Ep 17: Strength Protects Healing

Why do some injuries keep coming back, even after treatment?

In this episode of Before the Scalpel, the doctors explain why rehabilitation is a critical part of the healing process. They discuss the relationship between spinal alignment, muscle strength, and long-term stability—and why strengthening the muscles that support the spine is essential for lasting results.

You’ll also hear:
 • Why adjustments alone may not solve recurring problems
 • The role of “muscle memory” in spinal health and recovery
 • How weak spinal stabilizers can contribute to re-injury
 • The difference between general exercise and targeted rehabilitation
 • The story behind MedX technology and its unique approach to spinal strengthening
 • Why investing in strength helps protect the healing process

From advanced rehabilitation technology to the science of spinal stability, this conversation explores how building strength can help patients maintain their progress and achieve better long-term outcomes.

Transcript

SPEAKER_02 0:15

Welcome back. Today we're going to elaborate on why we invest in rehab and what rehabilitation really is. And so some of the equipment that we have is a little more advanced, has been around, well, 30 years, maybe even longer. Certainly was here before I was. Sure. But when we talk about rehab, very important part of our treatment here at Powell, when you adjust the spine and you align the segments of the bones, muscles hold everything together. And so it's essential to measure the strength of the muscle in order to determine if it needs to be solidified because otherwise the bones that you put back in place don't stay there. And there's many ways to do that. So there's very easy ways to do the rehab and physical therapy, we call it to strengthen muscles, but MedX is a is a little bit different.

SPEAKER_01 1:05

Right.

SPEAKER_02 1:06

And maybe you could tell us a little bit about that.

SPEAKER_01 1:09

So the muscle structures that we're going to focus on is that when you were in gym class, they said make sure that your core is strong. And the confusion is that there are core muscles that attach from the base of your skull to your tailbone. And they're called the perispinals, and they're these big muscles. And then the fronts and the backs of your legs, your buttocks, and your belly. And that's what the gym teacher or the football coach said, that's your core. Well, that is accurate for core that does not attach to the spine. The core that attaches to the spine is a different group of muscles. In the knuckles of my hand, if those are the bumps of your spine, between the bumps is a group of muscles. The name of the bumps are spinous process, and so the muscle between those bumps are called interspinalis. Then there's a group of muscles that attach from the bump to the levers on either side of the spine. Those are called transverse process. So to go from the bump that you can feel to the one on the side that you really can't feel, that's called intertransversi. Then there's a third group that goes from the bump of your spine down two or three segments, both up and down at an angle. So the spinal muscles have muscles directly between the bumps, from the bumps to the sides, and then diagonal. So it's very well protected. And the muscles that go diagonally are called multifadous. So this piece of equipment can isolate the spine and test to see if those core muscles are weak or strong. If you've had an injury, more likely than not, those muscles would be weakened. And so if we're trying to do alignments to get the spine back in normal position, but the muscles that hold everything together have been weakened, it doesn't matter how many adjustments that you would get, you're not going to hold. And we've commonly heard, well, I always get adjustments, but then a short time later it comes right back. Well, the reason it comes right back is because no one's addressed the strength of the muscles of that area of the spine.

SPEAKER_02 3:28

Well, I there's a term that I learned in school that we call that muscle memory.

SPEAKER_01 3:33

Correct.

SPEAKER_02 3:34

So a bone or a joint is misaligned, the muscles that support that, depending on how long it's there, that muscle pattern develops a memory. Yep. So we adjust it. Now you've changed the alignment, but the muscle memory won't necessarily change. Right. It may for a brief moment, but it's going to go right back to what it remembers. Correct. So physical therapy, which is very beneficial, that you can get pretty much in everywhere, then you're saying is a little bit different than what we offer with the medics just because of the way it isolates those specific muscles. Not to say that it's both are both are effective, but the but the medics is a little more specific for the spinal condition.

SPEAKER_01 4:12

The structure that was created was created by a gentleman that didn't go past the eighth grade in school.

SPEAKER_02 4:23

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 4:24

Had a photographic memory. He actually had stated that his teachers were not all that bright, and so he was bored, so he left school at eighth grade. But anyway, so what he did is he invented a piece of equipment that uh many of uh folks will remember the name Nautilus equipment.

SPEAKER_02 4:45

Sure, worked out on our eye.

SPEAKER_01 4:46

So his name was Arthur Jones. And Arthur Jones only went to the eighth grade, but he developed Nautilus. And what made Nautilus unique is the logo of Nautilus was a uh was uh was a shell.

SPEAKER_02 5:01

Yeah, C shell, yeah, I remember that.

