We all know someone that never seems to get sick and other people that seem to get sick all the time. One of the major reasons some people seem to stay healthy is they have a strong, properly functioning immune system. Without an immune system, there would be nothing to protect you from viruses and diseases.
What Does Your Immune System Do?
Your immune system is your body’s defense system. It fights off cancers, viruses, toxins, and even the common cold. Your immune system is also responsible for dealing with cuts and preventing you from getting an infection. A properly functioning immune system needs to be able to detect the difference between a virus and your body’s healthy tissue.
Your immune system is linked to your central nervous system. Your brain relies on information provided by the nerves running throughout your body to determine how your immune system is going to react. If anything is impeding the flow of information, your body’s immune system will not be as effective as it should be.
Immune System Disorders
When your immune system is not functioning properly it can treat a non-threatening foreign substance, such a pollen or pet dander, as a threat and overreact. Individuals dealing with allergies are familiar with this problem when their body releases histamine chemicals in reaction to an allergen.
If you are dealing with asthma, you can experience difficulty breathing when your immune system overreacts and causes inflammation in the airways (bronchi) in the lungs.
Autoimmune and immune deficiency diseases are the two main categories of immune system disorders.
Autoimmune Diseases
Autoimmune diseases occur when your immune system starts producing antibodies that attack your body instead of fighting off a virus or infection. For some reason, your immune system has mistakenly attacked healthy tissue thinking it is an enemy to be taken out.
Examples of Autoimmune Diseases
- Graves’ Disease
- Guillain-Barre Syndrome
- Hashimoto’s Thyroiditis
- Inflammatory Bowel Disease
- Lupus
- Multiple Sclerosis (MS)
- Myasthenia Gravis
- Psoriasis
- Rheumatoid Arthritis
- Type 1 Diabetes
- Vasculitis
Immune Deficiency Diseases
Immune deficiency diseases appear when your immune system is too weak to fight off infections, is unable to stave off disease, or perhaps suppressed by medications or existing illness. Immune deficiency, in some cases, could have been there from birth due to a genetic disorder known as primary immune deficiency. In any case, your body is more vulnerable to disease and infections.
Many people do not know that many medications can weaken their immune system. Many medications can dilute the information your brain receives from your body, leaving you more vulnerable to viruses and disease. We often see medications advertised on TV that warn in the disclaimers at the end that they may have a detrimental effect on the immune system.
Examples of Immune Deficiency Diseases
- AIDS / HIV
- Common Variable Immune Deficiency (CVID)
- Drug-Induced Immune Deficiency
- Severe Combined Immune Deficiency (SCID)
One of the great things about chiropractic care is it does not involve the use of medications. Whether you’re dealing with pain or striving for better health, chiropractic care works without the use of medications.
How Does Chiropractic Care Strengthen Your Immune System?
Chiropractic care helps to strengthen your immune system by improving the communication between your nerves and your brain. If your nerves are being pinched or there is pressure on them, your brain is not getting complete information and may not respond to a virus or disease as strongly as it should. Your immune system only reacts to protect your body based on what your brain instructs it to do. Without complete information, your brain may not properly instruct your immune system.
If your immune system doesn’t respond properly, it can leave you more vulnerable to cancers, viruses, diseases, allergy attacks, infections, and other attacks by foreign substances.
Subluxations (misalignments in the spine) are often the cause of diminished communication between your immune system and your brain. When you have a subluxation it creates pressure on the nerves, irritates the nerves, or even causes a pinched nerve. Any of these problems will hinder the ability of your immune system to function optimally.
Chiropractic adjustments correct the misalignments to the spine, which enhances and restores the communication of the nervous system with your brain. This allows your immune system to function better and help to keep you healthy and disease-free.
Seeing a chiropractor regularly helps to keep your immune system functioning optimally because your spine will stay better aligned. This is part of the reason why many people that want to live a healthier life get adjusted regularly by their chiropractors.
Anyone striving to be healthy should be seeing a chiropractor regularly. It is the best way to ensure a healthy immune system. You should consult with your chiropractor to see how often your lifestyle requires your body to be adjusted.
Studies Prove Chiropractic Care Improves Your Immune System
- During the deadly flu epidemic of 1917 and 1918 (Spanish Flu), patients receiving chiropractic care fared better than the general population. Chiropractic patients had a death rate of 0.25% compared with a 5% rate of those who didn’t. Those without chiropractic care were 20 times more likely to die from the flu epidemic.
- A study by the National College of Chiropractic in Lombard, Illinois, found disease-fighting white blood cell counts were higher as soon as 15 minutes after chiropractic adjustments.
- The chief of cancer prevention research at New York’s Preventative Medicine Institute and professor of medicine at New York University, Ronald Pero, Ph.D., conducted a 3-year study with 107 individuals who had been under chiropractic care for 5-years or more. He found chiropractic patients have a 200% greater immune competence than those who don’t have chiropractic care. This superior immune system response did not appear to diminish with age. When compared to cancer patients, and those with other serious diseases, the greater immune competence of chiropractic patients increased to 400%.
- In 1991, Patricia Brennan, Ph.D., led a team of researchers in another study finding that the function of the white blood cells (phagocytes) that go on a search and destroy missions for the body, was enhanced in test subjects receiving chiropractic care.
- In 1994, a study showed that HIV positive patients adjusted over 6 months at the Life Chiropractic University were found to have a 48% increase in the number of CD4 cells (an important immune system component) as measured by the independent medical center supervising their medical care. During the same period, other HIV positive patients at the same medical center experienced a 7.96% decrease in CD4 cell counts.
Call Tuckahoe Family Chiropractic at 804.740.3434 to request an appointment. Dr. Lombardozzi will consult with you on improving your immune system. Many of our patients see us regularly just to ensure that their immune system and nervous system are functioning optimally. If any of your friends and family can benefit from this article and a stronger immune system, please recommend this article to them.