Raleigh, North Carolina
As a Raleigh chiropractor, I’m often asked on a regular basis…
“What is the popping and cracking sound that I hear during my chiropractic treatments?”
I would like to take a little time today to answer some of the questions that I get regarding the cracking and popping sounds that the spine can make during a chiropractic adjustment.
In between the vertebrae, we have the facet joints. These are the joints that bring the vertebrae together and allow the vertebral joints and the vertebrae to move together, as your body is turning in space, looking up and down, bending. What happens, and very frequently, and what should be understood is that these are joints.
They are no different than any other joints in your body, like your knee, like your ankle, or your shoulder. They are designed to move in different planes of motion. It’s a little harder for people to understand this because you don’t see your spine. It’s inside of your body as opposed to your wrists, knees, hands that is a little more easy to understand for most people.
Around the facet joints, there are capsules. When these vertebrae misalign and get stuck out of their normal position, it may build up a pressure inside the joint capsules. This pressure can cause an underlying pain, stiffness, pressure, and discomfort in the spine.
It can cause pressure, stiffness, tightness. What we specialize in as chiropractic physicians in Raleigh NC is to evaluate these vertebrae, specifically locate, where those joints are not moving properly or misaligned, and restore the mobility.
Cracking and Popping Sounds During a Chiropractic Adjustment
When the chiropractic adjustment takes place, it releases the pressure of gases inside the joint capsules and you hear an audible pop. The Popping is a combimnation of the facet joints realigning into their normal position and gass being released from the joints in the spine.
It is very important as well, to address the muscles and ligaments in the spine as well. Here in our Raliegh, NC chiropractic office, we do recommend exercises and stretches for our patients. It is improtant patients maintaine the postural corrections that we make in our treatments. Stretching and strengthening in combination with the chiropractic spinal adjustments to the spine provides optimal outcomes.
In Health,
Dr. Jeffrey Gerdes