I never even considered going to a Chiro when I couldn't stand my back pain any longer. Called my MD and had him set me up an appointment with a physical therapist. Took a little while to retrain my body but sticking with the stretches and really concentrating on my posture has made a tremendous difference.
I somehow got it into my head many years ago that chiropractors were just quacks and I have seen nothing to convince me otherwise. I honestly can't believe how many people go to them.
Outside of the ones at the rehab hospital who were fantastic, most of the PTs we dealt with were about as useless as the bad chiros. We had two tell us she was never going to get any feeling back so stop wasting time and one tell her she had a stroke, she would never drive or go back to work, just get used to daytime tv for whatever time she had left.
I have a coworker with a daughter that had lyme disease when she was younger. He found a chiropractor that cured it.
I'll chime in with my own experiences. Limited to one D.C. who my mother-in-law works for. I dismissed chiro as snake oil too until I tried it.
Now, my doc hardly ever tells me to come back again after a treatment. I think this is the way you can tell. After my first visit he worked on me maybe once a week for 3-4 weeks. After that it was 'come in when you feel the need'. I may go once a month or may not see him for 6 months depending on how stuff feels. I tend to go in when things first feel wrong because I know bad things are coming if I don't.
Chiropractic IMO is a treatment and not a cure. I'm not sure my neck and lower back problems (likely from a long ago car crash) can be permanently fixed. I've met enough people who have had spinal surgeries that wish they never had to not want to go that route.
I also think regular but infrequent visits to a massage therapist are beneficial in keeping things loosened up. Even if my theory is wrong, who cares? I feel fantastic afterward.
My wife talked me into going to see hers last Monday, after my SI joint pain came back. I had gone to see a physical therapist about it 5 years ago, and he had me going from barely able to walk to pain free in one visit, just by pressing a couple of spots in my lower back. I'm a skeptic (show me your data, "Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence," etc ), while my wife is more open to so-called "alternative medicine." I went to this chiropractor against my better judgment, because of some of the things she's told my wife in the past.
So, the first thing this person does is check my sitting blood pressure, immediately followed by standing BP. On seeing a 5 point drop, she announced my "adrenals are overtaxed," but she has a supplement that can help that. She ended up working over both legs and the SI joint opposite from the one giving me trouble, staying well clear of the area the PT had previously pressed out to fix my problem. I needed "microvoltage therapy" as well as a few other questionable methods to loosen "tight" leg muscles. I'll give her some credit for the "microvoltage therapy," since the PT had successfully treated my runner's knee in part by running a current through acupuncture needles in my thigh (there are real data to back up claims for that treatment). I wouldn't have been surprised if she had started waving magnets over me.
Before she was finished, the chiropractor started pressing down on my extended arm while holding various bottles of supplements to my shoulder, so my body "could tell her what supplements I should be taking." As she was doing it, she explained she was using Kinesiology. No, Dr Quack, you were using "Applied Kinesiology," which is a sciency-sounding name for something that has been pretty thoroughly debunked, and is totally different from legit Kinesiology. The supplements she said my body "liked" or "needed" were associated with her changing the angle at which she pressed down on my arm, making it seem like my arm was better resisting the pressure. I'm really too nice, because I should have called bullE36 M3 on her and left. Needless to say, she didn't make any supplement sales and I have an appointment with the PT next week, due to the fact the SI pain was never addressed.
Maybe I should have put this in the rant thread?
paranoid_android said:I have a coworker with a daughter that had lyme disease when she was younger. He found a chiropractor that cured it.
How, precisely, did they do that...?
paranoid_android said:I have a coworker with a daughter that had lyme disease when she was younger. He found a chiropractor that cured it.
No they didn't. Anything they did was totally coincidental to the Lyme disease going away by itself.
Duke said:paranoid_android said:I have a coworker with a daughter that had lyme disease when she was younger. He found a chiropractor that cured it.
How, precisely, did they do that...?
Pretty sure this is a joke.
After getting rear ended and a wicked case of whiplash over 15 years ago, I've been going to a chiro ever since. I'm fortunate to have a darn good one and it has significantly improved the quality of my life.
In reply to tuna55 :
A chiropractor killed my father. My dad started to have back pains and his buddy ( a chiropractor) talked him into coming in for an adjustment.
The adjustments became more and more frequent until after about 4 years he admitted he couldn’t do anything more for dad, go see a doctor.
By then the cancer was so pervasive they opened him up, closed him back up and sent him home to get his affairs in order.
