You may be surprised to find that you feel physically fine right after being involved in a car accident, even if you’re a bit shook up. Your body likely entered a stress management phase, commonly called the fight-or-flight response.
Designed to help you deal with a crisis, this response pumps adrenaline and cortisol into your system, and one of the side effects is a temporary feeling of well-being. It can also hide the short-term effects of musculoskeletal injuries.
The team at Active Care Chiropractic & Rehabilitation urges you to seek chiropractic care even when you feel fine after an auto accident to prevent the delayed emergence of soft tissue and skeletal symptoms. Even minor accidents transmit tremendous force to your body, effects you’ll feel when your stress response ends. Here’s why.
It’s common, in the hubbub following a car accident, to ignore your physical condition, at least after you check and find no obvious injuries like bleeding or broken bones. That honeymoon period can last for hours, days, and sometimes even weeks.
Injuries like whiplash, soft tissue damage, and spinal misalignments generally aren’t felt immediately after an accident because your body often compensates for the structural imbalances caused by the collision.
The effect is perhaps comparable with sitting in an awkward position for a length of time while watching a movie or reading a book. You feel fine, at least until you get up, when muscles and joints start to protest.
While you can often stretch away the symptoms when you get off the sofa, the effects of a car accident can be more intense and wide-ranging.
While every patient responds in a unique way, there’s an onset pattern to injuries suffered after your auto accident. Headaches and stiffness tend to start slowly as you move out of the fight-or-flight stage.
You may start to feel tension in muscles forced to respond to misalignments, and micro tears in soft tissue could be another source of growing discomfort and pain. This is the beginning of the cascade of reactions to these hidden injuries, and it’s common for the problem to get worse before it improves.
As experts with your body’s musculoskeletal system, our chiropractors can assess and detect muscle and spine problems when and even before they become symptomatic. We can then focus on goals like:
Instead of masking your symptoms with pain medication, chiropractic care treats these injuries at the source to help your body heal itself more efficiently.
Contact Active Care Chiropractic & Rehabilitation at the nearest of our locations in Lafayette Hill, the Main Line, East Falls, Elkins Park, Manayunk, and Hatfield, Pennsylvania, sooner rather than later after being involved in a car accident.
Prompt treatment of your injuries may also help the processing of insurance claims as well as relieving the potential physical effects from your accident. Call or click to book your appointment today.
