Episode 25: A Neurological Look at Pain

Transcript…

In this episode, you will learn:

  • Learn the difference between a Chiropractic Neurologist, traditional Chiropractor and traditional Neurologist

  • Learn how a brain injury, including a concussion, can influence pain

  • Learn what else could be adding to your experience of pain…here’s a hint, it may not all be inside your brain!

Episode 25: A Neurological Look at Pain

Katie Wrigley  0:07  

This is the pain changer podcast episode 25. Last week Magic Barclay joined us to tell us about her incredible journey that landed her as the lead practitioner for holistic health of Australia. This week, I have the honor of speaking with Dr. Shane Steadman, a chiropractic neurologist in Denver, Colorado. Join us to learn what a chiropractic neurologist is, how it differs from a traditional chiropractor and neurologist, and what the experience of pain looks like from a neurological perspective. That’s all coming right up. Dr. Shane Steadman is the owner of integrated health and integrated brain centers in Denver, Colorado. He is a board certified chiropractic neurologist and a chiropractic nutritionist. He is a fellow of the American Association of Integrative Medicine. He is certified in chiropractic clinical neurology and a certified nutrition specialist through the American College of Nutrition, he has completed numerous hours of postgraduate and advanced studies in functional neurology and functional medicine. His studies also include the diagnosis and treatment of ADHD, learning disabilities, behavioral disorders and movement disorders. He is a member of the American Chiropractic Association, ACA, the ACA Council on neurology and the Colorado Chiropractic Association, the American Association of Integrative Medicine, the American College of Nutrition in the International Academy of Functional Neurology and rehabilitation. There’s actually so much more I can give you in Dr Steadman’s background, but I am so excited to talk to him. And let me tell you a listener. I so wish I had found this man when I was still living in Colorado because he is doing a world of good for people out there who are struggling. Welcome to the pain changer podcast, Dr. Steadman.

Dr. Steadman  2:02  

Hey. Thanks for having me.

Katie Wrigley  2:05  

So let’s start with what is the difference between a chiropractic neurologist and a traditional chiropractor or traditional neurologist? What is the difference? Distinction?

Dr. Steadman  2:15  

Great question. So, you know, we’ll start off with chiropractic. So a lot of people, they always go, oh, you’re a chiropractic neurologist. So, you know, are you just going to adjust me and everything is going to get fixed. So I am like “ahh, not quite how it is”. So my primary degree is a chiropractic degree and a traditional chiropractic, you know, looks at the spine, they align the spine, they adjust the spine to provide an adjustment, they fix subluxations. And with that intent, then what you’re looking for is the body to heal itself, you know, for things to start working better, etc, etc. And that will say like, you know, for the most part, yeah, those are great. And chiropractic does amazing things. Yes, the neurology piece is that, so we have our board certifications, just like traditional medical doctors, they have their primary degree, which is medical, and then they have their board specialties. So you have medical neurologists, medical pediatricians, where you have chiropractic neurologists, and chiropractic pediatricians. And you also have osteopathic neurologists and osteopathic pediatricians. So those are kind of your three primaries. And then you can get your board certification, which is just postgraduate training. So a lot of people, I think that helps because a lot of people actually don’t even know that these things exist. They think that all chiropractors are all the same. You know, all osteopaths are the same but yet we have medical neurologists and medical endocrinologists and medical this medical that. So it’s kind of fun to almost tell the audience like hey, there’s like a bunch of us who can actually get our postgraduate degrees and neurology, radiology, internal medicine, sports physician orthopedics and, and so I have my neurology and my nutrition, and postgraduate. So that’s what kind of, that’s where that delineation is. Now, the difference between chiropractic neurology, and medical neurology is probably the other big question I get asked is like, well, what makes you different? Well, in traditional medicine and conventional medicine, you know, they’re great. They’re great at diagnosing and kind of finding, okay, what’s that label? What do you have? And then based on that label, what medications do we give? What, you know, what are we looking for? It’s like a prognosis, you know, so is your life going to be super difficult? Is it going to be easy, you just gotta take this will be symptoms, or will there not be symptoms? So that’s kind of where they do a great job and they specialize. They chiropractic neurology Group, a lot of times people refer to it as like functional neurology. And, and the reason why they do that is because our training is more of like identifying the dysfunction and then how do we improve that? So if we look at maybe dizziness for an example, in the traditional medical sense, they might say, Okay, I’m going to refer you to a physical therapist and the physical therapist can do the Epley maneuver. And then if you need to fly or if you’re getting carsick, we can give you medication to, you know, to decrease that. So you don’t get carsick, like an anti nausea or anti whatever. So that’s great. In the functional neurology or chiropractic neurology world, what we do is we say, Okay, where is the dysfunction coming from? So is your dizziness, Is that more brain based? Is it within your visual system? Is it within your inner ear system? Is that a low blood sugar issue? Is it an anemia issue? Is it an autoimmune disease, and so we try to identify what’s driving it or what’s causing the dysfunction, then put together a treatment plan to say, Okay, if we work on the anemia, we can fix the dizziness. If we work on the inner ear system, we can fix the dizziness. And so that’s kind of the difference between your traditional neurology and your functional neurology.

