Be Smart. Halve Your Risk
This advice that has been repeated to us since early in the pandemic:
- Wear a mask
- Maintain social distance
- Wash your hands regularly
Although this advice smacks of common sense, it is still flagrantly ignored by some. On an almost daily basis, we get patients who complain about having to wear a mask for a whole 30 minutes. Wearing a mask is not just to help protect you, it’s also to protect others. So yes, we require you to wear a mask.
Facts Support Wearing A Mask
In the USA, COVID is essentially out of control and sadly wearing a mask has become a political issue, even though expert scientists have developed many models and forecast that over 100,000 lives could be saved in the next few months, if everybody just wears a mask. That’s as many US troops who died in fighting from the D Day beaches in 1944 to Berlin in 1945. Deaths that are mourned to this day. And now its ok, and all for the sake of wearing a mask? Really?
Ok, this is not the USA, but look at the size of the numbers and consider this in our own country. Every time I go shopping I see many not wearing masks. We are thus not immune to the same fate.
Double Your Risk
For those who are unconvinced, a recently announced real world study has proven the benefits of wearing a mask. In the state of Kansas, the state governor recommended mask wearing on 3rd July. Some counties in the state followed the recommendation, others didn’t. Two weeks were allowed to let the change take effect. Since then those counties where masks have been worn have stayed level on the number of new cases. Those who chose to ignore the advice have gone up and continue to go up. Right now, the number of cases in counties not requiring mask wearing is DOUBLE those who do. This is not a small study. It’s based on nearly 3 million people.
The facts are simple.
Not wearing a mask doubles the risk for you and for those around you.
Safety always comes first for you and our staff. We require that anybody in the clinic wears a mask. Our staff wear full PPE all day, so asking you to wear a mask for the short time you are in our clinic to help protect everybody is not an unrealistic expectation. Your help helps keep us open and thus allows us to continue to help you.
We strive to make our clinic as safe as it can be and it’s most certainly safer than the many other environments that we all need to visit to exist.
We are here to help you and we will do our part to be as safe as we can be. We need you to do your part as well, not just by wearing a mask while at the clinic, but also by living as safely as you can by following simple common-sense advice. That way, you keep yourself, your family and your friends safer as well.
Many of us are frustrated and confused by the arguments and counter arguments we constantly hear about just about anything. How can expert A argue the complete opposite of expert B? Well it depends in part if they were asked the same question.
So let’s start with something that probably most of us know about - RDA. RDA was introduced around the end of World War Two, to eliminate problems caused by vitamin and mineral deficiencies, such as scurvy and rickets. That’s 75 years ago, before most of us were born.
Go to any food store today and you will find examples of what percentage of RDA a particular product provides. (Ask yourself how many other things are still judged today against a 75 year old standard) Not a bad thing in itself, but at the end of WWII, the western world was devastated, there was food rationing and it’s hardly like that today. Unless your diet is particularly bad, you should easily manage to get RDA levels in your diet.
Hence, and quite rightly, you will hear comments like ‘vitamin supplements are a waste of money’, or the one I really like, ‘vitamins just make expensive wee.’ If you are eating a decent diet, all this is true. Provided that is, you are only looking at RDA levels, which are only to prevent sickness.
Fast forward 75 years and our knowledge and understanding in just about everything has grown massively. An example of which is that a group of leading authorities on diet and nutrition in North America created a new nutrition standard, called Optimum Nutrition.
The intent of this new standard is to improve health, the polar opposite of RDA, which was to prevent sickness.
In current times, with the global coronavirus pandemic, can you think of a better time to strengthen your defences?
Now various studies have shown that due to modern intense farming methods, the vitamin and mineral content of today’s fruit and vegetables is a fraction of that in 1945. Combine that with higher levels required for Optimum Nutrition and it soon becomes clear that it is practically impossible to get sufficient vitamins and minerals without supplementation.
Now ask the right question. Do vitamins and minerals just make expensive wee? Not if you understand the purpose of Optimum Nutrition, which is to IMPROVE YOUR HEALTH.
