Archive for January, 2008
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Sunday, January 27th, 2008by Michael Dorausch, DC
There was an article on Wednesday’s BBC news page about work stress causing changes in the body. The news coverage was of a study that showed findings indicating that a stressful job has a direct biological impact on the body and raising the risk of heart disease.
Don’t believe stress causes physical [...]
26 Year Old Post Baccalaureate Pre-Medical Student
Saturday, January 26th, 2008By Michael Dorausch, DC
A 26 year old premed student e-mailed me earlier this week about attending chiropractic school. I get frequent e-mails similar to the one I’m sharing here, so I wanted to address some of these questions in a post, rather than have to e-mail each person back individually.
Dear Dr. Dorausch,
I just read your [...]
10 Most Expensive Health Conditions
Saturday, January 26th, 2008by Michael Dorausch, DC
A 76 billion-dollar medical bill is enough to give anyone a serious heart condition. The Agency for Health Care Research and Quality (AHRQ) released a report earlier this week, suggesting the cost of the 10 most expensive health conditions in the US was more than $500 billion to treat in the year 2005.
According to the AHRQ, which is part of the United States Department of Health and Human Services, the nation’s 10 most expensive medical conditions cost about $500 billion to treat in 2005. That $500 billion paid for visits to clinics and emergency rooms, doctors offices, hospital stays, home health care and prescription drugs.
A brief summary appeared on newswise and more information regarding medical expenditure panel surveys can be viewed on the ahrq government website.
Estimated spending for the top 10 most expensive conditions (2005) included: heart conditions ($76 billion), trauma disorders ($72 billion), cancer ($70 billion), mental disorders ($56 billion), asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease ($54 billion), high blood pressure ($42 billion), type 2 diabetes ($34 billion), osteoarthritis and other joint diseases ($34 billion), back problems ($32 billion), and normal childbirth ($32 billion). The $56 billion spent on mental disorders included depression.
That’s a lot of money treating symptoms. Quite a few health-care experts would argue that heart conditions, cancer, depression, asthma, high blood pressure, type 2 diabetes, osteoarthritis, and many back problems can be prevented (or at least significantly reduced) by incorporating proper nutrition, regular exercise, and a number of proactive approaches towards being healthy (ahem… chiropractic).
Trauma disorders may be difficult to prevent as most instances occur without warning. Normal childbirth is one of those health conditions we just have to deal with, but it could certainly be addressed more affordably.
Scanning through previous news archives I located articles relating to asthma and children, breathing easier without medication, and a 2003 article related to asthma cases doubling.
On the topic of heart conditions there was this article on cardiovascular disease & HRT, this one on prayer and patient recovery, and this post titled: Everything Affects Everything.
On the topic of back pain there’s this post on sitting up straight, this one on my aching back, a post on proper posture at work, snow shoveling as a cause of back pain, and an article on those that don’t have a clue.
Midwives and chiropractors working in pediatrics probably got a chuckle out of seeing normal childbirth listed as a medical condition. Folks interested in these topics may want to check out this article on pregnancy, this one on home births with midwives, or this one about chiropractors in hospital delivery rooms.
As a resource, here are searches for diabetes related posts, Cancer related posts, or depression related posts.
Source: (AHRQ) Public Affairs Division - 540 Gaither Rd., Rockville, MD 20850 United States
AHRQ Newsroom
Running to Blow That Writer?s Block
Thursday, January 24th, 2008by Michael Dorausch, DC
Running is just one of many forms of exercise that can help stimulate your mind and get your fingers moving forward, to unleash thoughts and ideas that may have been stuck somewhere in the back of your blogging head space.
Early this morning I noticed a post to twitter from doshdosh in Toronto, [...]
Local Chiropractors To Serve Top 2008 Companies
Thursday, January 24th, 2008by Daria Belov
The 100 best companies to work for in 2008 have something in common people may not have recognized, great local chiropractors to provide natural health care to thousands of the nation’s most productive employees. They may not be employed by Starbucks or Goldman Sachs, but check a map for headquarters of many of the nation’s top companies, and you’ll find nearby chiropractors that are working out the kinks, and keeping folks healthy.
CNN Money recently released their 2008 list of best companies to work for. Among the winners of America’s top 100 employers were Google, Qualcomm, Edward Jones, Genentech, Methodist Hospital System, Cisco Systems, Wegmans Food Markets, Quicken Loans, and 92 others. The in-depth article features detailed company profiles, headquarters information, and a snippet on each company stating what makes it so great. I was viewing the best companies map when I noticed an El Segundo company that’s basically a neighbor of Planet Chiropractic. I was curious to see how many of these best companies had chiropractic offices near them, let’s take a look.