SPEAKER_01 5:02

And that C shell actually is what the cam is that's inside the machine. So if you're gonna do the bicep muscle, the length of the muscle changes when you go into a curl. Sure. So a medx or excuse me, a Nautilus piece of equipment strengthens the muscle from the beginning to the end of the muscle. It's called the origin to the insertion. Okay. And that muscle, as you're going through the motion, the cam in the machine changes the load. So you're stronger in this position and not as much all the way contracted. So the weight is heavier in this position, and as you go through the curl, the weight decreases in uh in weight, resistance, yeah, in a very small amount. The the logarithmic curve is called 1.4 to 1, meaning you're one 1.4 stronger in one position of a muscle and 1.0 uh, if you will, in strength at another. And so the CAM changes the resistance during the repetition.

unknown 6:12

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 6:12

So that technology was the state of the art at the time.

SPEAKER_01 6:15

Correct. Now you're talking about late 70s, early 80s.

SPEAKER_02 6:19

I remember Nautilus Equipment very well, worked out on the equipment in high school. Yeah. We were fortunate enough to have that, and it, you know, of course, but I didn't understand that whole concept there. Right. So yeah. Well, it makes it very specialized. And I know um Dr. Powell Sr., how did he get introduced to this this equipment? And how did it come to be here?

SPEAKER_01 6:37

Uh dad had been suffering with some low back stuff, and as a chiropractor, it's a very physical job, and your back strength has to be good, and he recognized that there were some problems in the strength of his back. And so he found a friend of his that had just purchased this equipment. So Arthur Jones sold Nautilus to Bally's uh health clubs, and so he didn't have a product like he did. So he went back to the drawing board and he invented MedX, medical exercise equipment. So he had another product that had a different market. I gotcha. So dad's friend from Colorado purchased this equipment. Dad had ran into him at a seminar, uh, went out to Colorado and worked on this equipment, I think it was under a week, and noticed changes in his own spine. So after he identified uh the value, like we had talked about earlier, he'd seek he'd seek out new technologies and new things to help not only him and grandma, but all of his other patients, he found that this piece of equipment fit that notch pretty good.

SPEAKER_02 7:46

Well, and to elaborate on that, when we when we talked earlier about our discovery program and the machine that decompresses the discs, one of the most common questions I get from patients before they even start the program is how do I know that once we decompress this, that this is actually going to stay where we get it? And then I go into the you know the uh the efficiency and the accuracy and the and the huge results we get with the medics. Right. So knowing those specifics now makes me understand how much better that works. Well, of course, the patient too.

SPEAKER_01 8:16

Yep, incredible.

SPEAKER_02 8:17

You know, so and again changes the muscle memory and strengthens the spine.

SPEAKER_01 8:20

Right.

SPEAKER_02 8:21

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 8:21

And so uh it was quite an investment. So it's early 80s, buys this piece of equipment, and that piece of equipment costs more, brand new, in 1982, than an El Dorado Cadillac, and in some cases, more than most houses was what this piece of equipment cost. But when you recognize the value that cannot be duplicated in any other method, then you have to invest the money into the equipment, and that's what Dad did.

SPEAKER_02 8:53

Well, and I love the term investment versus cost because when you invest in something, you're going to have benefits in the future. That's why we invest. Cost is a setback, and that's not not certainly we we're always looking ahead like the cutting edge we talk about. Correct. And uh so I think that's again what's makes one of the makes our clinic unique, and it's all because we had a health problem that we sought ways to find it to make it better.

SPEAKER_01 9:17

Right.

SPEAKER_02 9:17

To make it better.

SPEAKER_01 9:18

So Arthur Jones was brilliant, genius status. Yes. Um I met him in uh lot uh in in San Diego many years ago, and he was the guy that would wear dress shoes, black socks, and shorts. And he smoked.

SPEAKER_02 9:39

Gotcha.

SPEAKER_01 9:40

And he smoked anywhere he wanted, wherever he wanted. He did have a language problem with uh colorful adjectives, we'll say.

SPEAKER_02 9:50

I see.

SPEAKER_01 9:50

And he didn't really care who was around or what they thought. He didn't care what people thought.

SPEAKER_02 9:56

Don't judge a book by its coverage.

SPEAKER_01 9:57

That's right. But he invented this piece of equipment, and to make sure that he didn't miss anything, he bought this, he developed this piece of equipment, then he put it on a spit. So, how do you take a piece of equipment and you test a hundred-pound 50-year-old man, a 200-pound 50-year-old man, and a 300-pound 50-year-old man and judge the strength equally?