Nicky and I have been taking optimum nutrition levels of supplementation for a number of years, plus we eat a diet which is as healthy as we can make it. Many GP’s we talk to are taking plenty of supplements at the moment, maybe not at optimum nutrition levels, but their intent is clear. Our bodies need every bit of help they can get at the moment.
High quality comparative information on supplements is available in North America and we choose to buy ours from a company that always scores right at the top. They make their own supplements and to pharmaceutical standards, which means you are guaranteed to get precisely what it says on the label. Most companies do neither.
Generally, the people I talk to are very sceptical about supplements because of what they have heard. I get that. But what question was being answered?
Breaking News
There are now close 30 studies demonstrating that having optimum blood levels of Vitamin D reduces COVID-19 risks: reduced risk of infection, reduced risk of severe disease, reduced risk of dying.
Many researchers now regard the evidence as overwhelming
While many will say we need more research, ask yourself this: What have you got to lose?
Footnote
Nicky & I have no financial link to any vitamin manufacturer. This information is provided merely to help you and the choices you make for yourself and those important to you.
It’s very important that we understand the implications of the words we use, as they can have a powerful control of our beliefs and the actions we take. Let’s take the word ‘Health’, a very common word and one with which we in the UK associate very strong beliefs.
Many years ago, it was decided for good reasons that our nation should have a National Health Service. The concept was admirable; government funded health care for all. Having personally lived in countries without their own NHS, and witnessed the inequalities that this causes, I can only say I am immensely proud that we continue to fight for our NHS’s survival.
But if we look deeper into world funding of health, as published by the World Health Organisation, we find that only 3% is spent on prevention, or health, and the other 97% is spent on treating episodes of sickness and injury. It is difficult to justify calling such a service a health service when in fact it is 97% a sickness and injury service. This is not an intended criticism of the NHS, far from it, it is merely a statement of fact.
Now consider the implications, for a moment, if we had all grown up with exactly the same service, but it had been more accurately called the National Sickness and Injury Service, or NSIS.
Your health is your responsibility and yours alone
For a start, we would not have the belief that our health was somehow somebody else’s responsibility. We would have the reassurance that should something go wrong, we would have an excellent NSIS to call upon, but we would understand our health was fundamentally our responsibility and ours alone.
What impact might it have if we taught our children from day one that it was important to be healthy, to make healthy decisions each and every day, and to take personal responsibility for their own health? Would the UK have the dishonour of growing fatter faster than any other nation on earth? Would we have 3 million suffering diabetes and another 7 million at risk? Would we have a decreasing life expectancy? Would we have a NSIS which simply can’t cope with the ever increasing demands placed on it?
Some may think this is just a play on words. I disagree. I speak to far too many individuals who believe health care should be free, based solely on their mistaken belief that our NSIS is a free health service. This in turn actually dissuades or even stops people from investing in their own health, which of course eventually places a greater burden on our national service.
I doubt anyone would argue with the merits of a government funded service where the majority was spent on prevention and health. But for now, we need to be realistic and understand we have an admirable service which provides care for episodes of sickness and injury. It is thus up to each of us to accept the responsibility for both our own health and for the next generation.
Accept that responsibility and your actions will inevitably change to lead you and your children to a healthier, happier and longer life.
At Nicky Snazell’s Wellness and Physiotherapy Clinic, we have embraced prevention as better than cure and promote wellness as a core part of our service. If you want to become more proactive about your health, we can help you with a roadmap to that healthier, happier and longer life.
Call now on 01889 881488. Erica and Jean will be happy to help
Shamanic Healing And Reiki
In ancient times they didn’t have the medical knowledge of the body or the medicine and technology that we take for granted now. But they still had to deal with the sickness, trauma, pain, stress and all the other symptoms of life that we experience today.
This forced the ancient doctors to use their observational skills and take account of all aspects of the patient’s health; their food, lifestyle, fitness and mental state, when analysing the source of the condition and thus how best to treat it.
Thus, ancient doctors, called Shamans, were our social workers, psychiatrists, surgeons and nurses rolled into one. They used colourful language to describe conditions, for example, mental stress was described in terms of soul energy and demons. They believed patients who had been through a life altering trauma, whether mental and / or physical trauma, may have lost a part of their soul, or damaged their ‘spiritual force field’. In short, they looked at the whole body and its environment.