(image: map screenshot of best companies in the US to work for, and the local chiropractors that serve them.)
I scanned through the 2008 best companies map and selected locations that featured chiropractors within minimal driving distance of company headquarters. The list is provided in no particular order, and if a company is not mentioned, it doesn’t mean there’s not a great local chiropractor in the area to serve their employees.
We’ll begin in Colorado with PCL Construction Enterprises who scored a best company to work for rank of 77. The Denver-based company has 3,558 employees, and their headquarters are located nearby Care Chiropractic, the office of Dr. Steve Visentin.
Also in Colorado is CH2M Hill, a full-service engineering, consulting, construction, and operations company that received a best company to work for rank of 54. They are headquartered in Englewood Colorado and have over 15,000 employees. Dr. Ken Szarka of Comprehensive Chiropractic is conveniently located in the same city and his office information can be viewed on the Colorado chiropractors page.
In beautiful Southern California we have Mattel with a best company rank of 70. The toy manufacturer employs 5,430 hard-working and motivated individuals who can get their spines realigned by a nearby El Segundo chiropractor, Dr. Michael Dorausch.
Heading out to Las Vegas, Nevada we discover that best company to work for, ranking in at number 33, is Station Casinos, which employs over 14,000 individuals. While there is more than one local Vegas chiropractor, Dr. Matt Mortensen does a great job of maintaining the health of many Las Vegas residents.
Back to Southern California and the San Diego area. Home of the San Diego Chargers is also home to Qualcomm, best Company to work for rank number 8 with 10,095 employees. Dr. John Michals of Michals Family Chiropractic is the chiropractor to see in San Diego, especially if you are located in the coastal Encinitas area.
Also in San Diego is Scripps Health, which has a hospital located in La Jolla California. Dr. David Klein is conveniently located within walking distance of the number 56 ranked best company to work for, he is happy to serve the over 9000 Scripps employees seeking chiropractic services.
Scoring with a best company to work for rank of 80 is Nashville, Tennessee based Healthways, a company constantly searching for new ways to inspire healthier habits. When it comes to developing healthy habits, regular chiropractic care is up there with exercise and proper nutrition and Power Family Chiropractic is the place to visit when seeking a chiropractor in Nashville.
The city of Spartanburg South Carolina is the home of Milliken, a textile and chemicals manufacturing company that ranked number 92 on the 2008 list of best companies to work for. Milliken, which employs over 8000, is located in the same city as Sherman College, one of the nation’s 18 chiropractic schools. One will find lots of chiropractors in the Spartanburg area that are eager to serve South Carolina residents.
While Erickson Retirement Communities, a best company that ranked at number 93, has locations in Naperville Illinois, Dearborn Michigan, Highlands Ranch Colorado, and a number of other cities, they are based in Catonsville Maryland, and the company headquarters are just miles from Catonsville chiropractor, Steven Silverston.
When your patients pay with coffee cards you know you’re in the office of Dr. Lawrence Clayman, a Seattle chiropractor that serves up fresh wellness based healthcare daily. Seattle is also the headquarters of #7 ranked best company, Starbucks, which has a whopping 134,013 employees.
KPMG of New York city may be ranked at 71 with its 21,000+ employees, but Dr. Jay Handt (at Central Park West and W. 69th St) owns New York Chiropractic. PricewaterhouseCoopers is another New York-based best company that made the list at number 90, and Dr. Jay and his chiropractor son Josh, are happy to serve that companies 29,818 employees. Jay Handt is active in the chiropractic community and he’s authored articles that have appeared here and here.
The East Coast and Derby Connecticut is headquarters for Griffin Hospital, best company to work for rank number 49. With over a thousand employees there are going to be employee visits to neighboring East Haven chiropractor, Dr. Adam Church, of Connecticut’s Atlas chiropractic.
While San Francisco-based Genentech is on a mission to develop drugs to address significant unmet medical needs, the 10,842 employees can get some of the best chiropractic care San Francisco has to offer in the office of Dr. Keith Fretty, owner of Ocean Chiropractic Center.
If you were a massage therapist hired to work for the 2008 #1 ranked best company to work for, you could have retired as a millionaire. Google in Mountain View California topped the list for the second year in a row as best company to work for. More than 8000 are employed by this northern California-based company and local chiropractors like Gavin Carr and Michael Gabrielson are available to keep those googlers nervous systems functioning at optimal performance.
What did the chiropractor say to Matt Cutts? “Looks like you’re having a problem with your back links.”
Whether you do or don’t work for one of the companies listed on this year’s 2008 list, you can still find a chiropractor that can help you keep feeling fantastic and living life to its fullest. Best of health to you!
