What is Malalignment Syndrome?
Malalignment syndrome is a cluster of symptom consist of pain, joint dysfunction, muscle imbalance and postural adaptation resulted from a condition that occurs when one or more segments of the body are out of alignment.
In non-medical term this condition can be described with this example:
While driving a car on freeway when we sometimes hit a pot hole on the road. Now this impact may not cause any physical damage from outside, but, it may alter the impacted wheel alignment due sudden transfer of energy from the road to the wheel. If the car is driven without correcting the alignment, it can cause abnormal wearing pattern due to alteration in force distribution. If we do not fix it, the usage and wearing will increase sharply due to decrease traction from abnormal worn tire. This abnormal force can damage other parts of the car if it is not corrected.
Similarly our skeletal system is mechanical system of our body, which not only interconnected by itself, but also with other systems like muscular and nervous system. If normal alignment of skeletal system is altered due to any reason, it can create an abnormal mechanical stress pattern in our body and result in various symptom.
For example, a simple fall on an icy parking lot may not cause any serious physical injury, but it may alter the alignment of our pelvis and abnormal mechanical force is generated due to malalignment of joints of pelvis. Our body will try to adapt to this dysfunction if not corrected and may create an additional abnormal stress mechanism which may impact other parts of the body. These abnormal mechanical stress mechanics can cause pain and dysfunction not only locally but also it may affect distal parts of the body. For example, patients with shoulder pain may be due to innominate posterior rotation and lateral knee or ankle pain may be due to innominate anterior rotation, provided that all other cause has been ruled out. There are numerous pain and dysfunction may result due to malalignment, like groin and hip pain may be due to malalignment of thoracolumbar vertebral dysfunction. Even headaches can be associated with malalignment syndrome. We believe that malalignment syndrome is the missing link for chronic and unresolved pain as well as dysfunction in spite of various medical intervention
For more information, contact us at Southfield & Clinton Township, MI Centers.