SPEAKER_02 10:27

I don't know, it's gonna be tough.

SPEAKER_01 10:28

So the piece of equipment has a uh counterbalance to take the body mass out of the machine. So, for example, if I'm in the machine and I'm doing a rep and I'm gonna push back, if my chest cavity weighs 75 pounds and somebody else weighs 150 pounds, how do you take that weight out of the test so that you can just isolate the muscles of the spine and accommodate for the mass of the body? So he develops this counterweight and it works. To make sure that he didn't miss anything, he puts this piece of equipment on a spit and he turns it 180 degrees upside down and has patients exercise and test in multiple different ranges of motion to ensure that the accuracy is the same on the load. Because when you push back against a pad, you can measure the pounds per square inch of force. So this machine can measure the pounds per square inch of force in multiple different angles and get the same result. So the PhDs in you know, late 70s, early 80s were out of this world of what this guy invented. And so they've used that technology in other stuff, by the way. So uh the father of physical therapy, um Vert Mooney, was the lead researcher in MedX, University of Florida, Southern California, uh University of Florida, Gainesville, and then the second branch was the University of Southern California, San Diego. So I went to both of those universities, studied with these guys on this equipment when we when I first started practice, and I got to meet I didn't meet uh Bert Mooney, but I met Arthur Jones and I met a lot of these guys. Wow. Incredible.

SPEAKER_02 12:20

That's what's that's what has put us where we are today.

SPEAKER_01 12:23

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 12:24

Yeah. Well, and that also explains why maybe some people, why a lot of people don't have this equipment.

SPEAKER_01 12:30

But I mean it's it's heavy.

SPEAKER_02 12:32

It's heavy, and it's expensive. And takes up a lot of space.

unknown 12:35

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 12:35

So, you know, fortunately we're blessed to have the space to do it. Correct. So yeah. So there's another example of uh how Powell has stepped into the future and has, you know, modern modern equipment to treat uh all variety of conditions for chiropractic.

SPEAKER_01 12:50

Correct. So but the success that we've seen with patient care, I can say with confidence, utilizing the multiple different pieces of equipment, like MedX, I wouldn't get the results that we're getting with our patients without these technologies. Absolutely because I can't duplicate the strengthening of a machine with a theraband or doing push-ups. So when I put a patient that has had whiplash for their neck or a lifting or fall injury for their back and strengthening their spine, the time frame or how long the treatment lasts is substantially more, or even sometimes never returns after you really get this uh situation strengthened, flexible, and in alignment.

SPEAKER_02 13:40

Well, and I know prior to getting decompression, there were many disc cases that we had that actually got better just with the MedEx machine.

SPEAKER_01 13:48

Correct.

SPEAKER_02 13:48

Uh, because of the way it isolated the spine. So strengthening it actually helped move the disc back into a better position.

SPEAKER_01 13:55

Yep.

SPEAKER_02 13:55

Uh and of course then we evolved with the decompression, so it all just seemed to be a natural fit.

SPEAKER_01 13:59

Another thing that I thought was interesting with the equipment is there was a journal article, um, I forget uh when, but I read it, that the the bones of the spine uh re react or respond to stress. So they discovered that somebody that has osteoporosis, osteopenia, so that's the weakening, weakening of the bone. If you put a load on the bone with a very precise amount of force, the body responds by loading calcium into the bone that's being stressed.

SPEAKER_02 14:35

I see.

SPEAKER_01 14:35

So when they're in the machine, because it's so isolating to the spine, the bone density increased from doing the exercises.

SPEAKER_02 14:45

Wow.

SPEAKER_01 14:45

So it was an incidental finding, or there was a surprise. Yeah. So they didn't realize that increasing the strength of the spine could also possibly increase the strength of the bone.

SPEAKER_02 14:55

Yeah. Pretty cool. Yeah. Well, as we move into our next episode, uh, we'll be talking uh more about what maintenance means and what how that provides the momentum for our clinic.

SPEAKER_01 15:09

So thank you for watching.

SPEAKER_02 15:11

See you next time.

SPEAKER_00 15:17

Powell chiropractic clinic introduces discovery, the alternative to back surgery. The advanced discovery protocols created in 2006 by the doctors at Powell Chiropractic Clinic are healthy and effective ways to avoid surgery and relieve pain. Innovators in chiropractic care, Dr. Jim Powell and Dr. Walter Nall invite you to live pain free, drug free. Call today for a free no cost consultation and preliminary examination. Powell Chiropractic Clinic, located on Munson Street Northwest in Belvin Village, and at Powellchiropractic.com.