What Does a Prenatal Chiropractor do for Pregnancy?

The Mladenoff Clinic of Arizona Team • August 7, 2023

Choosing to see a prenatal chiropractor is a great idea during pregnancy. Even if you are completely healthy and do not expect to experience any problems during your pregnancy, there are still many benefits that come with choosing to be under a professional chiropractors care.

About chiropractic treatment while pregnant

There are a lot of great alternative medicine treatment options, including visiting a prenatal chiropractor .

Chiropractors who decide to treat pregnant women must first undergo additional training in order to learn how to provide spinal adjustments in a safe and thus effective manner. Dr. Diana Mladenoff is specialized in prenatal and postnatal chiropractic care.

According to the American Pregnancy Organization, chiropractic care is a process that helps maintain the spinal column, discs, and related nerves so the mother and baby can both be in perfect health.

What a prenatal chiropractor does for pregnancy

The following information outlines what prenatal chiropractor s, like Dr. D, have to offer pregnant women who are preparing to go into labor.

Nausea control

While nausea is a common symptom of pregnancy, pregnant women who experience nausea will often look into their treatment options in order to experience less or even no nausea. Since nausea will often last for months, seeing a prenatal chiropractor for treatment is something more and more pregnant women are exploring, as chiropractic care is an alternative treatment that is both safe and drug-free.

Relief from body aches and pain

Chiropractic adjustments help to relieve any joint, back or neck pain that pregnant women often experience during their pregnancy. As the fetus grows, they can expect their center of gravity to shift, which in turn can cause them to experience problems with their posture. This can cause pregnant women to not be in their proper balance, requiring them to undergo chiropractic adjustments in order for them to get better balance.

Reduces the labor and delivery time

Seeing a prenatal chiropractor can help pregnant women improve the labor and delivery process. When a pregnant woman chooses to undergo chiropractic adjustments, they can expect their labor and delivery to be less painful and take less time. It does not matter if a woman is pregnant for the first time or for the fourth time, she will still reap the benefits that prenatal chiropractors have to offer.

Prental chiropractors can help expecting mothers to feel more comfortable during their pregnancy, as well as during labor.

Benefits of Chiropractic Care During Pregnancy

As your belly grows, so does your spinal curvature. The placenta will also start to secrete increasing amounts of a hormone called relaxin that will eventually help the cervix dilate. Prior to labor, relaxin helps loosen your ligaments, allowing the pelvis to soften, so it can accommodate a vaginal birth. All those loose ligaments can lead to hip pain, pelvic pain, and sacroiliac dysfunction.

Chiropractic care can help realign the spine and joints affected by pregnancy. By combining regular adjustments and supportive modalities, such as stretching, acupuncture, and hot and cold therapy, you may find relief from your aches, pains, and muscle tension.

Because musculoskeletal adjustments affect the nervous system, you may also experience additional benefits, such as:

Reduced nausea
Fewer headaches
Less edema (swelling)
Reduced sciatic pain
More restful sleep
Faster, less complicated labor and delivery

When to Start Chiropractic Care During Pregnancy

You can start chiropractic care as soon as your pregnancy is confirmed and your obstetrician approves treatment, though many people are already regularly seeing a chiropractor while they're trying to conceive. As soon as you feel pain, check with your OB-GYN, then call your chiropractor and make an appointment. Don't wait until the discomfort is unbearable — the sooner you seek help, the sooner you can coax your body into a better position and improve your day-to-day living.

Even if you've gone through most of your pregnancy without seeing a chiropractor, you can still see one before delivery. Perhaps you felt great for 8 months, but realize your baby still hasn't flipped into the proper head-down position and your due date is rapidly approaching. Perhaps you simply need a little relief while you're in the home stretch. Reach out, and ask Dr. Diana for an assessment to see how she can help.

Which Week of Pregnancy Should I Stop Chiropractic?

Not only is there no reason to stop seeing a chiropractor during pregnancy as long as you remain healthy overall, you'll likely benefit from adjustments even more as you navigate your third trimester. The final few months of pregnancy are often marked by a burst of weight gain as your baby fills out, and those extra pounds combine with loosened ligaments and a widening pelvis to throw everything from your gait to your posture out of whack.

Rather than toughing it out and waiting until your baby is born to get help, allow your chiropractor to step in and correct your alignment, so you can have the comfortable pregnancy you deserve.

To connect with a pregnancy chiropractor you can trust, text (or call) Dr. Diana at The Mladenoff Clinic of Arizona today at (602) 524-0222. With a convenient location in the Phoenix area (camelback east between Arcadia and Scottsdale), our wellness clinic can offer you easy access to the help you need to have the pregnancy, labor and delivery you've always wanted.

