Applied Kenesiology During healing your muscles can help or hinder the process! You may have spasms that just never seem to stay away for long. Using a technique known as Applied Kinesiology Dr. Asness can diagnose the underlying process and reduce the spasm and muscle imbalances that can keep you in pain. Balanced muscles hold the corrections we make until damaged ligaments can strengthen and stabilize your back. Applied Kinesiology is also your body's built-in diagnostic tool, so we can check at each visit and correct today's problems, not what existed when you first came in. Key Benefits Relief of muscle spasm. When you strain a muscle, sensors in the muscle called spindle cells are overstretched. They then give incorrect information to the nervous system, as if the muscle was too loose. As the body tries to correct this perceived problem, it sets up a condition called reflex spasm. The muscle becomes constantly tight; indeed, even if you can loosen it up with massage or heat, the tightness comes back as soon as you use the muscle. Correction of chronic pain. In addition, because of the way reflexes work at the spinal cord level, opposing muscles are turned off and therefore functionally weak. This creates an unbalanced pull on the spine which will perpetuate problems until it's fixed. This is why the pain perceived is often on the opposite side of the body from the area that actually needs the adjusting! Comprehensive Chiropractic care involves treating both the spinal imbalances and the attendant muscle spasms! A "conversation with the body" Muscle testing takes advantage of the body's built-in system of priorities. We test an indicator muscle with an amount of directed pressure which is normally easy to hold. This gentle force becomes impossible to resist when a problem is slightly exacerbated by pressing it further into trouble. This is because the alarm reaction of the nervous system becomes a higher priority than holding the indicator muscle strong. This allows Dr. Asness to ask the body directly about what is going on now, and get clear answers.