Healthy Life Newsletter, September 2024
A Note from Dr. Mha Atma
The summer has gone by very fast. I often hear folks saying that they don’t understand how time keeps going by so quickly. For me, I think in part it’s because my mind spends so much time thinking about either things that have happened or about what the future might hold. I like to remember the words at the beginning of my favorite Leonard Cohen song, Anthem:
The birds they sang
At break of day
Start again
I heard them say
Don’t dwell, on what has passed away
Or what is yet to be….
I invite you to join me in slowing down, even in the midst of stress, challenges and deadlines, and seeking to be fully present in each precious moment of life. It’s good for our health!
Patient of the Month: Julie Rea
I felt “locked up:” Stiffness and discomfort in my neck, middle back and lower back. Seemed like it had been that way for years…maybe since childhood? Previous doctors seen for this condition didn’t help much—no overall positive result.
I decided to try chiropractic care so that I could improve my mobility, work out, exercise more. I was confident it would help.
I found Khalsa Chiropractic to be a friendly, peaceful, kind and calm experience. Dr. Mha Atma recommended exercises and dietary changes along with chiropractic care. The treatment, over a period of weeks and a few months, resulted in feeling great, with more movement and less pain. I am amazed how different I feel. It feels like years are coming back to me of feeling good!
I’ve told about a half dozen people about my experience. I recommend chiropractic care to others because it really helps with mental and physical well-being. I love it! It truly is life-giving!
Dr. Hamid Sadri holding the World Series trophy in 2021. He is the team chiropractor of the Atlanta Braves.
A Grand Slam for Chiropractic
Pro Baseball Chiropractic Society Now Serving All 30 MLB Teams
.Athletes of all sports continue to discover how consistent chiropractic care can enhance their performance, address injuries and keep them active. This is especially true in Major League Baseball (MLB).
Baseball players face fitness and injury challenges in their rigorous 162-game regular season, with twice as many regular-season games as NBA basketball players and more than nine times the number of games as NFL football players.
Now, after more than 12 years of effort, the Pro Baseball Chiropractic Society (PBCS) has member DCs serving every team in MLB. Working as part of the health care teams with athletic trainers and medical physicians, these highly skilled chiropractors help keep their players on the field and in optimal health.
In addition to serving professional baseball players, the PBCS also provides practical tools for DCs who want to become team chiropractors on every level from recreational, to club, to the minors, to the majors.
PBCS Executive Director and Pittsburgh Pirates team chiropractor, Dr. Rick Bishop, notes: “It has been an honor for me to be a part of the PBCS from its beginning. We have such a strong vision for education. With that as our foundation, it is so important to us to serve as a resource to educate those not only inside, but also outside the professional baseball chiropractic community.
”
Dr. Curt Rindal, team chiropractor for the Seattle Mariners, at the 2023 All Star Game in Seattle.
Eating for Skin Health
It’s well-established that your eating habits can affect your skin – but do you know how much of an impact it can have? This conversation goes far beyond whether that fast-food meal you just ate will lead to an extra pimple or two. We’re talking about how a healthy diet can promote skin health on multiple levels, from skin aging to pigmentation to skin cancer.
In a recent study, researchers reviewed data on four specific skin conditions and evaluated how specific dietary factors impacted their development: skin aging, skin pigmentation, cutaneous melanoma (cancer that starts in the pigment-producing cells of the skin) and keratinocyte skin cancer (the most common form of skin cancer).
Eating oily fish was associated with a lower risk of skin aging and skin pigmentation.
Eating salad / raw vegetables was associated with a lower risk of ketatinocyte skin cancer.
Drinking tea was associated with a lower risk of skin pigmentation.
Drinking coffee and eating pork were associated with a higher risk of skin aging.
Eating beef was associated with an increased risk of cutaneous melanoma.
Eating bread was associated with an increased risk of ketatinocyte skin cancer.
Care about your skin? We’re all looking for ways to keep our skin young – and healthy – as we age. Keep these dietary factors in mind and you’ll be taking an important step to promoting skin health for a lifetime. Talk to your doctor for more information on the profound impact diet can have on your health and wellness from head to toe.
