The Gate-Control Theory And How It Alleviates Pain Following Chiropractic Treatment
Pain is typically a direct result of some kind of trauma, injury or infection to an area of the body. It’s the result of either a physical or chemical stimulation of the free nerve endings, which exist in almost all of the body’s superficial tissues. The nerve endings relay the painful stimulus to the spinal cord and brain which quickly process the information and direct an appropriate response. Those free nerve endings are small, however, and usually unmyelinated, meaning that they don’t have the same protective coating of the larger peripheral nerves which control motor functions. As a result, they send signals slower than their larger, myelinated counterparts. The myelinated segments act as a booster to increase the signal speed along a nerve fiber.
Think of the amount of time it takes for you to see a reaction when the doctor taps on your knee with a reflex hammer. It’s almost instantaneous that you’ll see your quadriceps muscle contract causing your lower leg to kick slightly. Now think about anytime you’ve ever accidentally burned yourself. You accidentally touched a hot frying pan or stuck your hand under water that was too hot. You didn’t pull your hand away for at least a full second before you realized the pain was there. That’s the difference between pain fibers and motor fibers.
This is where the gate-control theory comes into play. This theory is attributed to Melzack and Walls and was first proposed by them in 1965. It is generally accepted now as one of the leading explanations for the mechanism and perception of pain. The basis of the theory is that mechano-receptors relay information to the central nervous system faster than pain fibers. So, by stimulating mechano-receptors with non-noxious, or non-painful stimulus, you essentially over-ride or close the “gate” to the painful stimulus. Think of the most recent time that you’ve bumped your head, elbow or knee. What’s the first thing you probably did? Grab the area that got hurt and start rubbing, right? That’s the natural subconscious response by everyone because it is the most effective way to immediately reduce the pain. Rubbing the spot that got hit activates the mechano-receptors in the area of pain and over-rides the pain signals to the brain.
Many treatments and therapies for injuries use this theory to dull or eliminate the perception of pain.
Chiropractic care works in a similar way by not only stimulating the mechanism of the gate control theory, but also correcting any areas of interference to the nervous system via the spinal column. In large part, one of the main goals of chiropractic treatment is to optimize the human nervous system so that there is no signal interference between the brain and the rest of the body. When a subluxation in the spine is putting pressure or tension on a spinal nerve, it affects the signal that gets passed along that nerve root and causes dysfunction of any internal organs or skeletal muscles at the receiving end. And in the opposite direction, the brain cannot receive proper feedback signals from that area, so there’s a lot of miscommunication happening in both directions. The adjustment of subluxations in the spine helps relieve that strain on the nervous system and allow signals to pass freely without interference. In combination, using therapies like electrical muscle stimulation helps to decrease pain, in part, by stimulating the mechanoreceptors, which then tones down the pain signals reaching the brain from that area and ultimately allows spasming muscles to relax.
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