April 1999
Chiropractic Not Just for Back Pain
by Darlene E. Paris
Earlier this year, my cousin Veronica and I visited a spa in the city to relax from a stressful work week. As we settled into one of the hot tubs, we talked about ways in which our bodies react to stressful situations. I mentioned that I notice a nagging pain in my lower back whenever I approach a deadline. Veronica said that when she’s under stress, she’s not able to rotate her head without experiencing some neck pain.
I asked Veronica if she had ever seen a doctor regarding her neck pain. She said no, but that she occassionally gets massages to ease her neck pain. Likewise, I haven’t taken the time to see anyone about the pain I get in my lower back. I attempt to treat it myself by applying a heating pad to my back at night and massaging myself in the morning with one of those hand-held electric massagers.
As a holistic health writer, I’m embarrassed to say that I had never considered seeing a chiropractor about my back problem until I started working on this article. Sad to say, most people are like my cousin and me. "Unfortunately, there is this philosophy that chiropractic is a last resort...probably because it was ostracized for so long and there was restriction of trade among the American Medical Association (AMA) awhile back," says Dr. Daniel J. Fedeli, D.C. Fedeli has been practicing chiropractic for seventeen years and is the founder of the Balancing Center, a holistic health clinic of sorts that offers massage treatments, cranial sacral therapy, and psychological services as well as chiropractic care.
Chiropractic vs. The American Medical Association
Growing up I remember hearing horrific stories about chiropractic from my parents’ friends, many of whom are in the field of health care. Dr. Jerome F. McAndrews, former president of Palmer College of Chiropractic, and current media advisor of the Foundation for Chiropractic Education and Research, is one doctor who was affected by these vicious rumors.
"Back then they said I preyed on ignorant immigrants and took my money in cash so I wouldn’t have to keep records," McAndrews says. "They also said that chiropractors were all latent homosexuals who liked to put their hands on people. During that period, all this was being said in print," he adds.
The negative publicity concerning chiropractic stemmed from the AMA’s national boycott of this natural system of healing, which began in 1963 and lasted until 1987 when five Illinois chiropractors filed a lawsuit against the AMA and affiliated groups for restriction of trade. The chiropractors won the lawsuit, but some chiropractors say that the AMA’s smear campaign will forever affect people’s perception of chiropractic. "The residue of that terrible, nasty boycott is still out there to some degree," McAndrews says.
Since the ruling, however, chiropractic has gained more acceptance among professionals within the medical community. More medical doctors are referring patients to chiropractors for back pain and some conventional doctors and chiropractors are forming partnerships so that patients can benefit from both doctors’ expertise. In addition, chiropractors are now licensed in all 50 states, and most insurance policies—including some HMOs and PPOs—cover chiropractic care.
The History of Chiropractic
Chiropractic was founded a little over 100 years ago by a grocer from Iowa named Daniel David Palmer. Palmer performed his first adjustment in 1895 on a janitor named Harvey Lillard, who had been deaf for 17 years.
Palmer believed that if Lillard’s crooked spine was made straight, or adjusted, the janitor’s hearing would be restored. The story goes that when Palmer, who also had some knowledge of magnetic healing, gave the man an adjustment, Lillard regained his hearing. Thus, Palmer coined his method of healing "chiropractic." Chiro meaning hand and practic meaning operation or practice.
Like chiropractors of the twentieth century, Palmer was also misunderstood by the members of the medical community of his time and was thrown in jail for treating patients without a license. Although Daniel David Palmer founded chiropractic, his son, B.J. Palmer, receives credit for developing chiropractic and spreading the word about this natural system of healing.
Chiropractic and Back Pain
Despite the negative publicity surrounding chiropractic, 15 to 20 million Americans visit the offices of chiropractors on a yearly basis. One of the main reasons people see a chiropractor is for back pain.
The patients that I talked with who suffer recurring back, shoulder, or neck pain prefer chiropractic to conventional methods because this system of medicine gets to the root cause of their health challenges. They also like the fact that they can get relief from their pain without using drugs.
Conventional doctors treat back pain by prescribing medication such as muscle relaxants or analgesics. When the back pain is severe, however, many doctors recommend surgery. "Most patients come see me only after they have seen all kinds of other health professionals who have tried different methods of treating back pain," says Dr. Paul Rubin, D.C., a chiropractor and clinical director at American WholeHealth on Michigan Avenue, one of the largest integrative health care facilities in Chicago. "I always ask them,‘So why do you go and see an orthopedic surgeon when you can choose a treatment that is far less invasive in handling something that usually turns out to be not-so-major of a problem," he says.
