiropractic care.  For more information about our office check out the about us page.  If you would like specific information on conditions that we treat you can click the following links: neck pain, back pain, headaches, sports injuries, auto accidents.

Researchers out of Boston University believe that they’ve determined which genetic factors promote longevity.  Longevity is due to a number of different factors, many of them lifestyle related such as diet, exercise, smoking etc.  Many researchers now believe that living into the late nineties has more to do with your genes than it does with your lifestyle.  Professor Paola Sebastiani, a biostatistician at Boston University who is on the research team that made the discovery suggests that there is a strong genetic component to extreme longevity.

Scientists identified 150 DNA sequence variations called single nucleotide polymorphisms among those 100 years old and above that may have contributed to their healthy aging. In the control group, 15% of participants had longevity-associated genes suggesting that 15% of the American population are predisposed to live to be 100.  According to the researchers this test is 77% percent accurate.

What would you do with this information?

I heard Dr. Sebastiani (the researcher in the study) interviewed on WFYI this morning and she was asked if she had tested her self and she said no.  At first this came as a surprise to me, but made more sense as I thought about the impact of this imformation.  If you did know that you were going to live to 100 according to your DNA would you be less likely to follow a healthy lifestyle?  On the flip side, would you take more risks if you believed that you were going to have a short life. What if you made decisions based on test that were incorrect?  Unfortunately by the time you figured it out you it would be too late.

Dr. Sebastinani went on to say that the real value in this study is what we will learn about how people age.  The information gleaned from the study will help researchers understand why some people get diseases of old age sooner than others.  While it is interesting to think about the idea of taking a test that will predict your life span, it is important to remember that there are many other factor that play a role in longevity and there is a 23% chance that the test is wrong.

In the mean time, I’m going to continue to eat healthy, get regular chiropractic , exercise and try to limit my stress.  If it is in my genes that I’m going to check out early at least I felt my best during the time I had.