Katie Wrigley  6:06  

Thank you that makes a lot of sense the way that you just laid that out. And I appreciate you, you’re giving those details and examples. So it sounds like within your realm, you’re finding the core of the issue, and you’re focused on the path of wellness, not on just minimizing symptoms, you’re not looking for the band aid, you’re looking for the equivalent of okay, this is going to undo this out of this body so they stop having this symptom versus medication to treat the symptom.

Dr. Steadman  6:35  

Absolutely, absolutely. Because I think if we can identify, just like in holistic medicine, functional medicine, if we can identify what the cause is, then it makes sense of the treatment plan. And then also we’re hoping for long term fixes. And there might be some cases that, you know, a long term treatment plan is that you’re 99% better, and maybe medication is helpful if you’re on a boat, you know, or to take it with you just in case. Because our bodies are different. We all have different issues and genetic makeups. And we have old traumas and head injuries or autoimmune diseases, you know that some patients you fix 100%, and they think you’re amazing. And there’s other patients like, Okay, I got you to 90, but with your autoimmune disease, it could always potentially flare up on you. So what do you do in the future? Right, and so that’s, yeah, that’s always the goal, but you got to know the cause. So you can figure out what the future is going to look like.

Katie Wrigley  7:35  

I love that. So that’s something else I’m hearing that’s different that you didn’t necessarily put into a succinct sentence, but your focus is on wellness, not the illness.

Dr. Steadman  7:45  

Absolutely. I mean, yeah, so you got acute care that you got to fix people, but then the wellness piece is just as important. Because how do you keep somebody healthy and well, long term? Right, you know, and even like, you know, and I’ll probably bring up autoimmune enough times, but, you know, even with autoimmune conditions, there’s an acute aspect to that, but then what do you do 30, 40, 50 years from now? Right, you know, so you got to figure out what that wellness piece is and diet, lifestyle, self care, etc, etc. And you have to educate people on that long term to stay well.

Katie Wrigley  8:22  

Absolutely. And your words are music to my ears. Dr. Steadman, that’s your… Yes, I am a firm believer from my own experience, and others, everything that you just mentioned, it’s that long term sustainability. So I want to go back to something you just mentioned about head injuries. And I did notice, you know, on your website, that you have a specialization and concussions. So can head injuries and concussions play into someone’s experience with pain can that can that have an impact

