If you are in a car accident, you will most likely benefit from visiting a Provo chiropractor. Many injuries sustained during a car accident will result in back pain as a side effect.
Why Do Car Accidents Cause Back Pain?
Car accidents often involve high-impact forces, and many of the most common injuries reported after a car accident fall under the medical expertise of a chiropractor.
Adrenaline helps you stay alert and alive in a stressful situation. It can also act as a painkiller for a short time. However, when you experience an accident and adrenaline surges through your body, it may first mask the true extent of your injuries.
Some people don’t realize they have suffered an injury until their pain worsens or becomes apparent hours, days, or weeks later. It is not uncommon for a car accident victim to walk away from an accident, appearing perfectly fine and requiring urgent medical care shortly after.
The following are some of the most commonly reported injuries following a car accident, but this is by no means a complete list.
- Whiplash results from your head quickly snapping in one direction, a common occurrence in car accidents. It causes back, neck, and shoulder pain, limited range of motion, intense headaches, tingling and numbness in the arms, and fatigue.
- Herniated or bulging discs occur when a sudden impact pushes one of your intervertebral discs out of place. These soft, spongy discs cushion your bones and absorb impacts, allowing you to twist and bend. If one of your intervertebral discs is out of place, you will likely suffer severe pain and limited range of motion. If the disc is damaged, the gel inside can escape and cause inflammation in the nearby nerves, also causing pain.
- Nerve, muscle, or ligament damage can result in different degrees of pain, depending on the severity of the injury, how soon it’s treated, and where it is located.
- Bone fractures are often viewed as something that only a specialist can treat. While the hospital can fit you with a cast or provide surgery, you can still benefit from seeing a chiropractor to get aftercare that helps speed your healing process. Your chiropractor can also teach you how to avoid reinjuring yourself.
How Can a Chiropractic Adjustment Help?
Reduce Inflammation
After most injuries, you will suffer some degree of inflammation. While it is normal to some extent, inflammation can harm your soft tissues and cause extreme discomfort if left unchecked. Your chiropractor can help by realigning your spinal cord, hopefully cutting back on inflammatory cytokine production.
Excessive inflammation in the spine can cause symptoms such as stiffness and pain that worsen after resting. If you suffer from back pain because of excessive inflammation, you will likely experience the most pain right after waking up.
Reduce Pain
When your chiropractor manipulates your spine, your body automatically releases hormones like oxytocin, neurotensin, and cortisol into your bloodstream. These hormones are produced to relieve pain.
Expand Flexibility
Sometimes, if you suffer an injury in a car accident, specifically in your neck or back, your range of motion can become limited. This can prevent you from doing activities that used to be easy for you, which can cause problems in your home, social, and work life.
Speed Up Healing
When your muscles or tendons get damaged, your body creates scar tissue made of collagen to heal them. However, this tissue can lead to persistent pain. To prevent pain caused by scar tissue, your chiropractor can use techniques that break up the tissue and speed up the healing process of your injuries.
Avoid Invasive Surgeries
Waiting too long to treat the injuries you’ve suffered due to your Provo car accident can result in more significant damage and lead to invasive surgeries being your only option for relief. Visiting your chiropractor as soon as you realize you are suffering from pain can save you time, energy, and money by preventing you from needing surgery.
Finding the Right Chiropractor for You in Provo
If you have suffered an accident in Utah, know you don’t have to live through it. Help is available to you. Our compassionate team at Utah Accident Clinic specializes in accident-related injuries, and we are here to help you understand your options. We will assemble a personalized plan to treat your injuries.
We know how to deal with federal and state worker’s compensation injuries, in addition to dealing with auto insurance.
Call us today at (801)-701-3271 so we can find out how best to heal your pain with a Provo chiropractor.