Thoughts on chiropractors
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My wife goes to one on occasion. She said I should go because I often have a stiff neck. After I tell her she is the pain in my neck (kidding), I said I'd look into it.
My problem is the internet. I've seen many reddit threads and other places talk about how chiropractors are a "scam" or you risk getting injured, etc. That was never on my radar, but......what do the esteemed folks at TNCR think?
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Mixed. I had a genuine injury as a kid playing football where my neck basically got stuck in a position where my head was tilted to one side. I couldn’t move it without extreme pain.
Went to the chiropractor , he felt around my neck with his fingers, suddenly popped something into place, and I was totally fine.
Years later I went when a had hurt my neck, turns out I had a herniated disc. He could do nothing but it didn’t stop him from trying.
Net net I think there’s a small set of issues where they can help, and a lot more where they can’t, and they don’t necessarily know or care about the difference.
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Most larger evaluations agree with the following:"Chiropracters don't (usually) hurt. Most people feel better after being "adjusted." However, long-term relief is difficult to assess because many of these conditions get better on their own."
I saw one for my herniated lumbar disc. Felt great when I left the office. Two days later, I was hurting again.
If they claim they can take care of cancer or heart disease, run away - far away.
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Never been to one.
Knew a few though who boarded their horses where I kept mine. They would sometimes try to tell the vets how to do their jobs. It was amusing especially when one insisted on providing unsolicited holistic advice to a vet who had a large animal practice in South Africa before immigrating here in the mid 1980’s. The chiro never tried that again.
Some of my friends though were regular chiro patients. At least until they finally realised that Chiros only treat symptoms but not the root cause of the problem itself.
I can think of one instance when a friend of mine should have gone to a lawyer after a chiro failed to insist, let alone even suggest, that he go to the ER. He was septic with a bouncing high fever that had lasted close to a week. What did the chiro prescribed? Vacuum cupping therapy on the back! Surprised he didn’t bleed him as well. Poor guy ended up in an ICU for a week then three weeks in the medicine ward. Forced him to take early retirement and has never been in anything resembling good health ever since.
Should the need arise, I’ll go to a sports medicine physiotherapist first before a “Chiro-quackpractor” any day.
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If their office offers acupuncture then I would be leery. If they mention holistic? Run away.
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When I was working and someone in a meeting said “We should or want to take a holistic approach to this….” As far I was concerned the meeting was over.
There were certain individuals who would always introduce the holistic approach banality. If I knew they would be present I would always arrange to have my assistant to enter the meeting at about the twenty minute mark with an “urgent phone call” message to pull me out of the meeting. In that way they could have an out of the box holistic approach session to their hearts’ desire.
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@Renauda said in Thoughts on chiropractors:
If I knew they would be present I would always arrange to have my assistant to enter the meeting at about the twenty minute mark with an “urgent phone call” message to pull me out of the meeting
"Page me in 15 minutes."
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I'm not feeling much synergy here. I think we might need to do a deep dive in order to move the needle.
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@Renauda said in Thoughts on chiropractors:
Knew a few though who boarded their horses where I kept mine. They would sometimes try to tell the vets how to do their jobs. It was amusing especially when one insisted on providing unsolicited holistic advice to a vet who had a large animal practice in South Africa before immigrating here in the mid 1980’s. The chiro never tried that again.
Yeah, when Simon went lame (it was his hocks) several people recommended an equine chiro.
I thought some injections might be more useful and longer-lasting than a spinal adjustment - on a HORSE.
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My experience was not a good one. Part of the problem is that some chiropractors want to have you visit them once a week for the rest of your life. I filled out a medical history for the chiro and noted I had an inguinal hernia repair. As part of his assessment, the chiropractor put a good portion of his bulk into my lower abdomen. He then gave a "Eureka" shout indicating that he was demonstrating a deficiency in my conditioning. I then replied, "No, you just tore open my hernia repair." My brother had a friend who was turned into a paraplegic by a chiropractor.
The other thing that bugged me about the chiropractors I've seen (3) is that they love x-rays - and one can be assured that the equipment they use is probably from the 1940s, likely equivalent to being within the 10 mile perimeter of the Trinity blast site in New Mexico.
Finally, I once had a roommate who went to chiropractic school. He was a big advocate for chiropractic methods. He finished school, and I lost sight of him. I got in touch with him a couple of years ago - just to catch up on what he was doing. He's not doing chiropractic. He told me that he wanted to do research on the effectiveness of chiropractic medicine - but he found that no one in the field was interested. In fact, he was discouraged from doing it. He left the field.
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The stable owner/trainer where I boarded, always recommended calling the farrier first to have a look at a lame animal. In 75% of the cases the farrier could fix the problem through hoof trimming or corrective shoeing for a fraction of the cost of a vet bill. She always maintained the farrier, an old cowboy named Pat, had forgotten more about equine lameness and horse’s feet, than any local vet could ever hope to know. I believe she was right.
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@Renauda indeed.
When SImon went lame, after a couple of vet visits, etc., the farrier suggested we let him go barefoot. The lack of shoe traction made it less likely for him to put stress on the hocks when going around a corner.
It helped.