Dr. Steadman  8:52  

All day long. And that’s probably some of the bigger areas that I don’t think get addressed very well, a lot of times, you know, in the chiropractic realm, we see like, you know, you have pain and an arm. And we’ll just maybe use that as an example for the moment, but you have arm pain. So you say, Well, I got to adjust your neck, you know, and if I adjust your neck, then your arm pain gets better. Well, what if it doesn’t, and you go to a physical therapist, and you can have exercises and stretches and use bands, but what if it doesn’t, and so I think, and that kind of goes back to finding the cause. So if you know the cause of it… So in this case, we’re gonna say the causes of brain injury. And so what happens in this example, you have a map of your body in your brain, it actually goes from like the middle of your head to the outside towards your ear. So you have a map of one side and you have a map of the other. And even within a brain injury, you can kind of throw off or you can mess up the map so to speak. And why that’s important is because your brain has to know where all the different limbs are. And if you don’t know where a limb is at, then what happens is your brain will utilize pain fibers. To kind of like color in the map, so to speak. And so now you have this pain that your brain is saying, well, there should be sensory there, but I’m not too sure what’s going on. But we have the map filled in, but we’re using pain fibers to fill it in, or the sensation from pain fibers. And this is where you see things like phantom limb pain, orthese weird chronic pain syndromes that people can’t figure out. And that’s why they give medications like Lyrica or gabapentin, or, you know, some of these things are more neurologic based pain meds. And so that could be an issue from the concussion, or the brain injury where you’re just messing up that map. And that’s kind of a lot of what you tend to see. But the other piece too, is that pain always goes into the spinal cord, it also goes through that brain because you have to know if you’re in danger. But sensory or good information, like light touch, crude touch, you know, hugs and all these different things, they will inhibit pain fibers. And so that’s why, you know, if you ever like, you know, bump into the corner of a desk, and you kind of your arm goes dead, you always rub it, you go, ah, that’s hurts and the smarts and when you rub your arm, and you go, Oh, that feels better, or you’re like, oh, rub it, rub it, rub it, rub it, you know. And then it starts to feel better, because the good sensation will inhibit the pain sensations. But if you don’t have good functionality, or your brain can’t utilize that information, then the pain fibers are allowed to escalate. And sometimes you can hear terms like spinal wind up, or brain wind up, where you have these pain systems that are actually becoming more efficient, good for them, bad for us. But that’s kind of where you see some of these like chronic pain syndromes that can come from like brain injuries, and concussions and strokes and some of these really interesting neurological issues.

Katie Wrigley  11:50  

Thank you for that explanation that makes a lot of sense. And from what I understand about the nature of pain, you know, it’s, I always try to be careful around this. It is in our heads, it is in our brain, which is actually really great news, because then that means we can change it. But it also makes sense. Everything you said that if any part of the brain has sustained injury and has any kind of damage that’s going to be reflected in the physical body and oftentimes in the experience of pain.

Dr. Steadman  12:20  

Absolutely. Yeah, they use the term that pain is personal. And I think that’s such a true statement. Because, yes, you know, the “it’s in your head”, you know, it does work, you know. And so there’s that’s why there’s so many different things that we can do for pain, whether it be massage, chiropractic, acupuncture, meditation, deep breathing, hyperbaric oxygen, therapy, IV nutrition, because all those things can impact our body. And it can change the way that we perceive pain, the way we experience pain, how we deal with pain, and how we cope with pain. I mean, it’s, you know, but it’s so experiential, that, you know, one person’s headache… I’ve had patients that, you know, you say, what’s your migraine level? And they say, an eight. And I’m like, how do you function? I have a migraine of a four, and I can’t, I feel I have to take the day off from work. Yeah, it is. But it’s very personal. So you don’t ever want to dismiss, and you would probably agree, you don’t want to dismiss somebody’s pain and say, well, that’s not a big deal. Because to them, it could be a big deal. Or you don’t say, Oh, you’re making this up, their brain could be making it up. But there’s still an issue. And there’s the question of why is their brain making it up? And then what can we do about it?

