By design, your body will alert you with a symptom when something is wrong. Unfortunately, we have been programmed from a very early age that symptoms are a bad thing, and they need to be eliminated as quickly as possible. Typically with a pain-killing drug.
Eliminating a symptom however, does nothing to eliminate the cause of the symptom. In other words, it merely masks the problem. An example of this would be the Check Engine light in your car. If it comes on while you are driving, what do you do?
The medical approach, in many instances, would be to cover the oil light with a piece of tape. Now that you can no longer see the light, is everything okay? Of course not, soon your engine will lock up. Most people would not dream putting a piece of tape over their car’s oil light. In reality, however, there is absolutely no difference in doing that, than taking an aspirin for a headache or an antacid for stomach pain. The saddest part of all of this is… the “cause” of the health problem is never addressed, only the symptom. Consequently, the problem goes unchecked and progressively gets worse.
As a Chiropractic physician, I take a more “holistic” approach. There are usually many factors that cause people to become ill or develop pain. All of these factors need to be assessed. I always tell my patients symptoms are a good thing. Symptoms tell us something is wrong and we need to make changes. To simply mask them with a drug is a mistake. Just like putting a piece of tape over the oil light in your car.
As a Chiropractor, I seek to correct the “cause” not just eliminate a “symptom.” Once “cause” of the individual’s problem is corrected the symptom disappears.
Yours in Health!
Dr. Edward Gould
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