Listen or Read Dr. Rubinstein’s Monthly Podcast Interview!
Topic: Pediatric Care
Below you will find an easy to read transcript of Dr. Gregg Rubinstein’s interview on the razorcast™ monthly podcast. You can either watch the video to listen to the podcast or simply read the easy to follow transcript below. Enjoy!
Podcast Interview:
RC: Hello everyone. This is Liz Harvey coming to you from our razorcast™ studios in New York City where we are dedicated to bringing you top quality advice from many of the leading expert professionals across the United States.
In today’s episode, we are speaking with chiropractor, Dr. Gregg Rubinstein. Dr. Rubinstein is the founder of 57th Street Chiropractic located in the heart of midtown Manhattan where he has been practicing since 1993. He specializes in pediatric & family care and Dr. Rubinstein is a long standing member of the International Chiropractic Pediatrics Association. He also serves as a board member of Friends of Fresh and Green Academy, a non-profit organization that does extensive charity work in education in Ethiopia.
Dr. Rubinstein is widely considered to be one of the top chiropractors in the U.S. and is also a contributing member of our national network of razorcast™ professionals.
Today we are going to talk about a very important topic: Pediatric Care
RC: Hi Dr. Rubinstein, how are you today?
Dr. Gregg Rubinstein: I’m doing great. Good morning, Liz, how are you doing?
RC: I’m doing great. Thanks so much for joining us and I’m excited about this topic today.
Question 1: Why would an infant need chiropractic care?
RC: So the first question: Why would an infant need chiropractic care?
Dr. Gregg Rubinstein: You know, I get that question asked to me an awful lot and the reason that an infant would need chiropractic care is pretty much the same reason that an adult would need chiropractic care.
The major premise in chiropractic is really teaching people that the nerve system is the master controlling system. That nerve system took two cells and developed a perfect baby from that and then when the baby is born that nerve system will carry on all that baby’s bodily functions and organize all the tissues and organize the digestion and make that baby a functional human being.
So when the bones of the spine are misaligned, it doesn’t matter how old you are, (if they’re misaligned) they are going to put pressure and irritate the nerves and that is going to alter the way the nerve system functions.
So an adult needs a healthy nerve system and so does an infant. Most people think, “Oh why should I bring my child in – he doesn’t have any back pain or neck pain.” But really when we talk about chiropractic, sensing pain and moving muscle is such a small part of what your nerve system does. It’s really only about 10%. The other 90% of your nerve system is controlling and regulating your body’s daily functions.
Being a chiropractor is about maintaining the integrity of the nerve system and maintaining the integrity of the spinal column. So again, most people think, “Oh well, my baby doesn’t have any back pain or neck pain.” But that is the smallest part of what a chiropractor does. It’s truly about keeping the spine and nerve system as healthy as possible and functioning at its highest level.
Question 2: What common issues do you see in children and what are some causes?
RC: And what common issues do you see in children and what are some causes?
Dr. Gregg Rubinstein: Well, the most common reason that most parents will bring their child in to a chiropractor is usually after birth.
Sometimes we can see something calling infant torticollis. Sometimes if the delivery isn’t really smooth or the mother is given drugs, particularly like an epidural, she can’t really feel when to push so sometimes the doctor needs to use extra energy to pull the baby out and if the head is the first thing that comes out sometimes that can be stress on the baby’s neck. And if the baby’s neck is stressed during the delivery, sometimes the neck can lock up and you’ll see an infant sitting there with his head sloped to one side.
Mothers will often notice that the baby has difficulty taking milk from both breasts. It will have a favorite side and it won’t feed on the other side. There will be imbalances or the baby won’t be picking up the head with any strength early. So we’ll start to see these different things and the parents will notice and that’s when they start to bring their children in.
Usually it will be some type of thing that they notice but as we’ve had discussions in the past, keeping the nerve system healthy is truly important for every stage of that infant’s growth and development. So any pressure from a misalignment of the spine can certainly alter that baby’s growth and development. So it’s important to get them checked whether they’re symptomatic or not and we can work from there.
So very often there are many different causes. When you see a child learning to walk, how many times a day do they fall – you know, 20-30 times a day. Then they rough house with their brothers or their sisters or whatever it might be, all these different things can create misalignments in children and not necessarily have to cause pain.
Question 3: If these conditions are left untreated, what problems can children expect as adults?
RC: And if these conditions or say injuries are left untreated, what problems can children expect as grown adults?
Dr. Gregg Rubinstein: (Well most of the stuff that I see in my office) As adults, back pain and neck pain are the biggest motivator that get people in to a chiropractor. They did a study on 154 ten year old children. They were all asymptomatic – none of them had any symptoms; none of them had back pain or neck pain. They did MRIs and they found that 14 out of 154 of these children already had signs of disc degeneration on their MRIs at 10 years old.
