Question
Hi there - This ques may or may not be something you can answer but here goes ... For the past several months I have suffered from (what feels like) a muscular ache involving my left shoulder, front left chest area and back left shoulder blade area. I am 38 years old and I have three kids the youngest is 18 mth old and weighs almost 35 lbs. (I carry him on the left side). The pain comes and goes, but is much worse at night, and hurts more when I am lying down. I have a tendancy to sleep with my left arm up and under the pillow and on my stomach. My question is ... does this sound like something that could be treated by a chiropractor? I know pain in the left chest could signal a heart attack, but I can run 3-4 miles 4 times a week and I haven't had a heart atack yet. Do you think this could be muscular in nature?  

Answer
Dear Kathryn,

Thank you for your question.  In order to answer it properly, I'll need to give you some background on anatomy and physiology and how they relate to the chiropractic profession.  Before I do that, however, I want you to know that this web site is not intended to be nor is it appropriate to use it for purposes of distinguishing emergency situations such as impending heart attacks, as mentioned in your question.  Should you desire such information or if you believe you may have an emergency situation, it is best to call 9-1-1 immediately.  

Your question is based on some common misconceptions regarding the chiropractic profession.  There are two branches or schools of thought in chiropractic.  Briefly, they are differentiated by whether they deal with the limited therapeutic approach for aches and pains (commonly termed "mixed" chiropractic because it represents a mixture of a chiropractor with a non-chiropractic matter) or a non-therapeutic approach to optimum body performance (termed "straight" chiropractic because there is no mixing of chiropractic with anything else).  My expertise is in non-therapeutic straight chiropractic.

Therapeutic "mixed" chiropractic is the older approach based on a split from the founding principles of chiropractic about a century ago.

Non-therapeutic "straight" chiropractic is the more modern of the two.  It deals with a particular, common situation called a vertebral subluxation.  This is not at all the same as the matter of aches in the shoulder or chest, as mentioned in your question, but they may exist together.  The spine is made of many bone segments which house and protect the spinal cord and the smaller spinal nerve branches that come off the spinal cord and exit between the bones.  These nerve pathways carry information or messages between the brain and the cells of the body.  These messages are essential for the life of the cells.  Without brain messages, the cells immediately begin the process of dying; i.e., they can no longer function the way they should to maintain life.

Because the bones are moveable, they can misalign in such a way as to interfere with the messages and, ultimately, the ability of the person to function at their best or express their optimum potential, whatever that may be.  People with vertebral subluxations are not able to get all they can out of life.

Vertebral subluxations can be caused by a wide variety of factors, what we'll generally call stresses.  These stresses can be physical (such as exercise routines, sleeping posture and mattress condition, the birth process, sneezing, falling down, etc.), mental / emotional (in its many forms, probably the most familiar use of the word stress), or chemical (such as pollution, drugs, perhaps even alcohol, etc.), which are, unfortunately, typically uncontrollable and regular parts of daily living for all age groups.  In short, a vertebral subluxation can occur for a multitude of reasons.

Tragically, vertebral subluxations are rarely obvious to the individual they affect.  They usually have no symptoms.  The reason is that most of what goes on inside you happens without your awareness.  For example, try specifically to "feel" your liver.  Try to be aware of exactly what it's doing right now.  You can't, so you can't know if it's functioning at its best or something less.  To complicate things, nerve pathways that carry messages of control (termed "motor" nerves) have no way of transmitting ache or pain messages, so your body function may be far from perfect and you'd not have any alerting signal whatsoever.  The branching of the nerve pathways is complex and extensive, making it exceedingly difficult to predict or determine exactly how the person will be affected.  For this reason alone, it is impossible for anyone to give you reliable answers as to a connection between the spine and specific symptoms of any kind, including various aches.  Certainly, every part of the body must have connections to the nerve system so that vital information may be transmitted between the brain and the cells.  There are some who would attempt to review the possible nerve connections between a nerve root and specific organs or tissues, but this ignores the multitude of variables that determine the expression of function.  The question of how your individual body carries out the myriad of activities just to maintain life is enormous and would require your Creator's (or creator's, for the agnostic) knowledge, or at least far more than our educated knowledge of the complexities of life.

Now that you have more information about the body and vertebral subluxation, how do you make use of it?  Well, first understand that this is not an explanation of why you may have the aches you describe or whether they are related to vertebral subluxation or anything else.  Are there reasons for what you're experiencing?  Even though they may be beyond our ability to identify, yes, there are; and they may be of great importance to you in other ways, but pinning them down is not relevant to the matter of whether you will benefit from being free of vertebral subluxations.  Vertebral subluxation is, in and of itself, detrimental to your life.  It is not valid or reliable to try to connect it to aches or any other organ or tissue conditions.  The only way to know if someone has a vertebral subluxation is to have that person's spine checked by a non-therapeutic straight chiropractor using a method of "analysis."  When a vertebral subluxation is detected this way, it is obviously important to correct it as soon as possible.  The term for this corrective procedure is 揳djustment.?br>
Since vertebral subluxations are caused by so many different things, people choose to go to a non-therapeutic straight chiropractor on a regular basis to enjoy the most time free of the life-robbing effects of vertebral subluxation. There's a saying that straight chiropractic is not about your back, it's not about pain, it's about your life.  Each person has a unique potential in life.  With vertebral subluxation, it's impossible to realize that potential!

A key question to ask for your purposes, then, would be, Is someone with various aches better off with vertebral subluxation / nerve interference or free of subluxation / with the nerve channels open?  It is easy to see that having all the available nerve messages getting through is better than only some of them getting through, regardless of the person's situation otherwise.  It's not that you should see a non-therapeutic straight chiropractor FOR your aches ?you should visit one in an effort to be free of vertebral subluxations, even WITH them.  Non-therapeutic straight chiropractic is not about diagnosing and/or treating aches or any therapeutic-model or medical condition.  It is entirely separate in its goal.  Aches may even occur near the spine, but they are not the reason for attending to the vertebral subluxations.  I cannot offer you a direct answer to the matter of treating aches or the consequences of not treating them.  

That said, it would, indeed, be wise to have your spine checked by a non-therapeutic straight chiropractor - even if you still elect to have therapeutic attention or advice for your reported back aches.  It's the only way to know if vertebral subluxations are present and interfering with your potential.  As I mentioned earlier, not all chiropractors adhere to this and it is important that you be able to distinguish which ones do if you're going to seek this type of service.  You need to understand very clearly that the practice objectives of therapeutic mixed chiropractic and non-therapeutic straight chiropractic are quite different, as described above.  What I can tell you must not be interpreted from the mixed viewpoint.  

If you are interested in finding out how to locate a non-therapeutic straight chiropractor in your area, please contact me at this site again or at [email protected].  You may also visit www.gschiro.com, a site that represents non-therapeutic straight chiropractic organizations on a state level.

Kathryn, I wish you the best in understanding what non-therapeutic straight chiropractic has to offer.  It has been my pleasure to provide you with some information.

Sincerely,
James W. Healey, D.C.