In todays world, these colourful descriptions might seem superfluous, as we have the benefit of so much more detailed knowledge. The focus of modern medicine, however, is to look at the smallest part, which can then be treated or cut out and replaced. In so doing, we have lost the observational skills of the whole, considering this to be largely irrelevant. Certainly, it is not part of modern medical training and without the benefit of training and understanding, it is often marginalised as ‘quackery’.
This, I believe, is a weakness of modern medicine and certainly there is a growing belief that other factors, not normally considered in modern diagnosis, are of sufficient significance to warrant consideration. Those practitioners who integrate Shamanic principles into their diagnosis are categorised as Holistic. I personally prefer the term Wholistic, as ‘whole’ signifies looking at the whole body and seems more appropriate.
In today’s world, Holistic [integrative] medicine heals the mind as well as the body. Orthodox practitioners, who are also healers, believe our soul essence has a powerful effect on wellbeing and the ability to survive disease. They can walk both paths, one of modern orthodox medicine, one of ancient wisdom, drawing knowledge and techniques from both.
Lifestyle stressors can cause depression and anxiety and will make you vulnerable to illness and bad luck. This is why when stress is part of the problem, you benefit from seeing a medic or therapist who also has an interest in shamanic healing and looking at the ‘whole’.
4 Keys To Health
Understandably, normal folks are likely to be put off by terms such as Shamanic healing and soul energy, as it’s simply not part of our modern thinking or terminology. That’s why I decided to bring these ancient skills into the 21st century and describe them in a way which most would comprehend and thus be more likely to believe.
My first book, The 4 Keys To Health, describes the need to look at the whole person, their mindset, food, fitness and lifestyle. This would include looking at their environment, their family structure and support, their work. To make planning easier, I created a simple red, amber and green traffic light system. Clearly, a person recovering from illness or trauma and with 4 red keys, should be more likely to realise that recovery would be slower than if having 4 green keys.
The principles of my book, however, were no more than a modern-day representation of Shamanic healing, a subject I have studied for most of my life.
When a person has become anxious, a serious and increasing problem in today’s world with a pandemic out of control, I have found that without listening empathetically, without allowing a person to be heard and understood and without applying Shamanic healing, then relief from this stress simply won’t be possible. Listening, combined with the physical touch in a healing, caring way is a truly powerful stimulus to the immune system.
I have just written a blog on such a case, which you can find here.
Japanese Reiki
Reiki is a Japanese form of alternative medicine called energy healing. Reiki practitioners use a technique of hands-on healing through which a “universal energy” is said to be transferred through the palms of the practitioner to the patient in order to encourage emotional or physical healing.
Hands on healing is understandably a difficult concept to understand or even believe. A Reiki practitioner, to be effective, is most likely gifted with an innate healing touch. When being treated by such a practitioner, the patient will sense a calming presence and soothing touch. That connection builds a trusting relationship and a feeling of being looked after and anxiety melts away.
Reiki can be combined with ancient shamanic healing.
If you, or somebody you know, is suffering with anxiety or possibly pain that just won’t heal or is slow to heal, then we can help. Ask for an appointment with Nicky or Dean.
Call 01889 881488 and Erica or Jean will be happy to help
CORONAVIRUS LATEST UPDATE – 4th June
Due to changes announced by the Government on 3rd June, we will now be able to offer treatment by David, Dean or myself from 1st July.
There are changes to be COVID19 compliant so please read this.
But you no longer need to be in pain.
CALL NOW!
I am pleased to let you know that I plan to re-open my clinic for a limited number of either face to face or virtual (video) consultations from Wednesday 1st July. This will be in line with guidelines set out by Public Health England (PHE), COVID-19 Infection, Prevention & Control (IPC) and my professional body, the Chartered Society of Physiotherapy (CSP).
We have installed a new system in the clinic to allow virtual consultations. These have been tested and shown to be an acceptable alternative, in some cases, to face to face treatments.
The clinic will be initially reopening with myself, David or Dean on Mondays and Wednesdays. Opening times and staff availability will expand as demand increases.
Please be advised that Sarah has sadly left us and taken a position outside of physiotherapy. We wish her well.
