I get asked an awful lot, “Why do chiropractors see children?” Or I’ll be working with a small child or an infant in the office and someone will see it and typically they’re going to say, “Oh wow, you’re adjusting a baby. What’s wrong with that baby?” And what is interesting to me is that most of the parents bringing in infants and children are usually bringing in kids that are asymptomatic. They are not having pain or discomfort. They haven’t really been on the planet that long.

Parents are getting their child’s spine checked because sometimes even the birth process can be traumatic and create misalignments to the spine, which chiropractors call subluxations. So sometimes it can happen at birth, sometimes we can see problems developing when a kid is learning to walk or if they are lying in odd positions for long periods of time in their crib. All these things can affect the alignment in infants. And then as they grow into children, they start to rough house.. They ride their bicycles. They start to play sports as they get older. All these things can put pressure on the delicate spinal nerves from creating misalignments to the spine.

And that is the primary thing chiropractors treat. Your nerve system doesn’t just sense pain and move muscle, it actually can improve the function of the body by improving nerve system function. Your nerve system is that master system and it controls everything that goes on in your body. And if there is pressure on that system, it is not going to perform at its best. The best thing to do is optimize a child’s nerve system, which optimizes the potential in that child to grow up healthy, strong, and without problems in the spine later, preventing scoliosis and assorted other spinal problems. What can happen in an older adult can start in childhood. Prevention starts early, not when someone already has pain in their back or already has a problem.

So, we recommend checking a child periodically to make sure their bones of the spine are properly aligned and there’s no pressure or irritation to those neural structures because when it comes to running, regulating and healing a body, no one does it better than a child’s own nerve system. There are times where a nerve system can be overrun or there can be other problems where outside intervention could be important, but for most kids that are growing up healthy, a periodic checkup is just as important as bringing them to the dentist to keep their teeth healthy. The better you care for your spine as a child, the healthier it will be when you are an adult.