Where are you on your healing journey?

Acute state or crisis mode: When a person is in a state of health crisis, their body systems are on high alert, the immune system is ramped up, and all attention is focused on reducing and limiting damage to the body. A person's emotional state can range from calm to hysteria and can vacillate between these two extremes.  It is during this time that we seek professionals to help us manage the disease or the dysfunction hoping to reduce pain and discomfort as much as possible. This state can last a few hours to weeks. Intervention can cut that time dramatically if the condition is amenable to treatment. In chiropractic we refer to this acute/active care or the treatment phase. Care is geared toward correcting the cause of the dysfunction and may also be referred to as the corrective phase of treatment. 

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Chronic state or recovery mode: Once acute inflammation and muscle guarding reduces, a patient enters the chronic phase of the healing process. Chronic inflammation is a part of this phase and can last months to years. In this state a person's body intuitively knows that it is still vulnerable to re-injury or exacerbation of a previous condition. They are advised to listen to their body's signals and limit activity to those things that feel safe. In chiropractic, we still consider this active care but it is no longer acute. Patients are still in a corrective phase or restorative care  because it takes time for the body to undo the patterns that led to the acute condition and the body's state has not yet returned to its pre-trauma state. 

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Recovered state: A patient that has returned back to the state of health that they were in before a trauma or dysfunction occurred are considered recovered from that condition. Care may continue but it is no longer geared toward correction but rather maintenance of that correction. Maintenance is still part of restorative care, however, most insurance companies do not recognize maintenance care as medically necessary and may terminate coverage at this point. 

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Wellness or wholeness: Occasionally, a disease state or a trauma can be so life altering that it triggers a jump in a person's ability to not only recover but change their entire state of being. They may end up implementing radical changes in their lifestyle that can unlock a potential that was hidden from them before. This new state of being may coincide with a spiritual awakening or may be triggered by it. In network chiropractic we recognize this as a reorganization of the nervous and energetic systems of the body allowing access to energy stores that were once previously inaccessible.  We refer to this type of care as wellness care and we no longer refer to the individuals under our care as patients but rather practice members. We are no longer treating a condition but rather we are assisting in a person's growth process. Practice members choose to continue with care for the purpose of attaining new states of well-being. The good news is that a person does not have to experience a health or emotional crisis to unlock this potential. Increasing self-awareness of one's body and connecting deeply with hidden parts of ourselves may be enough of a trigger for a jump to the next phase. During this phase of care Somatorespiratory integration (SRI) along with Network Chiropractic are key tools to assist practice members toward this goal. 

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