When player No. 81 took this blow to his head several years ago, it was just one of many concussions that have occurred throughout college football and the N.F.L. But what made this one different was that this player was wearing a mouth guard with motion sensors. The information from those sensors has given researchers a more detailed and precise window into what was happening within the player’s brain in the milliseconds after the hit Read full article here.
Outpatient facilities everywhere are caught in a bind. As patients get larger, their potential client bases get smaller. At least, that is, if facilities adhere to the traditional dictate that treating morbidly obese patients in an outpatient setting is likely to be too risky. Read full article here.
By James Beauchamp, D.C. A trip to the doctor is one of life’s more stressful events, particularly after accident or injury. You are suddenly thrust into the role of being a patient, which implies a certain sense of passivity. You should never be passive when it comes to your health! I want active patients, people who will participate with me in solving their health problems. So I am going to explain to you, from a background of 27 years of practice, how to get the most out of your doctors visit by being an active participant in the process. Preparation Your initial visit with your physician begins and ends with paperwork. Believe me, none of us are happy with that, but there are ways to minimize the burden. Many practices have websites from which you can print out the initial visit paperwork; others will email it to you. This allows you to complete the forms at your leisure in the comfort of your own home. An added benefit is that you are more likely to have all of the information at hand. Other things that you will want to bring with you are the exact medicines you are taking, in particular […]
By Brian “Steve” Keen D.C. I have heard many times throughout my career that a delayed response to treatment after a personal injury can be very difficult to prove. One must do some further investigation to give the particular injury its due credibility. The provider must look at: THE MECHANISM OF INJURY, CONSIDER THE EXACT SUBJECTIVE COMPLAINTS, LIST THE OBJECTIVE FINDINGS COME UP WITH A PLAUSIBLE DIAGNOSIS, ASSESS THE PROGNOSIS AND CONSIDER THE CLINICAL PICTURE IS VALID, PROVIDE A TREATMENT PLAN BASED ON EXAMINATION. I have had two personal experiences of delayed responses after injuries in my own life I would like to share. During the Spring of 1996 when I was in my last year of Chiropractic School, I suffered a delayed injury after a motor vehicle accident. I was sitting at a red light stopped, and a cab driver decided to make a left turn on an amber light right in front of me, but at the same time a large pickup truck decided to run the amber light going straight. This subsequently led to a t-bone collision between the two and the cab ended up sliding into the front of my car and crushed it. Both of […]
By James Beauchamp, D.C. When cars collide at commonly experienced speeds, the entire event is over in around a third of a second. In our culture this happens routinely, but from an evolutionary perspective it is a freak occurrence. The human body evolved to run and jump and lift and carry in a completely natural environment. Feet were never designed to walk on completely flat, level surfaces, for where can such be found in nature? In an artificial machine based situation such as a car accident, the forces involved are grossly excessive to the design tolerances of our bodies. A third of a second impact happens so fast that your brain remains uninformed of its occurrence until it is already over. We therefore have no ability to meaningfully react to an unexpected car accident once the collision occurs. Since human reactions aren’t a factor, let us consider how the energy of a collision affects the human frame. Physical blows to the body cause cavitation of the tissues in much the same way that water splashes away from your hand when you slap its surface. The striking object gives up its energy and decelerates just as the struck object absorbs the […]
By James Beauchamp, D.C. For the purposes of this article kinematics will be roughly defined as that chain of events which transfers energy from a moving motor vehicle into the body of the driver of another vehicle through a motor vehicle collision (MVC). This transfer of energy is what causes the injuries sustained in an MVC. A spinal sprain or strain (i.e. whiplash) can only occur if energy is put into the spine which results in an over stretch or too rapid a stretch of the tissues. In other words, flesh must be put into motion. We will trace the path of the energy from one vehicle into the body of the driver of another vehicle rear-ended at a stoplight. In another article, we will delve into exactly how the energy causes injury to the driver of the stopped vehicle. There are a few physics concepts that we must keep in mind. When I speak of the energy of the striking car I am referring to its kinetic energy (KE). Mathematically it is expressed as half of the mass of the car multiplied by the square of its velocity. The relative difference between the speeds of the two vehicles increases […]
By James Beauchamp, D.C. Science is the process of breaking an element of reality into its constituent parts for quantification and analysis. In the medical sciences we document pain and suffering (P&S) by breaking the reality of the patient’s suffering into objective documentation through the magic of office paperwork. This gives the patient the ability to relay to the doctor the facts of the injury, the experience of their pain and suffering, and how it affects his/her life. The patient’s paperwork and the physician’s documentation convert the patient’s experience into a documentable format suitable for computerized analysis. Common forms for documenting P&S include the following: History of Injury This is the patient’s own written description of the circumstances that resulted in his/her injury and how bad the injury feels to him or her. The physician then extracts further relevant details about the patient’s symptoms, including activity restrictions. This begins the initial baseline documentation of P&S. Physical Examination The physical examination determines the functional status of the injured areas. Range of motion limitations, palpable muscle spasms, visual bruising, swelling and specific orthopedic tests constitute objective evidence of injury and supports the patient’s complaints and by extension, their P&S. Special Studies These […]
Multi-Specialty HealthCare (MSHC) is pleased to announce another great verdict against State Farm in Anne Arundel County by Ron Jarashow, our Maryland Association for Justice (MAJ) brother. A four-day auto negligence trial went before Judge Goetzke in which State Farm would not stipulate to anything. It was a rear end crash, and defense contended it was a short stop (but on 4th trial day, conceded liability). State Farm fought the medicals causation and reasonableness of amount, and argued that the injuries were, in fact, pre-existing condition. The Plaintiff’s injuries were an injury to jaw (TMJ) and a soft tissue neck injury. Ron’s experts were Dr. Jon Dunn from MSHC and Stephen Gamerman, DDS (for TMJ). The Defense’s physicians were Dr. Halikman and Dr. Domenic Coletti (oral surgeon). Jury ruled in favor of the Plaintiff with a verdict for $130,000 in compensation. They awarded all specials of $29,638, which included all 17 weeks of lost wages for $5,300, and $95,000 for non-economic. Once again, Ron proved that justice prevails over the perceived prejudice of the Anne Arundel County jury. It was also another example of great teamwork between MAJ, MSHC and Dr. Gamerman. We cannot stress enough the significance of having […]
By James Beauchamp, D.C. Musculoskeletal injuries are always accompanied by some form of emotional reaction. A motor vehicle accident (MVA) may result in both physical injury and significant emotional trauma. In 2008 alone, there were over 1.5 million non-fatal car accidents in the US. While most of these will not result in significant long-term psychological problems, even a one-percent rate of PTSD from MVA’s will leave 15,000 people affected. To better understand the potential impact that Western civilization’s most common trauma can have on your life, I will discuss the nature of emotional trauma in general and how to tell when a normal reaction begins to look like something more serious. How does one then recover from both temporary emotional trauma and more severe reactions such as PTSD? Beauty and horror both lie in the eye of the beholder. It is your individual response to any accident, physical injury or unfortunate event that will determine if and how badly you will be emotionally injured, rather than the specific nature of the event itself. The apparent severity of an MVA is therefore not a reliable indicator of its potential for injury. However, the more life-threatening an event appears to you, the […]
