Cianci Chiropractic Center Success Stories

A new year and a new you.

Sounds a bit cliché, but optimism is upon us, and why not? Eat a little less. Eat a lot smarter. Spend more time with family, attend a few more soccer and baseball games with the kids. And you promise yourself you will call Mom and Dad more often.

Sometimes, though, it’s not quite that easy. You want to get out and be more active, but there is that knee that barks at you when you walk too far. And don’t let anyone get you started about your back… the years of abuse have turned your back into your enemy.

‘‘We frequently see patients who set out to start a resolution,’’ said Dr. Christopher Cianci, ‘‘to exercise and get in shape or start a new healthy habit, only to be sidelined by their body.’’

Easton’s Ryan Westerfield got into his New Year’s resolution a bit early. And while 2014 brought a new daughter, Evangelina, it also brought the hope of better health to the insurance agent.

However, it wasn’t pretty when he came for his first visit to Cianci Chiropractic Center. ‘‘Ryan relayed that despite his young age he was really limited, activity-wise,’’ said Dr. Cianci. ‘‘He wanted to lift weights but was afraid to. He loved to play basketball but his back hindered that activity. Even getting out of a chair after sitting for any length of time led to him having difficulty in being able to straighten up for the first few steps. Lifting, sitting, bending, standing, and walking had been very limited and progressively getting worse over the last eight months.’’

A seemingly innocent jog up the basketball court for Ryan led to two days flat on his back, a trip to the emergency room, and a diagnosis consisting of a choice between rest and keeping his fingers crossed, or a session with the surgeon’s knife.

‘‘I was in the middle of a game and I just twisted around and felt something pop in my back,’’ said Ryan. ‘‘I fell to the ground.

I couldn’t stand up for two days and I finally went to the emergency room.’’

The situation seemed dire for the former high school football and basketball player. He felt old beyond his years and his active lifestyle of running and playing basketball looked to be over. But he hadn’t exhausted all of his options, and his last choice ended up being the best choice: Cianci Chiropractic Center.

‘‘Dr. Cianci explained that a couple of discs weren’t sitting right, they were pinching the nerves,’’ said Ryan. ‘‘I had been having stomach issues, my left leg was weak and I couldn’t put any pressure on it, and my back just overall hurt.’’

Dr. Cianci started treatment, at first three times a week and now just once a week. Ryan’s overall health has improved greatly, including some issues for which the active young man thought there was no solution.

‘‘I used to have a pain where I would sneeze and my arm would go numb and now that doesn’t happen anymore, I do like that,’’ said Ryan. ‘‘It would just drop to my side like it was asleep when I sneezed, and it hurt for about 10 or 15 seconds. I really thought something was wrong with me at that point.’’

This is not a rare symptom for Dr. Cianci. ‘‘In a recent conversation with a neurologist he mentioned that if he sees a patient for a lower back problem he will often order an x-ray or an MRI of a person’s neck region because he said ‘neck and back problems often are seen together even if the neck is asymptomatic” explained Dr. Cianci.

‘‘It’s refreshing to see modern medicine now taking the same whole-body approach chiropractic has since its inception, taking a global, whole body, whole spine approach when evaluating a new patient.

We look at the spine as a system. Much like when a person gets their digestive system evaluated. Their medical doctor might order an upper GI study (gastrointestinal) and a lower GI study; their doctor evaluates the entire digestive system, the top half and the bottom half, as a whole.

Similarly, in chiropractic, we evaluate the whole spine. Often, one area compensates for another. The old idea of just looking at the symptomatic area of the spine and nothing else is fading away. Ryan wouldn’t have gotten the results he did without this global, whole-body approach.’’

Ryan is getting back to his active lifestyle, something he will need in order to keep up with his wife, Kelly, and their new daughter.

‘‘It’s great now,’’ said Ryan. ‘‘When I was in high school I used to run every day and I loved running. Then the back issues crept up on me, and it would tighten up, and it got to the point where I just had to stop. Now I’m starting to get back into it and run again and enjoy it. And it’s relaxing to run, where it used to be constant pain the entire three miles.’’

‘‘Now I just have to get back in shape,’’ he added with a laugh. It’s a New Year’s resolution that is paying off already.

Cianci Chiropractic, located at 8737 Brooks Drive in the Easton Industrial Park can help keep you on a healthy path.
Contact Cianci Chiropractic at 410-820-4070. You can also find Cianci Chiropractic online at www.drcianci.com.