As you will expect, both for your safety as a client and for the safety of my practitioners, considerable measures must be put in place which will greatly change the way that face to face consultations are carried out:
1. COVID-19 Symptoms Check
Clients must not attend if they are suffering, or have suffered, from any symptoms of COVID-19 in the last 7 days, or have come into contact with anyone suffering any symptoms in the last 14 days.
2. Screening
Every new client will be required to follow a 2-step process before a face to face consultation can take place:
- Telephone triage – a short free call to establish what the problem is and confirm that neither you or anybody else in your household is suffering from COVID-19 symptoms. Questions like: are you feeling unwell, have fatigue, a fever, lost your sense of smell.
- Virtual assessment – questions to establish if you are deemed in a high-risk group to this virus; questions like, are you very overweight, a diabetic, have cancer, rheumatoid arthritis, any medical reasons why your immune system will be depleted.
Then we would be asking specific questions about your problem to make a provisional diagnosis and develop a treatment plan that may include coming in for hands-on treatment.
For existing clients, a brief screening questionnaire should be answered over the phone or during your virtual consult, before booking a face to face appointment to confirm if you or a member of your household have COVID-19 symptoms.
Questions like, are you feeling unwell, have fatigue, a fever, lost your sense of smell.
For those clients not currently in pain, but would welcome advice on Wellness, a virtual consultation may be an attractive alternative, as it requires zero travel or risk.
3. Appointment Duration:
Face to face consultations will be 25 minutes, or a double session 50 to 55 minutes. The treatment time will be shortened slightly to allow time for cleaning. This will avoid increasing prices to cover extended sessions purely for cleaning.
4. Maintaining a Safe Environment.
When you attend a face to face consultation, please note:
- Hand sanitizer or handwashing must be used on arrival and departure.
- You will be required to wear a face mask to further protect you.
- We will be treating in PPE (mask, apron, gloves).
- You will not be able to wait within 2 metres of another client inside the clinic whilst social distancing is in force. Alternatively, you may wait in your car.
- Only one person will be allowed in the clinic room at a time with the therapist (carers/guardians attending the clinic only by prior agreement).
- Where another person is required to provide transport for the client, that person will be required to wait in the car.
- Clients cannot bring children with them.
5. Prices and Payment
• Our prices remain unaltered, although there will be slightly shorter treatment times to allow for cleaning.
• All virtual consultations will be charged at face to face rate per 30-minute session.
• I regret your virtual or face to face appointment will not be confirmed without payment in advance by card or BACS. This is due to the limited number of appointments on offer when we start phase one of opening.
• No refunds on missed appointments or cancellations without 48 hours’ notice.
• Any cancellation by the clinic will be fully refunded.
6. Treatment
We will be offering the following treatments:
- Acupuncture and Gunn IMS dry needling for pain
- Shockwave for painful tendons
- Laser for pain relief
- Joint mobilisation/manipulation for stiff painful joints and spinal discs
- Pulsed short wave for inflammation and pain
- Deep Oscillation Therapy for pain relief, swelling, stiff joints & tissue
- Exercise Prescription & Sports Rehabilitation & Biomechanics
7. Post Treatment
Ongoing appointments will not be booked on site. They must be booked by telephone during the opening hours of the clinic, starting as Mondays & Wednesdays only as of 1st July. As the appointment has been prepaid, this allows you to leave the clinic as soon as your treatment is finished.
Should you require a face to face consultation with myself or the team and agree with the conditions set out above, we will start with a phased return taking provisional bookings from Wednesday July 1st. Please contact me via email or telephone;
info@painreliefclinic.co.uk 01889 881488
Virtual consultations may be booked instead of live face to face if we deem it unwise for you to attend due to poor health.
Keep safe, healthy and active.
Remember your 4 Keys To Health: healthy mind, diet, body and lifestyle.
Warm Wishes
Nicky Snazell
BSc(Hons), BSc, FiSTOP, AACP, PE, MCSP, HCPC Reg
Consultant Pain Physiotherapist
For more information and address;
www.painreliefclinic.co.uk
Great event management can help your health and here's how
At Nicky Snazell Clinic Stafford, we find ourselves treating events staff, exhibitors and conference managers for stress-related issues such as back pain, neck pain, and general niggles, most of which are the result of stress caused by their jobs.