Katie Wrigley  13:33  

Exactly. I really liked the way that you outlined that, you know, it is in the brain. But there can also be a structural issue that those messages are coming from the structural issue in the form of pain up to the brain. But that’s where that perspective shifts that those coping, that can change things like my own experience. If you look at my imaging, I need neurosurgery. In my actual day to day life, I do not have six bulging discs, every lumbar disc plus my sacrum is bulging in different directions, some are approaching herniation, had unrelenting nerve pain, utilized other methods, found cognomovement, and I don’t have back pain anymore. But I am constantly monitoring myself and adjusting what I do to stay there much to the point you mentioned about the long term sustainability. And it is everybody’s experience. Pain is unique. And I want to really take an extra moment to acknowledge that because again, you know, your experience of pain, it is real, it doesn’t mean that you can’t impact it and change it and make it easier on yourself.

Dr. Steadman  14:37  

Absolutely, absolutely. And, and I think if we validate people, you know, and what their experiences are, I think that’s a big thing, because I often hear from patients that “Oh, my doctor doesn’t believe me.” And that’s unfortunate because, I mean, you know, sometimes you wonder I mean, I have to give credit to doctors out there. Sometimes you go. Do you really have pain or you know, cuz some people are attention seeking, you know, and there are some of those like mental health conditions, but I would say for the most part, the majority of patients that come in saying, “Nobody believes me”, I’m like, I believe you now, let’s just figure this out. You know, and I think, and I think the cognitive piece that you’re talking about, I mean, that’s huge. Because you can change your mindset, you know, and you can still have issues, but that also tells you how powerful the brain is, is that you can have, like, you know, like lumbar discs that are bulging, and there’s obvious, like, they call like, disarrangement, or there’s dysfunction within that system. But your brain can be so powerful that it can override that, you know, but then you have to, like engage in, you know, making sure that you’re monitoring, that you’re still maintaining that. Yep, And sometimes it can be tough, because I mean, life hits you. We do certain things, stressors happen. And so, and I think that’s where that wellness piece and education piece comes into play.

Katie Wrigley  15:57  

I agree. That’s very well said. And that echoes my experience and others that I’ve seen that are journeying out of pain. So what changes, if anything, when we’re viewing pain through the neurological lens, I believe, we’re already touching on it in the way that you’re approaching things now. But can you go into more detail, maybe some examples about looking at chronic pain through the neurological lens versus the traditional lens? or medical?

Dr. Steadman  16:26  

Yeah, the traditional lens of pain of experience, like pain syndromes and pain experiences is that it must be at that joint, or it must be within that muscle, you know, or within that system. So it’s more of what they call like a segmental approach, you know, so if that segment or body part or area has dysfunction, then that must be where the pain is. Sometimes you actually hear this term, and sometimes this happens to chiropractic, unfortunately, is like, you know, the call, like chasing pain, you know, it’s like, the pain’s here, the pain’s here, the pain’s here, then you’re constantly chasing it. And there’s some cases that it makes sense, you know, and sometimes as you’re chasing pain, you kind of get to the source where everything came from, right. But in a segmental model, you tend to, like, chase the pain, instead of saying, Okay, where’s it coming from? The neurological piece of it, and looking at it through that lens, I think really, like opens up your toolbox, so to speak. Because, I mean, I’ve done brain stuff, and people’s low back pain has gone away. You know, I’ve done dietary changes. And you know, from people that are, you know, outside of Colorado, we’re working on their diet and lifestyle and habits. And then I’m like, how are you doing? Like, oh, my neck pain went away. I’m like, that’s kind of fascinating. I didn’t even touch your neck and you live in a different state. Wow. So I think when you start looking at it from a neurological standpoint, I think it really opens up the possibilities of what we can do and all the different tools in our toolbox that you can start looking at with different people. And I think that’s where, like, I think, you know, people like you that are saying, Okay, here’s another avenue to look into, because you can do cognitive therapies, you can do hyperbaric oxygen therapy, we can do meditation, yoga, you know, retreats, I mean, you hear people doing certain things, and then all their pain goes away. Even just having a different relationship. You know, I’ve seen that people like changing jobs, having a different friend group and all of a sudden, you know, their pain syndromes are less. So that tells you that, you know, through the neurological lens, we just have so many more tools that we can try out with people.

