If you seem to get headaches for no reason at all, you may not realize how everyday stimuli and even our own bodily processes can trigger that unwanted pain. Let us examine some common headache triggers:

1. Physical or emotional stress can cause a tension headache. Our muscles react to tension in our lives by creating tension of their own. The resulting tightness affects the blood supply to the head while also creating uncomfortable knots in the neck or shoulder muscles.

2. Our dietary choices can trigger a headache. Migraine sufferers in particular may have sensitivity to many common foods containing tyramine, such as aged cheese, chocolate and red wine. Caffeine can amplify this problem, though withdrawal from caffeine can also give you a temporary pain in the head. Skipping meals can cause your glucose levels to plummet, triggering a headache.

3. Environmental and conditional factors can play a role in migraines. Bright sunlight, loud noises, industrial chemicals and overpowering scents can all set off an episode. Spinal misalignments from auto accident injuries or sports injuries can also cause a headache.

4. Headache symptoms may occur as a side effect of medications. Drugs that dilate the blood vessels and alter blood pressure levels, for instance, can trigger a migraine.

How Our Flower Mound Chiropractor Can Help

Here at Butler Chiropractic, our chiropractor, Dr. Butler, can relieve the muscular stress that triggers a tension headache. Adjustments can even help normalize your blood pressure to help reduce migraine frequency. We also offer lifestyle and nutrition counseling to help you avoid specific foods, medications or other common headache triggers. At the same time, we can relieve headache pain, back pain or other issues caused by a sports injury or auto accident injury.

Do you have a particular headache trigger? Tell us about it!

If your fingers, hand or lower arm give you continuous discomfort, you may suffer from a collection of symptoms known as carpal tunnel syndrome. This common manifestation of repetitive motion injury can make computing, driving or even holding a pencil an ordeal. Fortunately, today we have treatments that can relieve this kind of chronic impairment and restore your hand to full functionality.

The “tunnel” in question runs from your forearm between the bones of wrist and into your hand. This channel houses the median nerve, an important conductor of the neural signals that regulate the movements of your thumb, index finger, middle finger and ring finger. If something puts undue pressure on your median nerve, you may feel pain, tingling or numbness in those digits. The nerve pressure may result from a bone spur, an acute injury, arthritis or pregnancy-related edema. The number one problem with carpal tunnel is the narrowing of the tunnel. The most common cause of narrowing is misalignment of the carpal bones. This is why manipulation of the carpal bones is beneficial in treatment. 

A great many cases of this syndrome also occur due to improper posture or conditions on the job. People who type at a keyboard positioned too low for them, for instance, may spend countless hours typing at an improper hand angle, making them vulnerable to chronic wrist and hand pain. Constant use of a computer mouse can cause the same problem. Sufferers may experience temporary relief by “shaking the pain out,” but the discomfort will always return unless the affected hand has a genuine chance to heal. 

Natural Healing with Chiropractic Treatment

While doctors frequently recommend surgery for relief of these debilitating symptoms, here at Butler Chiropractic Care our chiropractor, Dr. Butler, pursues non-invasive methods such as chiropractic adjustments and physiotherapy to encourage natural healing. We can prescribe therapeutic exercises to reduce your pain and strengthen muscles, while our spinal adjustment techniques can relieve additional nerve pressure while also treating arthritis or other underlying conditions. Let us give you a hand with that chronic pain!

Does your job put you at risk for carpal tunnel syndrome?

Welcome to the very first Butler Chiropractic Clinic blog! We have conceived this new blog as an extra source of information for our Flower Mound, Highland Village, and Lewisville patients, and also as a way to stay connected with our clients! The Butler Chiropractic staff has been here to serve community patients for more than 25 years, and Dr. Randy Butler and our staff look forward to another 25 years of freeing our clients from pain. Our Flower Mound chiropractor works to relieve many different types of pain, including auto accident injuries, sports injuries, disc herniation, carpal tunnel, back pain, headaches, and chronic pain conditions including fibromyalgia and arthritis.

Auto Accident Injuries, Sports Injuries and Various Treatments on the List for Blog Topics

Dr. Butler takes the same initial approach -- a true "whole body" healing -- regardless of injury type. However, each injury can be very different in terms of the specific treatment course. Our patients often ask us about specifics of conditions such as carpal tunnel, arthritis, fibromyalgia, and tendonitis we treat here at our Flower Mound chiropractor. To help patients gain a better understanding of how treatments work for specific injuries, our blog will be discussing the treatments that we do here at Butler Chiropractic. Dr. Butler performs hands-on chiropractic adjustments and special prescribed strengthening exercises for sports injuries and auto accident injuries, as well as physiotherapy techniques. He also implements electric muscle stimulation and acupuncture into his treatment plans based upon the patient's individual needs. All of these treatments are upcoming blog topics, and we would like to make sure that we discuss the topics and treatments that our patients are most interested in, so please feel free to speak up and let us know what you want to read about here in the future.

Each patient here at Butler Chiropractic is highly valued, and we hope that this blog will help us to convey important and useful information to you. What topic would you like to read for future blog posts?