If you are involved with running an event or exhibition, it can be a high-stress situation, one which despite your best efforts is controlled by others. - That is where well-executed event management can help.
So, what should you do?
Firstly, you should carefully select your exhibition partner, someone like Exhibition Designer, custom exhibitions & live events specialists. They take your brief and run it, taking the hassle out of your event management. Event companies like this look after the managed delivery, reducing the stress involved with stand creation. This type of company also understands the best ways to provide breakout areas where event staff and visitors can sit and discuss business in comfortable surroundings.
Secondly, follow Nicky's advice allow yourself to relax emotionally, draw on your spiritual self through the mind and body meditation- It will relieve your anxiousness and negative energy. This kind of self-awareness will make a difference to your output at the event and your health and wellbeing.
Stress and negative energy are dangerous because they affect our bodies physically, upset digestion, which restricts nutrient absorption making us tired, and lethargic and can cause mood swings - all this volatility is not good for our performance.
Headaches, neck stiffness, backache, lots of common issues can be stopped sooner with knowledge and advice. We try to provide this at Nicky Snazell's Pain Relief Clinic because it modifies the causal behaviours that keep a niggle from going away. The mindset of event staff is paramount to stopping this impending stress developing into ongoing issues.
Summary
Think about what you are doing, give yourself time, work with a right exhibition company, remember your mental wellbeing and make time to relax. Stay well hydrated and smile.
We hope that you enjoyed this article and we look forward to hearing how it helped you. Thank you and bye for now.
Dry Needling Is Emerging As An Alternative To
Opioids: Style Magazine Newswire 12/12/2019
Maybe a sports injury is the problem. Maybe arthritis or some other health condition is the culprit. Regardless of the cause, nearly 20 million Americans suffer from chronic pain, worrying every day about flare-ups that interfere with their enjoyment of life. While many people turn to painkillers as their first line of defence, others are finding relief in opioid-free methods, such as dry needling.
“Many people view their pain as being a bad thing in itself, but actually it is nature’s warning system, meant to protect us” says Nicky Snazell, a physiotherapist and author of ‘The 4 Keys To Health’ and other books. “We need to heed that warning and address the real cause of the problem, not just look for ways to mask the symptoms.”
While Snazell says painkillers have their place, she prefers an integrative approach to combating pain, combining the most potent aspects of medicine with complementary therapies. Dry needling is one of the methods she’s a proponent of and regularly practices.
For those unfamiliar, here’s how the Mayo Clinic describes dry needling: A thin monofilament needle penetrates the skin and treats underlying muscular trigger points for the management of neuromusculoskeletal pain and movement impairments.
Snazell practices what is known as the GunnlMS method, which also uses dry needling to treat neuropathic pain.
Some professional athletes, such as NBA star Anthony Davis, have turned to dry needling to help them overcome troublesome conditions such as back spasms.
Research indicates that dry needling improves pain control, reduces muscle tension, and normalises dysfunction of the motor end plates, the sites at which nerve impulses are transmitted to muscles, according to the American Physical Therapy Association. This can help speed up the patients return to active rehabilitation.
“Dry needling is used as part of wider physiotherapy treatment and succeeds where other treatments fail”, says Snazell, who for over three decades has performed dry needling with success on thousands of patients in the UK.
A few points the American Physical Therapy Association says patients should know about dry needling include:
- The technique uses a “dry” needle, one without medication or injection, inserted through the skin into areas of muscle. Other terms commonly used
to describe dry needling include trigger point dry needling and intramuscular manual therapy.
- Although there are similarities, dry needling is not acupuncture, a practice based on traditional Chinese medicine and performed by acupuncturists. Dry needling is based on modern Western-based medicine principles and supported by research. (There has been controversy in this area though,
with acupuncturists in some states trying to block physical therapists from using the procedure, saying they are infringing on the acupuncturists’ turf}.
- Physical therapists who perform dry needling obtain specific postgraduate education and training. When contacting a physical therapist for dry needling treatment, the association says, ask about their specific experience and education.
Beyond dry needling, medication, and other pain relief therapies, Snazell says those battling pain can also ease some of their sufferings through lifestyle changes.