When patients do finally see a chiropractor, most of them wonder why they hadn’t seen one sooner.
Geneva Hallen says that she initially ignored her friend’s advice to get her back treated by a chiropractor when she was experiencing severe lower back pain. Instead, she followed her medical doctor’s recommendation and had back surgery. Unfortunately, the surgery didn’t get rid of the pain. "If anything it worsened an already painful condition," she says. "Now I had this huge chunk of scar tissue in my back because 60 percent of disc material from one of the vertebrae in my lower back was gone," she explains.
Not long after Hallen had surgery, she injured her back a second time. Once again, Hallen avoided seeing a chiropractor. "I did physical therapy in the pool...and all kinds of things, but I just couldn’t get my back fixed." When an orthopedic specialist recommended that she have another surgery, Hallen refused and finally decided to take her friend’s advice and visit a chiropractor. "I figured it couldn’t hurt me," she says.
Hallen says that after an initial visit with a chiropractor, she was sold on chiropractic. "I was impressed that the doctor identified a relationship between my job and my back pain," says Hallen, who used to work in politics. She says that after a few adjustments, the pain began to go away. Hallen was so excited about her new state of health that she decided to quit her job for a less stressful and more satisfying position as manager of her chiropractor’s office.
More Than Back Doctors
One of the perceptions that most people have about chiropractors is that they only deal with back pain. But according to McAndrews, chiropractic has been reported to bring relief to people suffering with asthma, sinusitus, constipation, migranes, and menstrual cramping. "We are very effective with back pain, but that’s only one facet of what we do," says Dr. Vincent Roberts, D.C., of Old Town Wellness Center, a nine-month-old holistic health care facility in the city which offers its patients massage therapy, acupunture treatments, and Feldenkrais sessions. "We can treat everything from the common cold with natural herbs and supplements to helping people with cancer who wonder what to do about the nausea they experience after chemotherapy," he says.
But not all chiropractors believe in using additional modalities such as herbal medicine and massage therapy. Some chiropractors, who call themselves "straights," restrict themselves to Palmer’s original premise: that if you manipulate the spine, you boost the body’s Innate Intelligence, the inner wisdom that your body uses to digest food, circulate blood, and heal wounds. "Straights believe that by adjusting the spine you can heal [almost] anything," says Dr. Mark MacCormack, D.C., a chiropractor at Old Town Wellness Center.
"Mixers," on the other hand, believe in using other modalities in addition to chiropractic. "They work with nutrition, herbs, homeopathic remedies, and a whole range of other therapies that really aren’t chiropractic at all, but they include it in their practice," says Richard Bryan, D.C., of Chiropractic Health Resources. Bryan is a mixer whose staff includes a naprapath/chiropractor, massage therapists, and Pilates instructors. He notes that many straights, while they do not practice other modalities, will refer patients to other practitioners. "Ten years ago, it was easier to classify someone as a straight or mixer; nowadays, it’s becoming more and more skewed," he says.
"I think the public is going to chiropractors, massage therapists, acupuncturists, and homeopaths much more readily now, and because of that both straights and mixers are including them in their practice," Bryan explains. "Although people come to me for chiropractic, we do so much more here that half the time they don’t even get the typical chiropractic treatment," he says.
No matter what type of chiropractor you see, however, most chiropractors believe that if your spine is properly aligned, you are more likely to be healthy. Practitioners of chiropractic focus on the musculo-skeletal system in achieving good health. They believe that when the spine is out of alignment, that is, the vertabrae of the spine have shifted in some way, it creates an interference in the way messages regarding the body are transmitted through the central nervous system from the brain.
"The nervous system is like a phone system...it gets twisted and tangled so that the messages get confused," says Dr. Susan Borelli, D.C., who has been practicing chiropractic for ten years. "If you’re on a cell phone talking with someone who is driving, and they suddenly go through a bridge, you lose them, and only get half of their message." She says that’s a lot like what happens along your spine.
The role of a chiropractor is to help untangle the wires. "If we can free up the nervous system by clearing the interference, the body works better and gets itself well," Fedeli explains.
The way in which chiropractors eliminate nerve interference, or vertebral subluxation, is through spinal manipulations and adjustments. However, not all chiropractors follow the same technique when adjusting the spine.
