I got a frantic phone call last month from a patient we will call Mary. Mary had been in an auto accident and was in severe pain. Mary was stopped at a light when she got rear ended from behind. The impact was so hard Mary hit the car in front of her. Luckily Mary was wearing her seatbelt.
When Mary came into the office she reported neck pain, shoulder pain, and right arm pain. On a scale of 1 to 10 with 10 being severe, Mary rated all three pains a 9. Upon exam Mary presented with tightness in the neck and shoulders as well as diminshed reflexes in her arms.
Mary had been x-rayed at the hospital and luckily had no fractures. She did have an extremely reduced curve in her neck. This lack of curve was putting a lot of tension on the muscles and nerves in her neck and in my opinion was the source of a lot of her pain.
We began treating Mary with gentle adjustments, ice, traction and exercise. The going was real slow for the first week. I wish I could tell you Mary jumped off the table after one visit telling me how awesome I was…didn’t happen.
The second week of care was when we really started to see some results. The muscle tension and spasm started to really clear up and most importantly Mary was really starting to feel better.
It was by week 6 when Mary was really able to get through the day without pain. Needless to say Mary was thrilled. When she reported to the office she was a 9, with 10 being the worst, and now she was in the 1-2 range.
The key to Mary’s recovery was her dedication to getting better. In 8 weeks Mary missed one appointment, did her home exercise and most importantly kept her chin up when the going got tough.
I am proud of Mary and so happy to be able to take a part in helping her.
