I wanted to talk today about scoliosis because I had a 15 year old patient come in with that exact problem. Scoliosis of the spine is when the spine decides to curve sideways. It can happen to about 12% of the population! It usually will happen to young girls between the ages of 10-12 and in young boys between the ages of 11-13. The ratio is usually 8 girls to 1 boy. There are usually no known causes of scoliosis which is why it is called “idiopathic”. It can be linked to many health issues as the vertebras turn sideways and can cause compression of the nerves and organs.

It is very important and I encourage all of my patients to bring me their little girls and boys at this age at least to do a simple screen of scoliosis. If it is detected early it can be monitored and helped by certain therapies.

Even though it seems like we will never see the end of this rain, the long week end is approaching and the gardening season. Here are a few tips that can help you make sure you do not overdue it.

-Stretch upper back and arms before starting

-Make sure to bend your knees, do no bend at the waist when planting.

-When you pick up something heavy bring the weight close to you and bend your knees to lift

I hope you enjoyed Easter! Spring is in the air. Many of my patients asked me in the last few weeks what is preventive care or maintenance care. So I thought I would quickly explain the 3 different stages of care that patients got through. What is also interesting is that a study was published in 2011 stating that “SMT ( spinal manipulative therapy) is effective for the treatment of chronic non-specific LBP. To obtain long-term benefit, this study suggests maintenance spinal manipulation after the initial intensive manipulative therapy” It was published in Spine in 2011. The authors were Senna and Machaly.

When patients usually come to see us they are in a lot of pain. My first goal is to help them get out of pain as quickly as possible.

So the first phase of care is usually called the intensive phase. The goal here is to actually control your inflammation naturally. The time spent here really depends how quickly your body will control the swelling or inflammation and the muscle spasms. It usually also varies on how long the injury has been present.

So I am back and really excited to share with you some of my photos of my trip to the World Federation of Chiropractic Congress in Brazil. It was quite an adventure and a super experience. I met chiropractors from all around the world. It is so motivating to meet new people and exchange with them.

So we left Montreal on friday night and flew all night ouf!! It is far…So overall the trip was great except with the first 2 days where for some reason we had made it to Rio but our luggage had decided to stay in Miami!!! Yes no luggage for 48 hours so we ended visiting Leblon shopping centre on our first day!! Once we got basics,we finally made it to Ipanema beach. It was SO crowded we could hardly could find a path to the beach. Brazil is the classic beach culture !!! Soccer, volleyball and like my husband would say beautiful women!!! So for the first part of the trip we stayed in Ipanema which I would compare to Plateau montreal it is hip and full of people, a very happening spot. We had some great dinners! The language was a bit of a challenge. I tried to mix in a bit a spanish, french and english. We had some good laughs because a few times we were not quite certain what we had ordered or what was going to show up on our plate!!!