Chiropractic Statistics

Did you know that according to a study published in the October 11, 2004 issue of the Archives of Internal Medicine:

• Chiropractic care cut the cost of treating back pain by 28%.
• Chiropractic care reduced hospitalizations by 41%.
• Chiropractic reduced back surgeries by 32%
• Chiropractic care reduced the cost of medical imaging, such as X-rays or MRI’s by 37%.

The above study was a retrospective claims data analysis of 1,700,000 patient records over a 4 - year period.

Medical Journal, "Orthopedics Today" Touts Chiropractic

Praise for chiropractic recently came from an unlikely source. In the February 2003 issue of the magazine "Orthopedics Today", there appeared a feature article titled, "Time to Recognize Value of Chiropractic Care? Science and Patient Satisfaction Surveys Cite Usefulness of Spinal Manipulation."

In the article, Jack Zigler, MD, orthopedic spine surgeon with the Texas Back Institute, states, "There are a lot of myths about chiropractic care. I decided to look into each of these myths, and what I found is that chiropractic education, side-by-side, is more similar to medical education than it is dissimilar. Chiropractors work for us as screeners for surgical pathology. They can do the same work-up and send the patient who has already gone through his conservative treatment and had all his diagnostic work done to the surgeon."

Additionally, Scott Haldeman, DC, MD, PhD stated, "About 10 to 12 international guidelines have suggested that there is some benefit to manipulation. If we look at their basic guidelines, manipulation has consistently been accepted by independent government and scientific bodies as being a valid form of treatment."

Andrew Cole, MD, associate clinical professor of rehabilitation medicine at the University of Washington and recent past president of the American Academy of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation gave the strongest overall endorsement when he said, "Overall, manipulation has the advantage of reducing pain, decreasing medication, rapidly advancing physical therapy and requiring fewer passive modalities."

Headache Relief Through Chiropractic

According to the American Chiropractic Association 14% of the public who see chiropractors presently go for headaches. For these patients the good news has gotten even better. Researchers at Northwestern College of Chiropractic in Minnesota, compared chiropractic care to certain drug therapies used for tension and migraine headaches.

The study, published in the Journal of Manipulative and Physiological Therapeutics, followed 218 headache sufferers who were given either chiropractic care or drug therapy or both. Pain was reduced 40 – 50% in all groups initially. However, four weeks after all care was stopped, only the chiropractic group still retained the benefits, while those who received the drug therapy lost about half of their improvement.