16th Annual ICA Symposium on Natural Fitness with Arnold Schwarzenegger
Tuesday, January 22nd, 2008ICA News
International Chiropractors Association Council on Fitness & Sports Health Science presents 16th Annual ICA Symposium on Natural Fitness with Arnold Schwarzenegger - there is simply no other event like it!
Join us for ICA’s 16th Annual Symposium on Natural Fitness and combine learning from a powerful faculty with a fantastic weekend of champion athletes, great athletic competitions and the world’s largest fitness festival!
Dr. Robert M. Goldman Joins 2008 ICA Fitness Symposium Faculty! Internationally recognized author, educator, and authority on athletic health Dr. Bob Goldman will be joining the distinguished faculty lineup at ICA’s 2008 Symposium on Natural Fitness this year in Columbus, Ohio.
In his groundbreaking book, Death in the Locker Room, Dr. Goldman exposed and documented the deadly danger and widespread use of steroids and other ergogenic drugs by sports figures at all levels, years before the current controversy. A strong chiropractic advocate, Dr. Goldman will be speaking at the ICA Symposium on the risks and consequences of ergogenic aids, sound nutrition, and safety in both recreational and competitive sports.
Dr. Goldman has an extensive background in sports and exercise. He was an All-College athlete in four sports, a three time winner of the John F. Kennedy (JFK) Physical Fitness Award, and was inducted into the World Hall of Fame of Physical Fitness. In 1995, Dr. Goldman was awarded the Healthy American Fitness Leader Award from the President’s Council on Physical Fitness & Sports and U.S. Chamber of Commerce. In addition, Dr. Goldman is a black belt in karate, Chinese weapons expert, and world champion athlete with over 20 world strength records, he has been listed in the Guinness Book of World Records. Some of his past performance records include 13,500 consecutive situps and 321 consecutive handstand pushups.
Dr. Goldman has served as a Special Advisor to the President’s Council on Physical Fitness & Sports and is founder and international President Emeritis of the National Academy of Sports Medicine, and is a Fellow of the American Academy of Sports Physicians as well as a Board Diplomat in Sports Medicine. Dr. Goldman is also Board Certified in Anti-Aging Medicine, and is the cofounder and Chairman of the American Academy of Anti-Aging Medicine (A4M). Dr. Goldman visits an average of 20 countries annually to promote brain research and healthy sports training programs.
Don’t miss this special opportunity to gain practical, clinically relevant updates on case management for conditioning, injury prevention and performance enhancement in sports and exercise. Join us in Columbus, Ohio on February 29 - March 2, 2008 for a fun, exciting and educational weekend. Your registration to our 16th Annual Symposium on Natural Fitness combines exceptional continuing education with an extraordinary fitness festival, filled with sports demonstrations and world-class competitions’plus a personal presentation at the ICA Symposium by Arnold Schwarzenegger, Governor of California!
The gala 16th Annual ICA Symposium program includes a fantastic lineup of powerful presenters, guest champion athletes including baseball legends Barry Larkin, Ray Lankford, and Ken Griffey Sr., and innovative, practical chiropractic educational offerings. Gain useful updates on practical applications of sports science and chiropractic with patients of all levels of conditioning and athletic involvement, learning first-hand from distinguished faculty including Dr. Bob Goldman, Dr. Jack Barnathan, Dr. Richard Gennaro, Dr. Gerry Mattia, Dr. Pete Gratale, Dr. John Maltby and Dr. George Gedevanishvili.
Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger
California’s Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger will join us at the Symposium proceedings to make his personal presentation. Following his talk, registered attendees enjoy a unique ICA Fitness Symposium program benefit: they are able to individually pose for a studio-style portrait photo with the world’s most famous chiropractic patient!
Symposium Program Location
The Columbus Renaissance Hotel (downtown Columbus, blocks away from the Arnold Fitness Weekend Expo and many different world-class competitions!) Register with ICA first, to get into the Symposium Room Block at the hotel.
Symposium Program Hours
*Class Times are dependent on time involved to address security concerns and for Gov. Schwarzenegger’s presentation and participation in the Photo Session) Friday Feb. 29: 8:30 am - 6:00 pm — Saturday Mar. 1: 8:00 am - 3:00 pm
To Register
Visit the Fitness Symposium InfoSite at www.chiropractic.org for access to printable registration forms and online registration.
Fax your registration form to (703) 351-7893
Call ICA at 1-800-423-4690 (US & Canada) or 703-528-5000 (Eastern Time Zone / UTC-5 office hours)
Schwarzenegger Most Chiropractic Connected Political Figure
Tuesday, January 22nd, 2008by Michael Dorausch, DC
California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger is likely the most connected political figure to the profession of chiropractic, certainly the best known. Earlier, I was preparing a news article for the International Chiropractors Associations 16th annual fitness symposium when I noticed a number of various articles on Planet Chiropractic referenced Schwarzenegger.
