Visceral Dysfunction
Over the past few years we have been helping many people with what is probably best called "visceral dysfunction". Many of you may wonder what this is. The type of dysfunctions which we can help you with include:
- Irritable Bowel Syndrome
- Digestive problems
- Bloating
- Breathing difficulties
- Side Stitches (when exercising)
- Irritable coughs that won't go away
- Period pains & other menstrual problems
- Continence issues
- Problems after abdominal surgery (including adhesion and pain)
How can we help? By identifying what the causes are and treating them. For example, it is known that irritation of the nerves in the spine which supply the organs can cause abnormal firing of the nerves and lead to some of the problems we listed above. By treating the spine we can eliminate this.
We also treat the organs themselves directly. Just like your muscles and their coverings (called "fascia") can get tight and restrict normal motion, the organs and their coverings can become adhered and not allow them to move / slide over each other as they normally do. This is a common cause of many of the dysfunction listed above. We treat these by very gentle stretching and manipulation, with surprisingly good results.
What can't we help? We don't treat organ pathology. The difference between pathology and dysfunction is simple - dysfunction describes an organ that isn't working very well but doesn't have permanent damage yet. Pathology means that the organ has a structural problem like an ulcer or cancer. Your doctor will treat the pathology type of problems.
For example, in irritable bowel syndrome there are no ulcers or structural problems (ie no pathology), but there is a lot of dysfunction in an otherwise normal appearing organ. Your doctors may have investigated the bowels with scans and colonsopy and found no pathology (ie no structural damage), but you still have the diarrhea / constipation dysfunctions. We can help with these dysfunctions.