Katie Wrigley  18:34  

Yes, and I love that because that means that if something doesn’t work for you, something else has a good chance of working for you. And it’s a matter of finding what that key may be inside that person’s body to help unlock this path to relief, to lowering pain, to having a healthier, more well life. So, you know, and I’ve had other guests touch on this as well, but you know, what are your feelings? It seems like functional medicine to me is a much better fit and/or holistic, whatever you want to call it, but functional holistic medicine seems to be a better fit for people with chronic pain versus traditional. Can you comment on that as far as what your expert opinion would be from, you know, your advanced degree standpoint and all the experience you’ve had working with neurology to help people shift?

Dr. Steadman  19:28  

The the functional medicine side of pain is very important, and I think we kind of touched on it with diet, but I think what a lot of people don’t realize is that globally meaning like all of your body, I mean, you have chemical mediators, chemical messengers, that can activate pain cascades, and those are really important if you become injured. You know, if you sprain your ankle, if you have a lot of stress, if you get caught up in things like toxins or pollution or things like that, like your body’s got to have a way to say, something’s not right, and you try to alert your immune system. But so where functional medicine comes in with chronic pain syndromes is that, again, that kind of opens up a whole nother world of treatments to say that a big chunk of chronic pain can come from your gut. Because if your digestive system is not working, or let’s say you have a food allergy, or you have leaky gut, then those macronutrients and things that shouldn’t be crossing the barrier system will cross and when that does, it releases different complement factors. If people see their bloodwork says, like, you know, C3, or C4 complement factors, TNF alpha, interleukin beta, these are all like immune messengers that go out and say, you know, alert, Alert, alert, or something’s going on. But then once it starts to cascade, you know, that’s where you start seeing, like, you know, gut dysfunctions, and like rheumatoid arthritis, or you hear this really cool story of somebody said, I used to have RA, my hands hurt, I couldn’t do anything, you know, I cleaned up my gut. And now I can do stuff again, I could open up jars. But the same thing also then applies towards things like hormones, you know, and you hear, you know, pain syndromes that come on with like menstrual cycles, or post menopause. The thyroid is another big one, you know, people have hypothyroidism will tend to have like chronic muscle aches and pains, joint pain, you know, so it all kind of comes down to that if things are dysfunctional, then your immune system gets involved, these inflammatory cascades get involved. And so once they start becoming involved, then they can actually amplify themselves, which a lot of people don’t know. So for example, so the messenger called TNF alpha, tumor necrosis factor alpha and NF kappa B, they can actually amplify each other. So when one goes up, the other one goes up, and then they just keep kind of going into a vicious cycle. And when that happens, you know, this is where you start hearing the stories like, oh, I smelled this perfume, and bam, everything started hurting, I just looked at a piece of bread, or a piece of bread was waved in front of my face, and bam, everything like turned on. It’s like, why is your body so hypersensitive? Well, you could just have a lot of inflammation, and those Cascades are going and going and going and going, and now you have this chronic pain, even like, you know, you look at disabled, you know, a disc bulge has to have localized inflammation. But then if you’re adding on top of that with metabolic dysfunction, dietary, poor dietary habits, things like that, it just adds to the inflammatory processes sitting there.

Katie Wrigley  22:35  

Right? That makes so much sense. And I was thinking about this earlier, as you were talking about diet, all of my diet is geared to anti inflammation. And I have a condition called hemochromatosis. And so I get to keep my own blood longer when I don’t eat meat. So, but that has been a big focus. And that’s one of the areas you know, that I encourage people to look at, as you can’t expect your body to change if you’re putting crap into it instead of healthy nutrients that it’s asking for. It’s simply not going to perform at the same level unless you have a nutritious diet that is for your body. And so what I’m hearing there is the functional medicine piece, it’s going to incorporate other pieces, it’s not going to be just focused on the localized area. There is a focus there, of course, but then it branches out into okay, what is available to us here. And what are we seeing could be the causes that are feeding into this and I’m sure there’s a lot of different tests that people that you run your patients through when they come in to help identify that. Instead of you know, eeny, meeny, miny moe, and just try it. I know there’s a whole system and a method to approaching it that way.

