It’s not in your head: Heat can cause your body to feel out of sorts.

If you can forecast the weather just depending upon how you feel, or remember stories of your parents or grandparents doing so, science backs you up. Joints react to barometric pressure so if you can feel a thunderstorm coming on, you’re probably right.

And if you have conditions like chronic joint pain, arthritis, chronic fatigue syndrome, or asthma and have noticed that you’re not feeling that great during hot weather spells, it’s not just your imagination. Heat can cause increased inflammation, which can lead to sometimes unbearable pain for people with these conditions. What can you do about it? If you’ve guessed chiropractic care, you are correct!

Why does heat cause inflammation?

Some studies suggest that hot weather can increase inflammation in the body and worsen ground level ozone levels – basically the equivalent of smog – which harms the body and can cause pain for those suffering from the above mentioned conditions. Especially for people with asthma, increased levels of ozone can make it harder to breathe. For those suffering from other conditions like joint pain and arthritis, higher levels of heat and ozone cause the body to try to protect itself, which leads to inflammation.

And joints do react to barometric pressure in the atmosphere, which may cause you to feel a little out of sorts or achy in your hips or knees. Joints have sensory nerves called baroreceptors which react to changes in atmospheric pressure. This can lead to inflammation as well.

Combating heat related pain

For those who have conditions that worsen during heat waves and higher ozone levels, staying indoors and keeping hydrated are of utmost importance.

If you can’t stay inside all the time, be sure to:

• Wear loose clothing while outdoors
• Try to incorporate a water activity like swimming to reduce inflammation and pain
• Stay in shaded areas

How Chiropractic care helps

Good chiropractic care almost always involves the goal of reducing inflammation in the body and can be especially beneficial for people who experience many types of chronic pain.

Spinal adjustment(s) corrects misalignments of the spinal cord and can help your body manage pain better. Remember, the spine must be aligned correctly to properly send signals to the brain, which sends out other signals to the body to activate healing properties. If the spine isn’t aligned correctly, those signals don’t go where they need to go and pain and inflammation continues to plague the body.

Additionally, if joint pain wasn’t enough, old injuries can flare up in reaction to the weather. The good news is that these old injuries can also be treated with chiropractic care so healing can begin or continue in the body.

We’d love to help you live a pain-free life, even in the heat of summer when all you want to do is stand in front of your AC. We have ice roller tables – basically a massage table with ice for your body – we use after adjustments at Greenville Spine if that is any incentive to come and check us out.

If you’d like to see us for possible treatment, give us a call at 864.631.1420 or visit our website.