Every chiropractic office does things a little differently. Some take x-rays on their patients and some don’t. Some do scans and some don’t I just want to share what we do here at YFC to evaluate you before beginning your treatment. 

The first thing that we do is a thorough examination.. not only on your area of complaint but of your whole spine and body. We like to look at our patients as a whole and not just at their areas of complaint. During this examination we will be looking at posture, range of motion, deep tendon reflexes, muscle strength, areas of misalignment and much more.

The second thing we do are scans to look at how your nervous system is functioning. We do organ glad and control, muscle tone and balance and heart rate variability. The instrument used for organ gland and control monitors skin temperature to assess autonomic nervous system function. The instrument used for muscle tone and balance is a highly researched chiropractic tool that provides accurate readings of paraspinal muscle activity and neuro-muscular energy expenditure. The final instrument used collects Heart Rate Variability data and monitor the balance and activity of the entire autonomic nervous system, including sympathetic (go go go nervous system) and parasympathetic (rest and digest nervous system). We want these equally balanced for proper functioning. A combination of these three scans will give us a CORE score. This score will tell us how well your nervous system is functioning as a whole. We retake these scans every 12 visits to see hows it’s changed and how you’re progressing. 

The final thing we do is take films. X-rays allow us to see the bones in your spine that we will be adjusting. We are able to see their position, the disk spaces between them, any fractures that may be present, curvatures in the spine, loss of necessary curvatures on your spine, anomalies and much more. The structure of your spine affects the function of your nervous system which is the source of EVERY process in your body. It’s how your heart knows to beat, how your lungs know breathe, how your stomach knows to break down food for digestion.. you can’t live without your nervous system, it is that important. This nervous system is housed by the bones that make up your spine. We affect your nervous system every time we adjust your spine. A good adjustment consists of finding the areas that need to be adjusted and applying the specific adjustment needed for correction. X-rays are one of the wonderful tools we have to provide the best care possible. 

So as you can see our first visit with you will include a very thorough examination so we can collect as much information about you as possible before coming up with a game plan for your health. 

For more information about our clinic visit our Yost Family Chiropractic facebook page 🙂

Dr. Nicole Davis graduated from Logan University with not only her Doctorate in Chiropractic but her Bachelors in Life Sciences. After working with hundreds of clients a week in a busy Ohio Chiropractic clinic, she decided to head home to Des Moines to be closer to her family.  She currently specializes in family wellness care with advanced training in pediatric and pregnancy care, working alongside 2 other doctors in the only Wellness Center in Iowa to offer Chiropractic, Acupuncture, Specialized Pediatric and Pregnancy Care as well as Functional Medicine.  She loves spending time with family, friends and her dog, Maci. She is here to serve her community with love, support and enthusiasm.