Dr. Steadman  23:48  

Yeah, absolutely. You know, and I think some of the simplest things that people can do on the functional medicine side is just run bloodwork. It is probably the cheapest, most comprehensive thing that you can run. But the problem is you have to find a practitioner that’s open to do a complete comprehensive blood work, you know, a lot of them say, Oh, we’re gonna run a lot of blood and they do like a lipid panel glucose, a TSH and a CBC and a cam, they’re like, no, no, no, we want to look at things like fibrinogen. And we want to look at homocysteine levels, and CRP levels, and vitamin D levels. And you want to start looking at all these pieces because something simple like blood work can tell you a story. And if you see a lot of inflammatory markers up you have a ton of inflammation. Now you gotta go find out where if you’re pre diabetic, or metabolic syndrome, that creates a lot of inflammation hypothyroid creates a lot of inflammation, you know, so all these little pieces and sometimes that’s a really easy, inexpensive way to like look under the hood and see what’s going on with the engine. I always tell patients to say I wish, I was thinking about the car thing, you can take your car to the mechanic and they they plug it into the computer and it spits out codes right and then the codes Tell you what you need to fix. So the mechanics know where to go. I wish we had one of those that’d make life so easy. But I think the closest thing that we do have is blood work, you know, to plug in yourself into a system, seeing the whole picture, putting it together, and then saying, Okay, this is the direction we need to go.

Katie Wrigley  25:17  

That makes a lot of sense. And I think with technology, we’re actually getting closer to the equivalent of the computer chip in the car telling you everything that’s wrong with obviously, we don’t have a computer chip in our head, but we are seeing technology start to move that way to be able to make the diagnosis process so much easier. So that it is a lot easier and closer to that, oh, this is what’s wrong with your car, oh, this is where these are the things that are wrong with your body. Meaning like not that there’s anything wrong with the person, but you have systems that are not functioning optimally pointing to dysfunction, wanting to stay with less, less heavy words, there, there’s nothing wrong with the person, we have something that’s just not functioning the way that we expect it to.

Dr. Steadman  26:02  

Absolutely, you know, and it’s easy to use a car analogy, because, you know, if our car’s kind of making a funny noise, then we take it in and we figure out what’s wrong with it, we figure out the cause, there’s a treatment plan to fix it. And now our car’s running optimally again, you know, we have a funny noise. And we’re like, I don’t know, I’ll just keep going through life. And hopefully it doesn’t get worse. You know, and, and so I think it’s like if we have funny noises, and we have things or not, you know, we’re running sluggish. You know all the car terms, and we should go get checked out. And we should have an analysis and find a doctor that’s going to look at the whole person like you never have a mechanic that just goes, I don’t know, it sounds like the spark plugs. And they just look at the spark plugs. And they go, No, those are fine. And then they give you your car back. Now they go, Well, the spark plugs don’t work. So let me check the carburetors. Let me check the engine, let me check the fuses, let me check this, you know. And they try to figure out what’s wrong. But we don’t do that with our own bodies. It’s a little bit crazy that we will go and spend, you know, three, four, $10k on a car, you know, and then our own bodies we’re like, “Ooh, $50. That’s, that’s yeah, that’s, that’s a really expensive supplement.”

Katie Wrigley  27:14  

Right? And oh, gosh, a lot of that I think personally comes from what you mentioned earlier, is that people so often feel like their doctor doesn’t believe them. So they don’t even want to go to their doctor. Because the first thought is, am I imagining this, because that’s what they’ve been trained to do. And I’ve done that myself too. But that’s, I love that analogy with the car, you know, and one of the other things I hear is like, oh, but it’s not covered by insurance? Well, your insurance isn’t paying to get your car maintained, either. They’re just paying for the big things. Like, you know, and you’re gonna have a harder time driving your car if you’re not functioning, right. So you want to be taking care of yourself to have all the systems in your life operating too, including your car, your diet, whatever it may be internal external systems, your health is going to make that a hell of a lot easier to navigate when your health is close to or in optimal state.

