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Addictions and Chiropractic
We would like to kick off the month by touching on a growing issue that is directly impacting our communities, Alcohol and Drug addiction. It all seems that alcohol abuse is growing rather quickly and starting at younger ages. Statistics show that on the less severe end of the alcohol use disorder spectrum, alcohol abuse affects about 10% of women and 20% of men in the United States, most beginning by their teenage years. It is essential that as a community we take these statistics into consideration and take responsibility over our actions, as adults don’t drink around your children and don’t advocate drinking at a young age.
At first what may be a casual habit could slowly turn into abuse if done for the wrong reasons.
In today’s day and age, where our society pretty much functions on high levels of stress and anxiety, alcohol and other addictive substances for some may serve as an aid in coping with the everyday challenges. However, if we could only educate our communities on the natural alternatives, such as adrenal stress testing, we as a society could improve by large volumes.
You see, the body reacts to stress by secreting two types of chemical messengers- hormones in the blood and neurotransmitters in the brain. The adrenal stress test leads us to an exact protocol that deals with a stress hormone called cortisol which has a dramatic affect on both of these.
“My protocol looks at the body’s current ability to deal with stress, specifically focusing in how its releasing cortisol. By resetting this important hormonal pathway the patients stress response is reset and they can now potentially handle stress better and therefore lower their need to seek feel good substances,” said Dr. Daniel Monsalve
Stress, however, is not the only reason why many may become dependent of substances. In fact, it is known that most people fall into addictions due to their attempt of drowning out physical pain such as back and neck pains.
“These chronic conditions which are amongst the most prevalent conditions in the US can lead people to chemical dependency. People unknowingly become addicted in the attempt to relieve the physical stress on their bodies. Correcting this pain via Chiropractic & Functional Medicine protocols we can in turn help people kick addictions to pain medications and in some cases alcohol as well,” said Dr. Monsalve.
