Springtime brings warm weather, blue skies, and, for many people, allergies. Out-of-control immune systems make life miserable for untold millions each spring as allergic reactions cause sneezing, coughing, itching, runny noses, and other unpleasant symptoms.
The World Allergy Organization reports that about 40 percent of all people suffer from at least one type of allergy. Many of these flare up each spring and can last for months or longer if nothing is done about them.
Chiropractic affords relief to many whose spring allergies resist other forms of treatment. A look at what causes allergies and how chiropractic can help will reveal why so many swear by this type of therapy.
An Overly Sensitive Immune System Can Make Life Unbearable
The human immune system is extremely complex and normally does an effective job of protecting the body against a vast range of pathogens and other threats. When the immune system responds to an intruder, it often does so by inflaming tissues in the affected area.
Inflammation can eliminate harmful microbes and substances, while also clearing out cells that were damaged or destroyed by them. While inflammation serves an important, health-supporting purpose, it often gives rise to unpleasant side effects like pain, itching, swelling, and redness.
As such, the immune system needs to provoke inflammation only where truly necessary. Unfortunately, many people have immune systems that react to substances that are not actually harmful at all.
Come springtime, for example, many trees, grasses, weeds, and other plants start releasing significant amounts of pollen. Many types of pollen are adept at traveling long distances on even a slight breeze, a feature that promotes genetic diversity within species.
When someone's immune system reacts to otherwise harmless pollen, miserable springtime allergies often result. The same immune system processes that protect a person from harmful bacteria and toxic substances can cause nearly unbearable allergic symptoms because of exposure to simple pollen. With pollen being only one of several common causes of springtime allergies, a season that should be especially enjoyable becomes much less so for many.
Chiropractic Brings Immune Systems Under Control
Although the immune system is somewhat autonomous, its activity is guided and regulated by other parts of the body. A discipline called "psychoneuroimmunology," for example, focuses on the interactions between the immune and central nervous systems.
One of the foundational findings in this relatively young field was that nervous system dysfunction can throw the immune system off track. Instead of helping the immune system stay balanced and appropriately focused, an impaired central nervous system can cause it to go haywire.
Chiropractors view the body as a whole by default, a perspective that helps highlight these kinds of undesirable interactions. Chiropractic also includes many means of treating the central nervous system to restore it to proper working order.
As a result, visiting a chiropractor can prove to be one of the best ways to deal with springtime allergies. With a person's nervous and immune systems working harmoniously, the kinds of uncontrolled, unproductive reactions that give rise to allergic symptoms can become a lot less common. Even where chiropractic treatment does not do away with springtime allergies entirely, many find that it provides significant amounts of welcome relief.