OHSCrifle said:Duke said:paranoid_android said:I have a coworker with a daughter that had lyme disease when she was younger. He found a chiropractor that cured it.
How, precisely, did they do that...?
Pretty sure this is a joke.
No, not a joke. At least to him it isn't.
I can't honestly say how it worked, and neither can he. But he swears up and down this chriopractor cured it. This all happened about fifteen years ago, and ever since "the cure" they will make the 200 mile round trip to see him to fix whatever they have going on medically.
Among the other bits of healthy living wisdom he shared are regular doses of colloidal silver in one's diet and the importance of owning a Rife Machine as most of the U.S. population has lyme disease to some degree, they just don't realize it.
He may have, but even if he did, that is not what chiropracty (?) is for.
I have been to a few (two whiplash crashes). For the past few years I have had a neck that would just "go out" and get really stiff for a few days. I went to another one a few years ago. He did the obligatory neck and back cracks. I did try and get him to specifically address the neck issue and the only thing he mentioned was a specific stretch (which seemed opposite of what I would expect).
Well, the stretch worked. I have not been back since. I can stretch my own neck, and if I want my back cracked (whatever that really does) I can just use a yoga roller on the floor.
As noted. They can be useful, but it has to be a good one, and it has to be for the right problem.
Opinion, and history. Motorcycle wreck in my early 20's. Back pain and stuff. A sports chiropractor treated me successfully for a couple of years. Snowboarding wrecks were successfully treated by acupuncture.
This was the cure for me. $35 at Goodwill.
Behold, the inversion table. Gravity compresses your spine all day. Use that big heavy head, and gravity to gently pull it straight.
When I'm hurting, I get on it once a day for approximately 3 minutes. 45 degree angle is plenty. I swear, just having it around scares away the back pain. Sometimes, I go months without getting on it, but probably, once a week is good for maintenance. YRMV
Oh yeah, this is basically what Chiropractors term "spinal decompression"
paranoid_android said:No, not a joke. At least to him it isn't.
I can't honestly say how it worked, and neither can he. But he swears up and down this chriopractor cured it. This all happened about fifteen years ago, and ever since "the cure" they will make the 200 mile round trip to see him to fix whatever they have going on medically.
Among the other bits of healthy living wisdom he shared are regular doses of colloidal silver in one's diet and the importance of owning a Rife Machine as most of the U.S. population has lyme disease to some degree, they just don't realize it.
Colloidal silver, for when you want to cosplay a smurf all day every day.
For anyone wondering what kind of nonsense a Rife machine is, it's a vague electromagnetic sort of nonsense involving auras.
My first wife was big into magnets as therapy. "They draw the toxins out of the body."
I made the mistake once of asking her where the toxins went after they left the body. You know, do they collect in your clothes and need to be washed out or do they just stick to the magnets or what? That conversation didn't go well. Similar conversation when she wanted to spend 5 months of my enlisted pay on a mattress with magnets in it from her mom's magnet therapy pyramid scheme store. I offered to install a dozen speaker magnets under her side of the bed and rheostat them to the perfect gauss level for her. Somehow my type of magnetism just couldn't be the same.
Sometimes it's all just about what you believe will work.
Wow, this was a hard read for me. I have been a chiropractor for over 20 years. I had a career in PT before that. I am a herniated disc specialist who has worked inside of a medical group along with other "real" doctors. I know there are a lot of flakes out there, but it is tough to get painted with a broad brush. I have a very successful practice including rehab and nutrition. Believe me, I know there are a lot of flakey chiro's out there. Oh, someone described a test with a blood pressure cuff, taken prone and standing. That is actually a medical test for adrenal fatigue. I get whoever was angry about the misdiagnosis of their father. I had the same thing happen to my father, only it was two MD's that blew him off for a year. I get it. I can't answer for the other things, but kinesiology is a big field and not just for chiropractic. Half of my referrals are from medical doctors and many are people who wish to avoid surgery. My practice is researched based, maybe that is why the flakes in my profession are so irritating. I had a nice life doing home care PT before this, but it wasn't going to go anywhere. I wanted to work as a chiropractor as I could do the most amount of good while doing the least harm. I saw too much go on while I was working "in" the medical field. I think medicine and surgery are great, as long as you take or have it when you need them. Not as the first option. Anyway, I just had to chime in.
AngryCorvair said:Armitage said:I like this thread mostly because people I respect and trust are confirming what I already believe.
Go ahead, ask us what kind of car you should buy.
The answer is always Polara.
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