“We need to realise that many causes of pain are self-inflicted and can be easily avoided,” she says. “Find ways to lower your stress level. Change your diet to avoid such things as processed foods and excess sugar. Exercise regularly. All of these activities can play a role in helping you to reduce your pain and get more enjoyment out of life.”
The Practical Application of Nicky Snazell’s Advanced Needling Skills
Nicky Snazell is one of the worlds leading GunnIMS dry needling practitioners, having reached the highest training level and awarded a fellowship of ISTOP. She has treated thousands of patients over nearly 30 years, taught IMS and presented on pain and health internationally, and written 5 books on pain and health. Nicky is a recognised authority who attracts patients from all corners of the globe.
This internship will take you from previous theory and practical courses in which you were taught WHERE to put needles, to the essential and more important step of WHY and HOW.
Internships will involve one on one with Nicky Snazell, observing while she treats complex neuro-musculoskeletal cases.
She will elaborate on:
- How you diagnose with a needle
- The difference between Eastern-based acupuncture and GunnIMS dry needling
- Physiological theories and anatomical placement of needles
- Provide an initial understanding of the WHY of treating and HOW to mix with Eastern practice.
Nicky will also provide an understanding of how her 4 Keys approach gives a baseline to both assessing the patients healing time, plus the overall health of their immune system. This will guide the most appropriate type and intensity of treatment. In other words, the dosage.
Previous experience required:
- Foundation BMAS or AACP course
- Minimum of 3 years acupuncture practice
- Chartered Physiotherapist or
- Medic with post-graduate training in MSK and acupuncture
Internship days will start at 9:30 am and finish at 3:30 pm, with a 30-minute lunch break (please bring your own lunch), and will be held at Nicky Snazell’s Clinic near Stafford.
Internship cost £250 per day
For more information, please call Nicky Snazell’s Wellness & Physiotherapy Clinic on 01889 881488.
The clinic is in central England and has rapid access to most of the country, with an excellent motorway network nearby. Stafford is only 1hr 15min by train from London.
Back pain is the most common cause of disability, so how do you get back pain relief?
In this page, we look at back pain relief and how this effects you. We also discuss the best solutions and make recommendations for those who are suffering. There is also a case study example of how this can help you and what the takeaways are.
All I want for Xmas is a new back & back pain relief
Are you a back pain sufferer? Do you want to recover naturally and quickly from chronic spinal pain? Be able to sit, stand, walk and play without the nagging fear of pain? Do you also want to avoid any side effects of long-term painkillers and anti-inflammatory drugs?
The spinal column protects our spinal brain and our wiring system, the nerves. Need I say more as to how important that is? Unyet, back pain remains one of the leading causes of disability, with the main culprit being Mr. Disc. This innocent looking cushion is filled with a sturdy jelly-like substance in a whirl not whip configuration of protective fibrous bands.
Better posture helps with back pain relief
Worn out discs are made worse by our old friend poor posture. Poor posture compresses not only the discs, but also small muscles, and nerves and capillaries, slowing up the supply of nutrition and oxygen to the spine. Worn discs are unable to protect the little spinal facet joints, and inflammatory osteoarthritis moves in. Arthritic facet joints are painful in their own right in 30 % of back pain and need strong muscles to support them.
If you have worn discs look to your muscles. Weakened back, stomach and butt muscles along with tight hamstrings all squash discs. Improving your fitness with back specific strengthening and stretching exercises will help to lessen the degeneration of your spinal joints. That’s why father Xmas will be limbering up before attempting those chimneys.
Detecting a slipped disk
How do I know it could be a disc I hear you say? Well, let’s self-diagnosed, it may be a disc problem if slumping in a chair makes it worse, or pulling knees to chest on your back, or picking stuff off the floor, or putting on shoes. Moreover, walking and leaning back relieves the pain.
If you are finding it harder getting out of bed, putting your shoes on, or sitting for periods of time, you need to look after your back. The magical thing about backs is that ageing does not have to be a pain, backs respond quickly to expert treatment and a self-help guide to lifestyle change.