Walking for Back Pain
Avoidance behaviors are widely associated with low back pain; after all, when you’re in pain, all you want to do is minimize the pain, and the thought of movement often raises the fear of the pain getting worse. The problem is that movement is an important aspect of back pain relief.
It starts with avoiding bed rest, and continues with a visit to your chiropractor for appropriate evaluation and treatment. Between visits, your chiropractor may recommend walking as part of the treatment plan. That’s because walking – movement – can help; and research proves it.
If you suffer from low back pain that recurs (comes back periodically), know that consistent walking reduces the risk of recurrence. In fact, you could go twice as long without pain compared to not walking. Researchers showed this in a study that randomly assigned 700+ adults to a walking program or a non-walking control group after they recovered from a low back pain episode. Members of the walking group experienced an average of 208 pain-free days before recurrence, compared to only 112 days in the control group.
With health care costs skyrocketing (along with just about everything else these days), take comfort in the fact that the completely free activity of walking can significantly reduce the risk that your low back pain will recur (researchers tracked patients for 1-3 years following their initial episode of pain). If you’re experiencing low back pain, ask your doctor about if, when and how you should include walking in your rehabilitation plan.
Early Antibiotics and Asthma
Do you know a molecule called IPA plays a critical role in protecting against asthma? The problem is it’s produced by bacteria in a healthy gut – something too many people don’t have these days.
One reason: antibiotic overuse. That’s why early-life antibiotic use increases the risk of asthma.
According to research published in the journal Immunity, not only is this molecule crucial when it comes to the asthma conversation; when antibiotics reduce its production – thus increasing susceptibility to asthma, this susceptibility lasts long term, even after IPA levels and gut microbiome health return to normal.
Antibiotic overuse is common at all ages, but particularly in infants / young children. A common culprit: viral infections (colds, flu) that do not require antibiotic treatment (which treat bacterial infections, not viral infections), but are nonetheless prescribed – and gratefully accepted – by worried parents who don’t want to leave the doctor’s office without a prescription. Sometimes, antibiotics are also prescribed for bacterial infections, but in the absence of guidelines recommending their use for a particular infection.
Keep in mind that asthma isn’t the only risk factor when taking antibiotics; all drugs have potential side effects; plus, excessive use may lead to antibiotic resistance, which means the antibiotics aren’t as effective if and when they’re legitimately needed.
The moral to the story: Always ask your medical doctor about the necessity of a particular medication – antibiotic or otherwise – before filling a prescription. At any age, it’s smart health care.
Fruit Makes You Happy
At least in terms of reducing seniors’ depression symptoms, according to research. Boosting fruit intake during midlife may be the key. Let’s look at what the study findings suggest, adding to all the other reasons you should be getting enough fruit in your daily life.
Involving nearly 14,000 adults, the study tracked participants for approximately 20 years from midlife (average age: 51 years) to later life, evaluating whether higher consumption of fruit at midlife positively impacted the likelihood of experiencing symptoms of depression later in life. At the start of the study, researchers utilized questionnaires to determine consumption frequency of 14 fruits (and 25 vegetables). Two decades later, they evaluated depressive symptoms among the same group using the Geriatric Depression Scale.
Higher consumption of fruits was associated with lower risk of depressive symptoms among participants, even after accounting for various other factors that influence depression risk: medical history, physical activity, sleep habits, age-related variables, etc. Note: Midlife vegetable consumption did not appear to influence depression risk.
Of course, reducing your risk of depression is only one of many health-conscious reasons to consume plenty of fruit; packed with fiber, vitamins, minerals and beneficial plant compounds, eating fruit helps regulate your bowel habits, support weight loss, reduce cancer risk and promote heart health.
Minimize (Unhealthy) Snack Calories
Healthy snacking is one thing, but unfortunately, most Americans indulge in unhealthy snacking the majority of the time. Case in point: A new study that suggests U.S. adults average 400-500 calories in snacks every day that offer little nutritional value – and account for approximately one-third of daily added sugar intake.
