It’s a child's nervous system that controls their development and the person they will grow to be. Children are as susceptible to trauma in their spines from various activities and events. These microtraumas can misalign the vertebrae of the spine, placing pressure on their spinal nerves and therefore decreasing their bodies ability to function normally. Although symptoms, such as pain and malfunction may not show up for years, injury to their vital nervous system can have a lifetime of damaging effects.

How Can The Spine & Nervous System Be Traumatized? - Examples Include:

Pressure from positioning in the womb
 
Pressure from the trauma of labour – within the birth canal or birthing process itself
 
Frequent falls encountered by young infants in the first months of life – from learning to walk or falling from a bed
 
A sudden stop in a vehicle, or any significant unsupported movement of the head and neck in an infant can induce excessive movement in the spine causing vertebral misalignment

These apparently innocent, frequently occurring events can create spinal misalignments.

How Can Parents Recognize Childhood Spinal Problems?
Unless a child has an obvious problem, it can be difficult for parents to recognize when a child has spinal misalignments. It is not always easy for someone other than a chiropractor, highly trained in evaluating the spine, to determine if the child has a problem, just as it is difficult for someone other than a dentist to determine if a child has any cavities. Both cases take the skills of a trained specialist to perform a thorough evaluation.

There are some signs however which parents may look for which can be an indicator of a child with a spinal problem. Common indicators of spinal problems may include the child's head consistently being tilted to one side; restricted head or neck motion to one side; disturbed sleeping patterns where the child sleeps for only an hour or two at a time; feeding difficulties in the very young infant; the infant may have difficulty nursing at the breast on one particular side.

The following common childhood disorders can also sometimes indicate a spinal problem –

Can My Child's Paediatrician Find and Treat These Problems?
This is a reasonable question for parents to ask, since the community generally considers the medical profession to have all the answers to every medical problem. Unfortunately, when it comes to subtle spinal problems, your child's paediatrician is not a trained specialist. The medical profession does have doctors who specialize in spinal problems, known as orthopaedic surgeons, but these doctors generally work on the more serious spinal conditions.

How Are Children's Spinal Problems Treated?
The first thing your chiropractor will do is to conduct a careful and thorough evaluation of your child's spine. Most chiropractors are trained to evaluate paediatric spinal problems and will use gentle, specific skills to identify, evaluate, and treat any involved spinal areas.

What Does the Treatment Involve?
Spinal adjustments for infants and young children involve very light finger-tip adjustments to correct malfunctioning spinal structures. A light spinal adjustment, is usually sufficient to restore mobility to spinal joints which have become locked and are causing interference with the normal function of the nervous system. Most adjustments make a "popping" sound when the spinal joints are moved, however this sound is seldom heard when children's spines are adjusted.

How Many Treatments Are Required?
Usually infants and children require only a few adjustments to restore normal function. This is because their tissues are more flexible than those of an adult. The actual number of adjustments, however, may vary depending on the length of time that the condition has been present.

Please contact the clinic should you have any further questions.

References – Dr. Peter Fysh, DC Dynamic Chiropractic, July 29, 1994, Volume 12, Issue 16
- www.icpa4kids.org Dr. J Ohm

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