Where the Magic happens: The Brain

Our brains are cool and interesting and also profoundly mysterious. For most of human history the brains ’functioning and mechanics have dumbfounded us. How is it that a small bleed in someone’s brain can lead to widespread symptoms like paralysis, and an inability to speak and think and yet, there are also some people who are missing an entire part of their brain that function as normal (as seen in studies where surgery is performed in patients with severe epilepsy or as incidental findings in some brain scans)

Every single function in our body is orchestrated by our brains, whether it is how our hearts beat, how we know what the temperature is, how we move our limbs in perfectly smooth manners but also our memories, our emotions, our perception of life inside and around us. I would go as far to say that we are our brains.

Would it then not make sense that taking care of our brains, constantly making sure that it works as best as it possibly can, is essential to a healthy, happy life?

We know that chiropractic care influences the brain in an incredibly profound way and many recent studies are showing how that specifically works. One study in New Zealand shows an increase of 20 percent of prefrontal brain function after an adjustment. The prefrontal cortex runs important control mechanisms, including joint position sense — the brain’s ability to know where the arms and legs are in space. It also controls mental rotation, ie, to accurately recognise objects, we need to mentally rotate them. There are many more ways chiropractic improves brain health and we are excited to share them in this edition!

 Lelic, D, Niazi, IK, Holt, K, Jochumsen, M, Dremstrup, K, Yielder, P, Murphy, B, Drewes, A and Haavik, H (2016), “Manipulation of dysfunctional spinal joints affects sensorimotor integration in the prefrontal cortex: A brain source localization study,” Neural Plasticity, Volume 2016 (2016).