Dana Nelson, Doctor of Chiropractic (D.C.) has been helping people in Solon live better lives since April, when she began seeing patients at Fitzpatrick Family Chiropractic.
Dr. Nelson is a licensed Doctor of Chiropractic, a Certified Functional Strength Coach and owner of Active Health Spine and Sport and Fuerza Functional Fitness & Rehab (both in West Liberty and Solon).
“We (Dr. Nelson and her family) moved here four years ago, and I started the practice here (in Dr. Brian Fitzpatrick’s office) in April. So, it’s pretty new for me but we’ve had a good short year and we’re hoping to build on that. It’s been awesome.”
Dr. Nelson’s West Liberty office has a massage therapist and a small gym for one-on-one personal training and small group physical training. The focus in Solon is chiropractic adjusting. However, she utilizes a more traditional hands-on technique rather than laser and activator tool therapy.
“The other thing we do is movement analysis. When a patient comes in we look to see how their body is moving because the research shows us that combining chiropractic manipulation and adjusting, and exercise therapy, are the two things that get people better faster when it comes to most musculoskeletal things like back pain, neck pain, and headaches. By doing movement analysis we can figure out what things are moving wonky and then we correct them by adjusting them and/or giving them corrective exercises (to do at home).
This approach, she said, bodes very well for very active people such as athletes, because it translates into their sport.
“If they have a weird gait, or the way they jump, if they’re doing that repetitively in their sport, they’re more prone to injuries. What we do is find those faulty movement patterns and we teach them how to use their muscles differently. Obviously, sports are big in Solon and what I’ve found here is that athletes are great to work with because they’re in-tune with what’s going on with their bodies and it’s very important to them to take care of their bodies because that’s their vehicle to do their sports. That’s why what I do here has been very well-received because people want that mixture of not just fixing the problem temporarily but also fixing the recurring problem.”
Providing only a temporary fix is a common perception, or misconception, of chiropractic care, one Dr. Nelson works to avoid.
“That’s what’s different about me, because I’m not interested in that (making adjustments followed by an endless cycle of re-adjustments). That’s why it’s called ‘Active Health.’ I want the person to take an active role in their care. I don’t want anybody to become reliant on me providing this service to them constantly, all the time. That perception is absolutely right because we’re (chiropractic care in general) not always fixing the actual problem. It’s like if you were to go to your medical doctor for your back pain, they’ll maybe prescribe you some pain medicine and that’s kind of a band-aid too. It feels better for a while, and maybe six months later you’re right back there. I always tell patients I like to see you all the time but that’s not the goal.”
The goal, she said, is to have the patient go back to their sport, back to their life, and not feel like they have to go back to the chiropractic office on a regular basis.
“The reason why they feel they have to come back is they know they did feel better, temporarily, after they were adjusted, but if we didn’t actually figure out the root of the problem, why it keeps happening, then it’s just going to keep happening.”
Dr. Nelson’s approach isn’t for everybody, she admits, noting that not every patient wants to do exercises at home or make certain changes. Some patients, she added are more than willing to just keep coming back to their chiropractor for adjustments. And she’s “fired” patients because frequent adjustments coupled with their unwillingness to do the exercises wasn’t going to solve their problem. While an endless cycle of adjustments is OK for some in the chiropractic field, it isn’t for Dr. Nelson.
“In their defense, that’s really all we were taught, how to adjust. In order to get the other therapies and gait analysis, I did it while I was in school because I knew it was the right thing to do. I’m a research guru, evidence based, I come from a research background before I went to chiropractic school, so I knew that the research showed exercise plus manual manipulation is the best treatment for a lot of musculoskeletal things.”
When to seek chiropractic care
“Usually, it’s pain. A lot of times people think of chiropractors as just being for neck pain or back pain. Because of the extra sports training I do anything from plantar fasciitis, I treat a lot of shin splints with the cross country and track teams here in town, we’re a big baseball and softball family so I’m well-versed in shoulder issues. Most of the time it’s pain that brings people in, and that’s when we get into OK, the pain is from this specifically, but here’s why you’re getting the pain and here’s how we need to change it. It’s not just getting adjusted or throwing on an ice pack or an ultrasound. It’s about realizing that the reason the front of your shoulder hurts when you throw a baseball is because your posture stinks when you’re throwing that baseball.”
In general any musculoskeletal pain, foot pain, knee pain, back pain, neck pain, headaches, and migraines are good reasons to pick up the phone and schedule an appointment.
“A lot of times we can be gatekeepers, we can be peoples’ first stop when they come in and they’re not sure if we can help them or not and we have a conversation, and if I don’t feel like I have enough information then we go into an exam to try and figure it out. I’m very honest with people, if I feel like I can’t help you, I’m going to tell you. And then we’ll refer them out to an orthopedic or wherever they need to go. And even if I feel like maybe I can help you, maybe I can’t, I’m going to tell you that too. We can try it and see what happens, but it’s kind-of 50/50 if this is going to work or not.”
She added primary care physicians are limited in what they can do and often refer patients to physical therapy, “Which is great, we have great physical therapists in Solon, but I always tell people if you feel like chiropractic and physical therapy, and you want to do it in the same place, were that stop for you.”
Dr. Nelson also does gait analysis for runners, even in the absence of pain, just to be sure they have a proper gait to avoid injuries.
“There’s just a plethora of things that we work on when it comes to people. We can be preventative. I hope someday it can become that where people aren’t just coming initially to us with pain, but because they know, ‘People have told me I walk funny,’ or whatever, and ‘I want to get this figured out so I don’t have issues later.’ That’s my hope for chiropractic, and even for PT, that people can start coming proactively versus reactively after the fact.”
“I love practicing this way, it’s exciting. I tell people I’m not saving peoples’ lives; I’m changing their lives. They just have a better quality of life whether it be an athlete being able to perform better and stay on the court and not being sidelined by injuries or its grandma being able to get up and down off the floor and play with her grandkids or picking up her grandkids. To me, she’s an athlete (somebody who wants to be active throughout their life) too. It’s all about that quality of life and allowing people to continue to do the activities they want to do and are important to them.”
For more information
Dr. Dana Nelson
Phone – 319-244-8292
Email – [email protected]
Website – www.activehealthspinesport.com
Address – 101 Windflower Ln, No. 800, Solon
Instagram – ActiveHealthSpineSportSolon
Facebook – Active Health Spine & Sport-Solon
X (Twitter) – ActiveHealthCh2