Published in the research journal PLoS Global Public Health, the study consisted of an analysis of 20,000-plus surveys completed by adults over the age of 30. Researchers found that snacks accounted for 19.5% to 22.4% of total daily energy intake, with the most frequently consumed snacks (in descending order) as follows:
Convenience foods high in carbs and fats
Sweets
Alcoholic beverages
Sugar-sweetened beverages
Milk and dairy products
Fruits
Grains
Vegetables (by far the least frequently consumed snack)
So, what are your go-to snacks? Convenience foods like most people; or fruits, whole grains and vegetables? A healthy snack or two between meals is a great option to avoid overeating at one of your primary meals. However, if you’re consuming 400-500 calories a day on low-nutrition snacks, you might want to reconsider your dietary habits.
All the Ways DCs Top MDs for Spinal Pain
New Review Compares Downstream Utilization and Cost Differences
A new systematic review compares the cost of caring for patients with spine-related pain, examining the difference in downstream costs between chiropractic care and medical management.1
The authors conducted a Medline search, initially finding 2,256 citations from which they identified 44 applicable studies of high or acceptable quality. The 44 studies include 26 cohort studies, 17 cost studies and one randomized, controlled trial.
This is the first such study conducted since a similar paper was published in 2015.2 This is important, as most of the papers published since then identified not only initial costs of care, but downstream costs as well, which can be even more expensive than the initial care.
Here are all the ways chiropractic management resulted in lower downstream utilization and cost compared to medical management:
Diagnostic Imaging – 15 studies found chiropractic care resulted in less diagnostic imaging, particularly advanced imaging like MRI.
Opioids – 11 studies found chiropractic care resulted in fewer opioid prescriptions.
Surgery – Eight studies found patients underwent fewer surgeries with chiropractic management.
Hospitalization – Seven studies found chiropractic care resulted in fewer hospitalizations.
First Provider – Six studies associated lower downstream cost with a DC as the first provider.
Injections – Five studies found decreased use of injections with chiropractic care.
Specialist Visits – Five studies associated chiropractic care with fewer referrals to specialists.
ER Visits – Two studies found chiropractic care resulted in fewer emergency department visits.
The authors concluded: “Patients with spine-related musculoskeletal pain who consulted a chiropractor as their initial provider incurred substantially decreased downstream healthcare services and associated costs, resulting in lower overall healthcare costs compared with medical management.”
References
Farabaugh R, Hawk C, Taylor D, et al. Cost of chiropractic versus medical management of adults with spine-related musculoskeletal pain: a systematic review. Chiropr Man Therap, 2024;32:Article 8.
Dagenais S, Brady O, Haldeman S, Manga P. A systematic review comparing the costs of chiropractic care to other interventions for spine pain in the United States. BMC Health Serv Res, 2015;15:474.
The Safest “Opioid”: Chiropractic
The opioid crisis exposed the profound dangers of opioid abuse, misuse and addiction, while elevating nondrug pain relief – i.e., chiropractic and other forms of care – to a new position within health care. But there’s still work to be done, because researchers are working on “safer opioids,” rather than expending their time and energy on natural, nondrug pain relievers (again, like chiropractic).
According to new research, an experimental opioid may suppress pain with fewer side effects, withdrawal symptoms and other complications than traditional opioids. That’s all well and good, but why would we want safer when we can embrace the safest “opioid” in terms of pain relief: chiropractic care? Nondrug, natural – that’s chiropractic. And although you could become dependent, it’s only in the best way, as in consistent pain relief and a lifelong relationship with your chiropractor that leads to whole-body health and well-being.
When you experience pain – headache pain, neck pain, back pain or other types of musculoskeletal pain, where do you turn first? Is it to the medicine cabinet, for over-the-counter pain pills that may temporarily alleviate the pain, but don’t address the cause? Or is it an eventual visit to your medical doctor and a potential opioid prescription? Regardless, you’re defining your pain relief in pharmaceutical terms.
Before you pop a pain pill or fill a prescription for an opioid – even if a “safer” one hits the market, ask about a proven, safe, nondrug pain-relief option. Ask about chiropractic.