Pregnancy
Pregnancy and Chiropractic Treatment
Everyone knows regular prenatal visits and great nutrition are a big part of a healthy pregnancy—but many may not realize that chiropractic treatment is a great addition to prenatal care. Gentle and non-invasive, chiropractic is a safe and effective form of prenatal care that can provide the mother with relief from pain during pregnancy, may help position the baby in utero and can also assist the mother with postnatal pain, among other benefits.
Why Should I Consider Chiropractic Care During Pregnancy?
The body goes through an incredible amount of physiological and endocrinological changes during and following a pregnancy. As the body changes, the curve in the back increases, the abdomen protrudes, the ligaments relax and the pelvis changes, to name just a few. Regular chiropractic adjustments can help the body adapt to these changes and can treat common musculoskeletal symptoms.
A chiropractor can also assist in establishing pelvic balance and alignment, which can help the baby get into the best possible position for delivery.
More Benefits of Chiropractic Care During Pregnancy
There are a myriad of benefits a mother can experience by selecting a chiropractor to join her prenatal care team. The American Pregnancy Association lists the potential benefits of chiropractic care as:
Maintaining a healthier pregnancy
Controlling symptoms of nausea
Reducing the time of labor and delivery
Relieving back, neck or joint pain
Preventing a potential cesarean delivery
After receiving chiropractic adjustments, many women have reported relief from low-back pain due to pregnancy. Chiropractic treatment offers a non-pharmaceutical and safe form of pain relief.
Webster's Technique and Breech Babies
The founder of the International Chiropractic Pediatric Association (ICPA), Dr. Larry Webster, D.C., developed a now widely used specific chiropractic analysis and adjustment. Called Webster's Technique, this chiropractic technique is performed with the goal of reducing the effects of sacral subluxation/SI joint dysfunction. (Sacral subluxation is a misalignment in the sacrum, which sits at the base of the spine, in between the pelvic bones. The sacroiliac (SI) joints attach the pelvis to the sacrum.)
Results from a mid-sized survey published in the Journal of Manipulative and Physiological Therapeutics reported an 82 percent success rate in relieving the musculoskeletal causes of intrauterine constraint (a reduction in the amount of room for the fetus to move) using Webster's Technique. Often intrauterine constraint can lead to breech positioning, which often results in a caesarean section.
Make an appointment to talk to our doctor about chiropractic and pregnancy.