BY EVA MAYS
Drs. Amy and Lucas Watterson, owners of Mountain State Wellness in Morgantown, met on the first day of chiropractic school at the Palmer College of Chiropractic in Davenport, Iowa.
They had different reasons for their interest in chiropractic care as a profession. Amy experienced a childhood injury that led to ill health, then misdiagnosis and overmedication by traditional physicians.
Finally, at the age of 20, she spoke to her mother’s chiropractor.
“She explained to me how wellness comes from the inside out, not the outside in from drugs,” Amy recalled. After receiving chiropractic care and clinical nutrition advice, she was able to discontinue the use of all her prescribed medications. “I never looked back,” she said. “It wasn’t that I needed a drug. I just had an injury to my neck and spine that created a disturbance in my nervous system that made me unhealthy. I became a chiropractor to help people that have had similar life experiences.”
Lucas had a strong interest in biological sciences as a child that intensified throughout his young life. While completing a bachelor’s degree in biology, he began to have long conversations with a family friend who was a chiropractor.
“I came to realize that through those conversations and reading some books he recommended that chiropractic care is a valuable form of healthcare. Medicine is based on chemistry and physics, but chiropractic is based on biological principles. It is another way that health can be achieved. And because of my background in biology, it was a good fit for me to continue my education with a doctorate in chiropractic care.”
It was a three-and-a-half-year program, during which they became fast friends, and then something more. They graduated from the program in June 2001 and were married the following day.
During their training in Iowa, Amy and Lucas took additional courses to become Upper Cervical Specialists. They are two of only 250 trained in this technique by the National Upper Cervical Chiropractic Association (NUCCA). The procedure begins with an examination that involves taking X-rays of the head and neck.
“We use those to measure how someone’s spine has been injured and shifted out of proper position,” Lucas said. The adjustment itself is described on the NUCCA website as “precise, gentle, and non-invasive,” bucking the stereotype of chiropractic adjustments that feature tugging and pulling. “We use a very light touch with our hands to the side of the neck, which shifts the very top bone in the neck called the C1 vertebra, sometimes called the Atlas vertebra, back into proper alignment with the head and the rest of the neck,” Lucas explained.
After practicing for a year in Oklahoma, the couple began searching for the perfect place to open their own practice. “We very intentionally picked a state that did not have any specialists doing the type of care that we do. West Virginia was one of those states, and Morgantown, in particular, was showing up on national ratings as the number one best small town to live in the eastern United States,” Lucas said. “It’s a great place to live, have a business, and raise a family.”
The couple opened Mountain State Wellness, located at 965 Hartman Run Road in Morgantown, in June of 2002. “We are celebrating the idea that we’ve been here for 20 years now, helping people in West Virginia achieve better health,” Dr. Lucas said.
Consultations can be scheduled by calling 304-244-1817 or by going to their website at https://mtnstatewellness.com/.
Morgantown resident DL Collins suffers from Meniere’s disease, which causes extreme vertigo. Two years ago, she began to experience a rare manifestation of the disease called drop attacks. A 2005 study describes these attacks as a sudden fall to the ground without loss of consciousness.
“My husband described it as someone taking my body and slamming it down to the floor,” Collins said. “I had no control over it, and it was unpredictable. I became very down because I couldn’t drive or care for my grandchildren. I didn’t even want to be alone in the house.”
Refusing to be incapacitated by the disease, Collins visited many doctors and took medications to try to treat it. When met with little success, she began researching online and found that many people suffering from drop attacks found relief from upper cervical adjustments. Luckily, she was able to find a specialist close to home. Collins began receiving chiropractic care from Dr. Lucas.
“He was so positive and reassuring, even though I was still skeptical at the time. But he kept saying, ‘we’re going to get this fixed. It’s going to be OK.’” Collins saw results from the treatments after six months, and she began to slowly rebuild her confidence.
“He gave me my life back,” she said.
