What Chiropractors Don’t Do?
Many people still express uncertainty about what it is that chiropractors do. Except for the one obvious thing which is the old ‘clicking’ of the human spine bit. Yet to give chiropractic its dues there is a lot more to this 100 year old profession than a few neck cracks.
It’s hard to have real talk about what chiropractors do without first doing a bit of light mythbusting. So let’s get it out of the way.
The prevailing myths about chiropractors are stubborn to say the very least. The most common chiropractic myth is that chiropractors expose their patients to unacceptable risk. Or that chiropractic is dangerous. The second most common myth about chiropractors is that they provide an unscientific form of healthcare. A less toxic, but still fairly common and unhelpful myth is that chiropractors put bones back in place.
The real truth about chiropractors is quite different from the picture painted by these urban myths. And the true picture is easily supported by scientific research and by healthcare legislation across the entire globe.
The truth is that chiropractors provide a very safe form of health care. As chiropractic has been proven to have a far better safety record than even over the counter medications. Let alone when compared to common pain interventions like surgery and opiate medications. Compared to which, chiropractors safety record is incomparable.
Not only is chiropractic safe, it is also effective in treating a range of pains. There is a substantial amount of research that supports the use of chiropractic as an important tool in the management of pain. This is reflected in the fact that chiropractors are treated as legally the same as doctors and dentists by government legislation the world over. And that there are innumerable studies that support chiropractic as useful intervention for spinal pain.
But what about putting bones back into place? Well, chiropractors do not put bones back into place. This is a wildly outdated explanation for what chiropractors do that even many doctors still believe to this day.
What Chiropractors Really Do?
So if chiropractors don’t provide unsafe, unscientific treatments were bones get put back into place. What is it that chiropractors actually do?
Chiropractors train for a minimum of five years to provide comprehensive and modern ‘conservative pain management’. In this context, conservative means not invasive and not unsafe.
Another way of saying this is that chiropractors provide treatment that is similar for pain to what dentists provide for tooth pain. In the sense that they are along with osteopaths the most highly trained individuals in the world of conservative pain management.
Back in the day, dentists used to only perform tooth extractions, it was their only clinical procedure. Similarly, back in the day all chiropractors did was spinal adjustments. In the modern age of healthcare both dentists and chiropractors do more than the early trailblazers of their respective professions. Most modern day chiropractors draw on a broad range of healing tools and perspectives much like modern dentists.
So in essence what chiropractors do is provide comprehensive healthcare solutions for patients with mechanical pain issues.
The truth about chiropractic adjustments themselves is that they simply restore movement to joints that have become stuck due to stress. Chiropractic adjustments are simply mobilisations.
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