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Eliminate the Fear, Not the Fever

August 9, 2026

As loving and caring parents, we naturally want to help our children feel better when the inevitable fevers, colds, and illnesses arise. Many of us will reach for popular over-the-counter remedies to suppress fever and alleviate symptoms, in the belief that these products are reliable. Yet, it is important to recognize that by suppressing fever, we are suppressing a critical immune response—one that has a necessary function in fighting illness. I can attest to the enormous fear that fever provokes in parents. By far, the greatest number of after-hours telephone calls are questions regarding the “management” of fever with drugs. Undue attention to a child’s temperature and mishandling of fevers generate a great deal of unwarranted parental anxiety, avoidable medical complications, and countless calls and costly visits to doctors and emergency rooms. As long as we remain captive to the medical myth that nature made a mistake in causing a fever during illness, our children will be put at risk. Yes, fever can be uncomfortable. A child with a high fever will often seem irritable, lethargic, glassy eyed, and listless. This alerts you that the body is mobilizing defense against disease and you, in turn, must care for your child in the most appropriate way: encouraging rest and fluids. On the other hand, there may be no reason to treat even a high fever if your child seems happy, active and alert. The pervasive belief that fever is dangerous and must be suppressed disregards the scientific evidence demonstrating its beneficial role in inflammatory diseases. The immune system depends on the fever to accomplish myriad tasks when gearing up to fight infections. “Fever phobia” is made worse by hearing myths about children being severely harmed by having a high fever. Many people know of children or adults who had a high fever and ended up with some sort of injury…brain damage or hearing loss. These problems are never caused by fever. The likely explanation is that they had a serious illness that gave them a fever, but it was the illness that caused the brain damage or other result. The fever was only the body’s attempt to fight the infection. “Doctors do a great disservice to you and your child when they prescribe drugs to reduce fever,” writes Dr. Robert Mendelsohn, pediatrician and author of How to Raise a Healthy Child In Spite of Your Doctor. “Fever phobia is a disease of pediatricians, not parents, and to the extent that parents are victimized by it, doctors are at fault.” Parents are left to fear that their child’s temperature will keep rising unless measures are taken to control it. Yet, reducing the child’s temperature will do nothing to make the child well, and our bodies have a built-in mechanism that will prevent an infection-induced temperature from reaching dangerous levels. Mendelsohn emphasizes that “only in the case of heatstroke, poisoning, or other externally caused fevers is this body mechanism overwhelmed and inoperative.” “Fever: Your Body’s Defense Against Disease” is the title of Chapter 7 in Dr. Mendelsohn’s book, an excellent resource for parents seeking a balanced and accurate perspective of the beneficial role of fevers in childhood. Dr. Mendelsohn condemns the useless and dangerous practice of fever suppression through drugs, and counters the myth that high fever causes seizures. “Many parents are fearful of fevers because they have witnessed a convulsive seizure and believe their child may experience one if the body temperature is allowed to rise too high. High fevers do not cause convulsions. They result when the temperature rises at an extremely rapid rate and are relatively uncommon.” Only a small percentage of children with high fever experience convulsions, and those who do suffer them do not have any aftereffects. Simple febrile seizures are self-limited and harmless, although they are one of the most frightening things that a parent can witness. Dr. Mendelsohn continues, “Fevers produced by viral or bacterial infections will not cause brain damage or permanent physical harm. Fevers are a common symptom in children and are not an indication of serious illness unless associated with major changes in appearance and behavior or other additional symptoms such as respiratory difficulty, extreme listlessness, or loss of consciousness. The height of fever is not a measure of the severity of the illness.” A child who appears very ill with a fever of 101°F would be much more of a concern to me than a child who feels fine, is drinking and playing, but has a fever of 105°F. Numerous studies have shown that fever enhances the immune response by disabling bacteria and viruses. Also, with a rise in temperature, iron is removed from the blood and stored in the liver, further disabling the rate at which bacteria can multiply. As a note of caution, when a fever arises in a newborn in the first few weeks after birth, there is a heightened level of concern. “Newborn babies may suffer infections related to obstetrical interventions during delivery, …aspiration pneumonia from amniotic fluid forced into the lungs because of overmedication of the mother during delivery…and exposure to the legion of germs that abound in the hospital itself,” writes Dr. Mendelsohn. Parents are advised to seek medical help if a baby runs a fever in the first two months after birth. As breastfeeding plays a critical role in preventing infections in infants, breastfed babies are superbly protected against a vast range of pathogens and have a lesser risk of developing fevers in the newborn phase. Mistrust of natural processes and reliance on drug-oriented medicine has obscured parents’ understanding of the importance of childhood illnesses and the necessity of fever as a vital aspect of the immune system. When a child has a fever, it is not necessary to artificially lower the temperature. It is, however, important for the child to take in plenty of fluids, because in this time of elevated body temperature, it is easy to become dehydrated. Broth, liquid electrolytes, and fruit juices are great choices because they replace electrolytes that are used up in the fever process. Rest during times of fever will allow the body to use its energy to fight off infection. Make a commitment to spend time with your sick child. Any time that you feel concerned about the way your child is acting, or if your instinct is that something is wrong, do not hesitate to call your doctor. Schedule an appointment with Dr. D by calling or texting our Arizona Wellness Clinic at 1 (602) 524-0222. Source: Susan Markel, MD, via Pathways linked here.

Understanding the Connection Between Emotions and Organ Health in Traditional Chinese Medicine

By The Mladenoff Clinic of Arizona Team • July 22, 2026

Have you ever noticed how stress settles in your shoulders, anxiety affects your stomach, or grief feels heavy in your chest? While modern medicine recognizes that emotional stress can influence physical health, Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) has explored this mind-body connection for thousands of years. In TCM, emotions and physical health are deeply interconnected. Each major organ system is associated with specific emotional patterns, and maintaining balance is thought to support both emotional and physical well-being.