Another week down, lucky 13 to go until it is all over (apparently). This week, Craig's returned to old-fashioned blogging, Michael delivers some fun animal facts, we have further updates on the clinics (including Easter updates and a future fee increase), and Physical Therapy is back at both our Kew and Marylebone clinics.

Clinic Updates
Marylebone – Luke is off for the day tomorrow, Friday 26th.

Easter
Quick reminder of our opening hours…

Fulham
Friday 2/4 – Closed
Saturday 3/4 – Open Morning & Lunch (Silva)
Sunday 4/4 – Closed
Monday 5/4 – Open Morning & Lunch (Mike & Sammy)

Kew
Friday 2/4 – Open All Day (Brad)
Saturday 3/4 – Open Morning & Lunch (Brad)
Sunday 4/4 – Open Morning & Lunch (Gopal)
Monday 5/4 – Open Evening (Gopal & Alex)

Marylebone
Friday 2/4 – Closed
Saturday 3/4 – Open Morning (Filippo)
Sunday 4/4 – Closed
Monday 5/4 – Open Morning (Katie & Filippo)

Tooting
Friday 2/4 – Closed
Saturday 3/4 – Open Morning & Lunch (Michael)
Sunday 4/4 – Open Morning & Lunch (Zara)
Monday 5/4 – Open All Day (Zara)

Putney
Fri 2/4 – Open morning (Bryan)
Sat 3/4 – Open morning (George)
Sun 4/4 – Closed
Mon 5/4 – Open morning (Bryan)

Traffic issues – Putney and Fulham
Heads-up on this again as people are still finding the traffic in these areas to be problematic and stressful due to ongoing road work. Please ensure you call us in advance if you are running late so we can keep everything running smoothly.

Fees
We will be raising our pay-as-you-go rate in all clinics from Tuesday, May 4th. We haven’t increased our PAYG fees for a very long time (nearly 10 years ago at last look, and in some of our clinics this will be the first increase ever).

We have obviously experienced increased costs in the years since then and were due to raise them this time last year, but absorbed everything (including the eye-watering additional PPE costs) to help everyone out during these crazy times.

We will provide confirmation over the next couple of weeks of exactly what the change will be, but please note the change will not affect packages of sessions – these will remain as they are for the time being.

Pods and Blogs
It’s another week off for the Chiro.London Pod, proudly fuelled by Ground Coffee Society, but Craig’s been busy writing blog posts instead!

One of his latest posts discusses the WHOOP system, which monitors your strain, sleep and recovery. In fact, you may have heard his previous podcast episode about WHOOP and how it works (if not, tune in here).

A fan since pretty much the beginning, Craig has even more cause for celebration now that “Did you visit the chiropractor?” has been added to the list of stimuli, meaning WHOOP can now begin to track changes in your body (including heart rate variability) after an adjustment.

Check out his blog on WHOOP here and stay tuned for his follow-up, where he’ll share his results on how chiropractic has affected his WHOOP scores.

Vertebra of the Week
This week in Michael’s tour of your spine, we make our way further down the thoracic region with…

T4
It’s very common for a lot of people to be tight here when sitting and slouching, as this vertebra is located in between the shoulder blades. However, the nerves from here connect to the gallbladder.

What is the function of the gallbladder? Basically, the gallbladder is a storage tank for bile that will be released to help digestion, especially in the small intestine, and to help break down fatty foods.

Fun fact: not every creature has a gallbladder. All members of the deer family (except the musk deer), all of the equine family (including zebras), camels, giraffes, elephants, rhinoceroses, whales, some birds (such as doves), rats and some fish don’t have gallbladders!

Animals without a gallbladder must continuously eat or graze in small amounts, whereas humans, dogs, cows, cats, sheep, goats etc. are designed to eat large meals when the opportunity presents itself.

So does that mean the creatures without gallbladders also don’t have T4 vertebrae or the connecting nerves? Surprisingly, no. The T4 nerve just supplies another area, organ or muscle. In horses, for example, the T4 nerve leads all the way up to the thyroid to help the function there instead.

Shameless Plug of the Week​
Given the weather is improving and everyone is getting out and moving more, the physical therapy team is back to help keep you together and be at your best!

Our physical therapists Iskander and Tallulah are now back in action in Marylebone, while Alex is available at Kew (but is pretty busy so definitely book in advance!).

If you are feeling a few niggles or are a little worse for wear and think you could benefit from a rub, please do get in touch with the Kew or Marylebone teams.

That is me done for another week! Hope you are all looking after yourselves and look forward to seeing some of you IRL soon. 😊

Cheers,
Drew