There was a February [...]
Geeks Interested in Nutritional Values
Tuesday, January 22nd, 2008by Michael Dorausch, DC
Fitness gurus and health nuts are not the only ones interested in nutritional data and the counting of calories. Even computer techies are beginning to take notice and opt for healthier choices when it comes to satisfying one’s daily nutritional needs. Who would’ve thought nerds like computer programmers would be interested in wellness and longevity?
The January 2008 issue of Wired magazine featured a brief but excellent piece by Bonnie Azab Powell. The article was centered around nutritional values and the advice given was to stick to the periphery in grocery stores, when wanting to find healthier foods.
You might expect that to be a fairly common topic in any fitness or nutritionally focused magazine, but this is a publication geared at a particularly savvy tech audience.
The article included three neat graphics that displayed information about where the most expensive calories can be found in a supermarket (the produce section), which supermarket aisles contain items that pack the most galleries by weight (the snacks and cereal aisle), and which supermarket aisles contained products with the most sugar (also the snacks and cereal aisle).
According to the graph displaying the break down on cost, the bread, beverage, and pasta aisles were among those with the lowest cost per calories. A calories by weight category (per 100 g) displayed the produce section as one of the lowest, 38 calories versus 446 cal for the snacks aisle. The produce aisle also came up low on the sugar graph (per 100 g) with 4.8 g in the produce aisle versus 25.4 g in the snacks aisle, and 26 g and the cereal aisle.
I don’t know how many computer geeks will be switching from their self recommended daily intakes of beverages like Monster Energy and Red Bull, to wheatgrass smoothies and 12 day herbal cleanses, but health related articles in computer minded magazines suggests someones taking their vitamins, and maybe even exercising. I wonder who else may be getting on the healing highway? Next thing you know we’ll see articles about posture and other healthy habits.
Hands-on Still Most Popular Among Chiropractic Techniques
Monday, January 21st, 2008by Michael Dorausch, DC
Receiving a chiropractic adjustment by any means other than a chiropractors hands is just not the same, according to individuals polled in a recent survey. More than 120 different chiropractic techniques are practiced in the United States and many chiropractors are proficient in three or more different adjusting styles, which include both hands-on and instrument based methods.
We surveyed 265 individuals from across the United States who had made at least 12 visits to a chiropractor’s office during 2007. Participants were asked which chiropractic methods they most preferred, with hands-on and instrument based being offered as choices. Participants were also asked to name the chiropractic techniques they preferred and/or didn’t prefer.
237 of those surveyed reported they preferred to be adjusted by a chiropractor that uses their hands, rather than an instrument. Among top reasons for choosing so were reports that hands-on chiropractic feels better, works better, and gives more satisfaction. Interestingly, among the 28 respondents that preferred instrument styled adjusting, feels better and works better were both selected for all 28 respondents.
Most chiropractors will agree that all styles of chiropractic technique work, and many will agree that some work better than others, especially with particular patients. According to the survey, those receiving chiropractic care were in agreement.
Participants were asked whether they would discontinue chiropractic care if the method they were use to was no longer an option. Only one of the 265 surveyed selected they would seek alternative methods rather than receive a differentiated form of chiropractic care.
Participants were asked to name or describe the styles of technique that they had received. While chiropractors throw around terms like Gonstead, Diversified, Pettibon, Torque Release, Grostic and Activator, when talking amongst each other, the survey’s findings suggest strongly that most patients don’t know the names of the techniques they are receiving.
Answers provided included descriptions such as: thumper thingy, plunger, table that drops, table that moves, big electric thing that bangs on your neck, and back massage. One respondent correctly identified Sacral Occipital Technique as one that used blocks or wedges, and seven reported Palmer technique as the hands-on style they were receiving. Five respondents listed Activator as an instrument styled technique, and nine identified a hand-held instrument that had a rubber tip and went click. Three reported they were receiving the Gonstead method of chiropractic care.
One thing US Chiropractors can learn from all this, is that patients are likely more concerned with the results of their adjustment, rather than the name of the adjustment technique used. Still, it can’t hurt to educate members of one’s practice as to what styles of chiropractic are being performed. That education is most valuable when individuals move and are seeking chiropractors with similar adjusting styles and/or techniques.
Chicago Airport WiFi not Free
Sunday, January 20th, 2008By Michael Dorausch
I have to imagine nearly all traveling bloggers love free Wi-Fi, especially when enduring long hours in airport terminals.
I arrived at Chicago’s Midway Airport about an hour ago and was excited when I sat down and noticed a sign that read… Sign on to Wi-Fi (see photo below).
As you can see in the [...]