Let me tell you about lady who came to me a month ago, I will call her Jo. Jo struggled to walk up the pathway to my clinic and sat with tears in her eyes looking as if someone had given her a death sentence. Jo had been told the same old story, “you have wear and tear in your spine, it will only get worse, learn to live with it. We will send you for some hands-off, exercise physiotherapy; you will need to wait a few weeks or months, as you are not deemed urgent. We may consider a surgical opinion, and take these painkillers and anti-depressants for the foreseeable future.”
Those words said in all innocence wiped out this ladies future, how could she care for her garden and house, and look after, play and hold her grandchildren?
You will be pleased to know Jo responded quickly to treatment and lifestyle advice and came into my office beaming yesterday, her pain was considerably better, the joint movement was fluid, Jo could stoop down and tend to the house and garden, and did not feel drowsy as she no longer needed her painkillers. That morning she had jogged half a mile with her grandson. She was living proof that with an integrative medical approach and a healthy lifestyle, that she could be fit and pain-free. The good news is that we know with 25 years of experience, that a synergistic approach of therapies, including the use of specialist technology, prevents a lot of the discomfort ageing can bring. I recently presented this in Spain at the z factor, and I strongly believe a long healthy pain free life is the best Xmas present you can receive.
For free info on backs browse my website, or let me know if you wish me to give a talk, together let’s get over this epidemic of back pain. Xmas treatment gift vouchers available. www.painreliefclinic.co.uk. FB,twitter. 01889881488
“Nicky Snazell is the only practitioner I will allow to treat me”
Jon Hobbs Chairman UK Acupuncture Association of Chartered Physiotherapists, Vice President of Federation of Holistic Medicine.
The majority of patients who come to my clinic, or maybe who are just considering it and even those who I have personally treated, are totally confused about what GunnIMS is and also how it differs from Acupuncture. The general assumption is that GunnIMS uses needles, so it must be acupuncture, right? Wrong.
What is the Difference Between Acupuncture and GunnIMS
Acupuncture is an Eastern technique, originally developed between 5,000 and 10,000 years ago, without the benefits of modern anatomical knowledge we have today. Chinese Medicine is based on the assumption that energy, or Chi, flows around the body along defined meridian lines. The belief then is that by inserting needles into these meridian lines, it will affect the chi to bring the body back into balance. As a general rule the chi flows in fascia below the skin level, which is not too deep in the body. Typically needles would be inserted into the fascia and left in place for up to 30 minutes. Western acupuncture is a subset of Eastern acupuncture and follows similar principles.
GunnIMS was developed much more recently, over the last 40 years, by Professor Gunn, a Vancouver based Doctor, using western knowledge of the anatomy and uses needles as a micro surgical tool, cutting and directly into muscles which are not reacting properly to nerve signals and causing excess pressure on nerves, leading to long-term, or chronic pain. It thus bears almost no resemblance to acupuncture other than the fact that both techniques use a needle. It’s about as relevant as saying surgeons and cake makers both use knives.
Who Can Benefit From GunnIMS
Many people who have, or are suffering long-term unresolved spinal pain, can be helped much more by GunnIMS than any other technique currently available. In fact, GunnIMS is unsurpassed in the diagnosis and treatment of chronic muscular-related nerve (neuropathic) problems.
I’ll explain that with an analogy. Think of your car: if your headlight bulb keeps blowing because of a faulty wire in the fuse box, then you need to fix the fuse box, not keep replacing the headlight bulb. This seems blindingly obvious.
The way that human anatomy is formed in the womb means that the limbs can be considered an extension of the spine. So, specific parts of the body are controlled by specific nerves, their roots emerging at the spine. Just as in the car analogy, you could have pain in your foot because of a nerve problem in your back, or an elbow problem because of a nerve problem in the neck.
This is why people who suffer pain in the leg or foot get no relief from endless treatments on their leg or foot. Keep changing the light bulb and it won’t fix the problem.
Didn’t we just agree it was blindingly obvious to fix the fuse box? Yet I’ve lost track of the number of times patients have arrived having suffered long-term pain which they have been told was permanent and nothing could be done and just get on with it.
This Is Simply Not True
Even worse, they have had many, many treatments on the symptom area, rather than the root cause of the problem in the spine.