Dr. Steadman  28:06  

Absolutely. I think finances sometimes become a major obstacle and it makes sense. I get it. But you know, there’s also like different studies that show that you’re eventually going to spend this money, you know, spend it all at one moment, and then struggle or do you kind of spread it out over time, and you make sure that you’re living well. You know, it’s kind of like you’re starting to see a lot of other industries that are now doing this like HVAC industries where they say, Hey, let’s check out your furnace on a monthly schedule, so that we can catch things ahead of time and you’re not spending $10,000 on new furnace. Right. And so I think that’s kind of how you start to look at health is like, okay, if I’m working on my stuff, the wellness, and my if I’m working on it, and figuring these pieces out early on, maybe doing blood work once a year that’s comprehensive looking for those trends. You know, that’s where you’re now investing because if you have energy, then you can maybe do well at your job, or maybe get a promotion in that job. Or you’re able to spend time with your kids, which is priceless, or you’re able to travel, or you retire and you get to have fun. You know, and so there’s a lot of pieces that it’s hard to look into the future. But I think that’s kind of how you want to look at some of the aspects of like health, wellness, and finances.

Katie Wrigley  29:26  

I love that again, I really love all the words that are coming out of your mouth that it makes so much sense. And you make it very simple in these analogies too and it’s all of those things point to a higher quality of life when you take care of yourself. And one of the things I like to ask people is like, what do you want? What have you had to give up? Because of this? What do you want to have back? What do you want to be able to do in your life? Because if you aren’t looking at the future at all, you’re more likely to feel stuck. And that identity of being stuck is going to get deeper and deeper ingrained. And when it’s in our identity, it’s harder to break that out cognitively. But future pacing and looking like I would really like to do this again, like travel, I couldn’t travel when I was disabled, it hurt too much like, I lived in Colorado for four years, I still haven’t been to Wyoming because it was too far away for me to get to. It is not that far away, it’s like two hours north of Denver, I think, if even, that was too much time in the car for me. And now I’m going to do a road trip to go out there at some point from Maine, because I didn’t have the opportunity. But that wasn’t feasible to me at the time, it wasn’t available. So setting, making a bucket list of places I want to go in the world, that was one of the tricks I use to help myself look to the future and what I wanted to do, I didn’t think I was ever going to be able to do it. And man, I’ve never been so happy to be wrong. So I want to wrap up with a couple of just finishing questions. One of them is, where can people find you? And what can you do for clients, both within the state of Colorado and for anybody outside, you had mentioned that you can do some metabolic help, you know, mentioning someone in another state that you hadn’t even touched. So what can you do locally, and then virtually?

Dr. Steadman  31:18  

Yeah, so the best place to kind of find us is two places, integratedhealthdenver.com, or integratedbraincenters.com. And so they’re kind of split a little bit, because some people are more on that metabolic side. And so we’re trying not to confuse people too, too much. But we can do both a lot of neurological work and functional medicine work. And we actually blend the two together as kind of like our specialty, which makes it really fun. And every case is interesting. You know, we have patients or people that we work with from you know, out of state, and we tend to do more of the metabolic work, you know, with them and look at lifestyle and things like that. Where in state, you know, definitely it’s better to do like the neurological work, right, you know, a lot of people actually fly in, and we’ll do what’s called like intensive, you know, weeks or intensive days where we can actually do a lot of therapies on one day, and we try to get from point A to point B in a short period of time. And that seems to help people a lot, because we can kind of get about two months of care until like a week.Wow. And that really helps to move things along pretty fast. And it’s kind of fun to see. We can make some significant changes. And it’s really fun, that’s probably our favorite way to practice in here. Because I think we get really involved with the patient, and we kind of become like family. And by the end of the week, everybody’s hugging each other. And, you know, thanks, I hope you have a great trip, we’ll talk to you on the phone. And, you know, so that’s kind of our favorite way of doing it. But I think what’s best for people is to know is that we actually just do a free consultation with every patient. And to me, that’s important, because it may not be a great fit, you know, and if it’s not a good fit, then I can find somebody locally for them. Because there are other chiropractic neurologists all over the country. And you know, and of course, I would like to be the person that helps. But at the end of the day, there’s a lot of people suffering. And so we need to, like, get them help and find help. And so, you know, we’ll do consultations. And if it works great, we’ll go over the next steps. And if it doesn’t, and I need to help them find a doc, then, you know, I’ll say here’s a doctor in this area, here’s three doctors. “This one has this kind of specialty” and kind of help guide people so that they can get better because that’s what we’re looking to do.

