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the benefits of chirpractic care


After the Injury: Methods to Combat Post-Trauma Depression

Even though living with daily pain or debilitating injury is hard enough as it is, there is a chance that with your change in mobility or even employment, you will also be combating the psychological side effects that come with chronic pain: depression and anxiety. Research shows that injury and chronic pain, especially those that restrict your personal independence, can put you at greater risk for depression and similar mood disorders. Therefore, if you have recently had an unexpected injury where the road to recovery is long, it's important to take preemptive steps to preserve your mental health.

1. Start physical therapy as soon as you can.

Physical therapy helps to combat depression because the goal of the treatment is to improve mobility and reduce long-term pain. In fact, one study showed that 40% of patients who suffered injury and struggled with depression were able to restore their mental health as they underwent physical therapy treatment. If you make a standing appointment with the same therapist to complete a regimen, request that your therapist also provide you with a mental health screening at each session and explain that you want one of the goals of the treatment to be to help you keep or restore your mental health. 

As you complete your exercises, especially those that push your physical ability, do not allow your physical progress to affect your state of mind. Instead, use positive thoughts to help motivate your training regimen. Contact a representative from a company like Burgman Chiropractic Clinic PC to learn more about how physical therapy can help you. 

2. Talk it out.

You might want to avoid talking about your feelings or how your pain and injury have changed your life. But part of moving on is processing the events that led to your current state in life. You might not think you need intervention at first, but signing up for personal counselling or group therapy as soon as you can after a traumatic event can help prevent severe depression or self-destructive thoughts and behaviors from settling in and becoming your new normal. It will be easier to combat feelings of discouragement and worthlessness if you already know how to recognize them for what they are and employ strategies to deal with them in a healthy way.

3. Do everything you can as soon as you are hurt to minimize the development of chronic pain.

Pain is connected to depression. It can be hard to lose your ability to move normally and to become dependent on pain pills for normal day-to-day activities. Therefore, before chronic pain sets in from an accident, start a preventative pain program. See a doctor right away, even if your injuries seem minor. Get adjustments at the chiropractor and get a massage to help relieve stress. Stress from the injury aftermath can also contribute to pain levels and depression. Begin meditating to help keep stress levels low as you deal with medical bills, loss of employment, or insurance claims. 

You can also minimize pain by recognizing your risk of developing depression. Injury can lead to depression, but depression itself can also lead to pain, as those with the tendency toward depression will also have a tendency toward chronic pain development. If you have history of depression in your family, talk to your doctor right away if you begin to notice daily pain, as these conditions can be related in more ways than one. You don't want depression to lead to pain, then deeper depression, which in turn leads to greater pain in a continuing downward spiral. 

Living with pain and injury after a traumatic event does not have to translate into a decline in your mental health. Take the steps listed above to help you preserve your identity as your recover. 

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the benefits of chirpractic care

Have you ever been to a chiropractor before? If not, you are missing out on a whole list of benefits that regular chiropractic adjustments can offer. Did you know that if your spine is misaligned, you are likely to get sick more often? This is just one of the many benefits that you will learn about here on this blog. I didn't understand how beneficial this type of treatment is until I started going for a bi-weekly adjustment, which has made a very big difference in my life.

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