Why Do Chiropractic Adjustments Make a Sound?

Pop! -- the sound you hear when Dr. DiSabatino adjusts you. Your back isn't actually cracking though, right?

Chiropractic is new and unfamiliar for many, leaving some uncomfortable about what actually occurs during a chiropractic adjustment. A common apprehension is the experience of the well known popping noise that sometimes occurs during an adjustment. Some patients continue to be scared about what the noise it, but this is because there is no understanding regarding its cause.

What is really happening? Synovial joints are different from other joints in that they have a space, or cavity, filled with synovial fluid. The byproducts of the production of this fluid are gases, specifically, oxygen, nitrogen, and carbon dioxide. When a chiropractor adjusts you, your joint is opened up (a phenomenon called cavitation), and these gases are released (analogous to a champagne bottle popping!).

Chiropractic doctors adjust subluxations, which, in the simplest terms, are stuck joints – parts of our body that have lost a full range of motion over time. People experiencing misalignment also face pain, inflammation, and complete loss of function of any of these areas of the body. These joints may and, often, irritate nerve tissue, which explains many of the neurological symptoms that patients complain about.

Although there are multiple ways to treat subluxations, the most common and traditional way involves a chiropractor finding the spine and administering a painless thrust, which corrects the subluxated joint.

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