This bone is called the “Atlas” or C1. In Greek mythology, Atlas was a Titan condemned to hold up the celestial heavens for eternity. In your body, this bone has been “condemned” to hold the entire weight of your head for as long as you are alive. It is VITAL this bone is aligned and moving correctly. Contact our Palm Desert CA chiropractors today to learn more.

You see that large hole in the middle? This is the hole that your brainstem and spinal cord descend through. Your brainstem controls all your body’s autonomic functions (breathing, heart rate, sleeping, eating, taste, temperature, bladder control, just to name a few) and gives rise to cranial nerves 3 through 12.

What Does The Atlas Do In Palm Desert CA?

The Atlas rotates right and left, tilts the head down, up, left, right and everything in between. The interesting thing about this bone is when any other bone is out of place in the spine (what chiropractors call a “subluxation”) this bone will also shift out of alignment. Anytime this bone is out of alignment, it puts direct pressure on the brainstem and causes your body not to function optimally. This bone is so important that some chiropractors will ONLY adjust this bone for a chiropractic adjustment. Their philosophy is that when the Atlas subluxation is corrected everything else will fall into alignment.

At Palm Desert Chiropractic, we do agree that this is one of the most important and powerful chiropractic adjustments we can perform on a person and their spine. We do, however, also evaluate and adjust the entire spine during your chiropractic adjustment in our office.

How do you know if your Atlas is out of alignment? Take your two pointer fingers and put them behind the angel of your jaw on each side. There is a space between your jaw and your mastoid process (the part of your skull behind your ear lobes) where your fingers can press in and feel what feels like a marble in that space. Does each side feel a bit different? Is it tender in there? Do you have tension in that area? If you answered “yes” to any of the above, you are probably out of alignment. Chiropractors are expertly skilled at finding and correcting subluxations so they don’t cause or keep causing problems. If you’d like to get checked out to see if your Atlas is causing problems or needs a bit of a “tune-up” give our office a call at (760) 636-1540 or Schedule An Appointment today.