Katie Wrigley  33:25  

I love that and you guys can’t see Dr. Steadman. But as he was talking about his favorite way to treat people, I think it came through in his voice, I could hear it, but he’s got this big smile on his face, his eyes lit up. This is clearly his passion. And it is clear from looking at him. And hopefully you hear it in his voice too. He loves what he is doing, and anybody who has that level of passion, in my experience, is an amazing practitioner who is going to be able to benefit you. So please find Dr. Steadman, we will make sure that we put this in the show notes for you. And I’ll see if there’s also maybe Is there a link like to a directory of chiropractic neurologists that we could put in for someone to find? If not, don’t worry about it.

Dr. Steadman  34:10  

Let me look at the link and then I can send that to you because there is a doctor locator but I think they’re redoing the website. Actually, I just got an email this week that they’re kind of revamping the whole thing. So I don’t know if it’s up or running and they might be using it. So there’s a little bit of changes over there. But we can see we can figure that out.

Katie Wrigley  34:26  

Yep. And I can always add it to the show notes later, too. If so, if it’s in flux right now, then maybe it’ll be settled in a month and I can update it then. And the last note I want to end on is where would you suggest someone start if they’re just starting to dive into this journey to figure out what’s going on in their body that’s making them suffer.

Dr. Steadman  34:50  

So I’m very biased in this but I’ll give my two cents. I actually do think that a chiropractic neurologist, that group is actually a good place to start. And this is why, so take out the biasness, but there’s not too many Doc’s that are kind of trained in that whole like neurology, functional medicine kind of approach. And I think with chiropractic neurologists is nice because you can go in and they can say it is your brain or it’s not your brain is your body, it’s not your body, it’s inflammation or not inflammation. And not all chiropractic neurologists do functional medicine. But a lot of times we can be advocates, so we can say, You know what, this is not a neurological issue. But here’s the doctor that does functional medicine. Here’s a doctor that does acupuncture. Here’s a doctor that does cranial sacral, you know, and so a lot of times we can help direct people, because there are so many tools, and how do you know which one and I think what happens a lot of patients, they are people, they just they try this tool and it didn’t work this tool that didn’t work, this tool that didn’t work, you know, so now you’ve spent like 1000s and 1000s of dollars, where sometimes you can go to somebody that does something like chiropractic neurology, and say, Okay, here’s where we’re starting. Here’s what’s the best thing for you. Biofeedback, for some people works great for other people it doesn’t but after you do a neuro exam, you’re like, you know what, biofeedback, Neurofeedback might be the coolest thing for you or, you know what, you need counseling. And maybe that’s the best next step for you. And so that’s kind of where our profession tends to kind of be as almost like that full spectrum of “This is where you should go”, or maybe we are the best person for the care but I think that’s a good place to start. If not that, if you don’t have one close by, then probably a well versed, well rounded Functional Medicine Practitioner, they can start giving guidance and help as well.

Katie Wrigley  36:48  

Thank you. That makes a lot of sense. And just to add, you know, and blood work is a great place to start too but not just your limited view of blood work, the more comprehensive ones which would start with a chiropractic neurologist. Yeah. Thank you so much for joining me today. Dr. Steadman and thank you my listener as always for tuning in and listening. Next week, I’m going to have another special guest for you. Josie Warren is going to be coming in and talking to us about using resilience as a way to help yourself alleviate your chronic pain. I hope you’ll come back and join me again next week.

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