So if you imagine… if you did nothing for another ten years, now you have a twenty year old that has degenerating discs. And all the stress as they enter the workforce and all these different things that they do can allow the body to kind of heal wrong – grow wrong over time, create these misalignments. That puts pressure on those delicate spinal nerves choking off that valuable nerve flow and that’s when real sickness and disease and pain can start.
Question 4: We mentioned that you are a board member of Friends of Fresh and Green Academy, can you tell us more about that organization and the work you do with them?
RC: Alright we mentioned that you are a board member of Friends of Fresh and Green Academy, can you tell us more about that organization and the work you do with them?
Dr. Gregg Rubinstein: Well, thank you for asking. You know that is one of the things that came out of our love for children. My wife is a flight attendant and she actually flew to Ethiopia as a volunteer and visited this school. And what makes this school so special is… you know, it’s basically free to go to public school in Ethiopia. But most of the kids that attend our school, their families are so poor that rather than go to school, the kids will be on the street begging for food or money and that way they can eat but they wouldn’t go to school.
At our school, we offer three meals a day. So no matter what happens, the kids never miss school because it’s the only place they eat. Since it’s the only place they eat, they never miss. Even if a kid falls down and breaks his arm, they still come to school because that’s where they’re going to get fed. So they come to our school; we feed them three meals a day and they get an education that they otherwise would not have the opportunity to get because again without food what’s the point of getting an education so they’re usually out on the street begging for food or money.
At our school, the kids are preselected. We visit the homes. We make sure that they meet that certain what we call ‘poverty level’ and then we admit them to the school and they get a chance to get an education and eat.
We also support their families with some limited medical care and they get free chiropractic care. I’ve sent many chiropractors over there to adjust all the children at the school and their families. So we keep this mission going and the kids learn about spinal health. They get an education and we hope that breaks the cycle of poverty because as these kids get older with their education they should hopefully give back to the school and realize what the school actually did for them. And we’re starting to see that now because some of the older kids are tutoring the other kids and mentoring them.
So in order to do that, we hold certain fundraisers here in New York because all the funds that we send to the school are generated from our fundraising efforts here and our child sponsorship program and you can look all of that up at www.friendsoffreshandgreen.com and there are a host of ways that you can help.
Question 5: What advice do you have for parents considering chiropractic care for their children?
RC: Well that’s fantastic thanks for telling us about that and my last question is what advice would you have for parents considering chiropractic care for their children? Perhaps they have not taken their child to see a chiropractor yet.
Dr. Gregg Rubinstein: You know it is a big step and I want to just preface this by saying the highest honor that I ever receive is when a new mother has a baby and within a couple of days comes into my office and just hands me the baby to check the baby. Now, not many people are in the mindset to do that. They think about their newborn and they’re like, “Oh why would I do that!”
When you’re looking for a chiropractor to adjust your infants or children you want to look at their website, you want to ask them some questions and you want to look at the office. If I walk into the office and I see sharp glass tables and marble floors and stuff, I’m having a suspicion that maybe they don’t work with a lot of kids there.
You want to see is there a little kiddy table; is there a separate children’s play area? On their website, do they talk about children? Have they done extra study in pediatric and family care? All of those things are great questions to ask. You know usually you’ll see the name family chiropractor or family chiropractic. You might see those things described in their advertisements or on their websites. But I would always ask to speak to the doctor and speak to the staff too because the staff are going to be a wealth of information. You call them up they’re going to know if there’s lots of kids coming in and out. If you ask, “Do you treat children?” And they say, “Yeah.” Well maybe. But if they say, “Oh yeah, we see lots of kids in our office all the time. Dr. Rubinstein specializes in pediatric and family care,” you’ll get a sense that’s what they want to do. Because if you don’t like working with kids, you’re not going to advertise that kind of stuff, you know.
If you like working with sports people, you’re going to advertise sports injury. If you like working with older folks, you’re going to advertise elder care. And what I advertise and where all my advanced study is in – pediatric and family care and wellness based care.
So those are the things that I would look at. Check the website, go into the office, look around. Most chiropractors would do a consultation at their expense just to meet you and talk and you can get a feel for them. If you don’t feel comfortable with that chiropractor, you can definitely move on.
RC: That’s great advice! Thanks so much and we know you’re extremely busy so I just want to say thank you for your time and help today.
Dr. Gregg Rubinstein: We’re always honored to help out and if we can get the message of what we do out to more folks, we’re doing a service so I’m glad to give my time for such a great cause.
RC: Thanks so much and for our listeners across the country, if you are interested in speaking with Dr. Gregg Rubinstein, you can either go online at www.chiropractormidtown.com or call (917) 534-6484 to schedule an appointment.
On behalf of our entire team at razorcast™, we want to thank you for listening and we look forward to bringing you more top quality content from our country’s leading experts.
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