Different Methods of Adjustments
According to Bryan, most chiropractors use either the Diversified or the Gonsted techniqes of chiropractic. "These two are the most widely used methods in chiropractic, and both are hands-on techniques," he says. But the Diversified technique is the most common of the two physical methods. "It’s what‘mixer’ chiropractors use," says MacCormack, who attended the National College of Chiropractic in Lombard. The National College teaches the Diversified method. Chiropractic physicians who use the Diversified technique use motion palpation to determine where joints are stuck and a quick twisting type of manipulation to free the stuck joints.
There are also specialized forms of chiropractic. Fedeli incorporates several chiropractic techniqes in his practice, but he generally uses a technique called National Upper Cervical Adjustment (NUCCA) which involves adjustments to the upper neck area. "The body needs to be mechanically balanced," says Fedeli. "One of the main obstacles to that is a misalignment in the atlas, which is the uppermost part of the neck," he explains. Fedeli doesn’t use a twisting manipulation to adjust the spine. The technique he uses is a very direct, controlled force which, he says, is painless.
Another specialized method of adjustment is called Network Chiropractic, which entails the use of gentle, light touches on the entire spinal column starting from the head all the way down to the sacrum. Network Chiropractic is especially soothing and gentle. "The kind of touch I use most often is like the amount of pressure you would put on your eyeball," says Borelli, who calls the people she treats practice members, not patients. She adds, of course, that "it depends upon what your body tells me it needs."
Your First Appointment
During your initial examination, the chiropractor will want to know as much information as possible about your health history. Like AMA doctors, chiropractors will take your pulse, test your blood pressure, and check your reflexes. What’s different about a chiropractic examination is that the doctor will need to conduct tests that will give him or her some information about your spine.
A few doctors use X-rays to determine the location of stuck joints or to detect other medical problems. Some use applied kinesiology. One of the most common ways of doing this is for the chiropractor to palpate your spine — that is, use his or her hands to determine where there is a problem. "I get the best input of what’s going on with a person’s spine when I touch them," says Borelli.
The second visit will include a report of findings as well as an adjustment. Then the chiropractor will explain the course of action he or she will take to correct the problem. Remember, chiropractic care is not a quick fix; the length of time you’ll spend seeing a chiropractor really depends upon the severity of your problem. However, you need to go as recommended so that the adjustments hold.
Will you see immediate improvements? Probably not. Fedeli recommends that you give chiropractic three to six weeks to start seeing some consistent changes. "It has to do with patients’ compliance, too." says MacCormack. "If you’re doing the things that we’ve asked you to do, then you’ll get better a lot quicker than if once you leave the office you go out and do things that make your situation a little worse."
Before arranging an appointment, you may want to talk with the chiropractor first to find out the method of chiropractic they practice and to discuss the doctor’s healing philosophy. Remember — no matter what type of chiropractor you choose, the goal of any chiropractor is to eliminate nerve interference.
After learning that I can have my aches and pains treated naturally, I’ve decided to retire my heating pad and massager and I’ve arranged an appointment to see a chiropractor. I’m confident my sleepless nights and aching back days will soon be gone. By my next deadline, I know that I’ll have plenty of good news to share with my cousin Veronica.
Darlene E. Paris is the author of Healthy and Natural Living in Chicago: The Best Alternative Resources in the City and Suburbs, available at bookstores or by calling 800-888-4741.
Resources
Dr. Daniel J. Fedeli, D.C. and Dr. Patrick Martin, D.C., The Balancing Center, 1871 N. Clybourn, Chicago, IL 60614; 773-327-3333
Dr. Richard Bryan, D.C., Chiropractic Health Resources, 4105 N. Southport, Suite 208, Chicago, IL 60614; 773-472-0560
Dr. Susan Borelli, D.C., and Dr. Ann Generali, D.C., Chiropractic for Life, 1961 Farragut Avenue, Chicago, IL 60640; 773-878-8933
Dr. Mark MacCormack D.C., and Dr. Vincent Roberts, D.C., Old Town Wellness Center, 1500 N. Wells, Chicago, IL 60610; 312-664-4030
Dr. Paul Rubin, American WholeHealth, 150 E. Huron, Suite 1100, Chicago, IL 60611; 312-266-8565
Dr. Jerome F. McAndrews, D.C., Foundation for Chiropractic Education and Research, 2321 S.W. Quail Run Drive, Claremore, OK 74017; 918-343-9470
![[Send]](http://consciouschoice.com/sendlink/send.gif){kind=small}
Recommend this page to a friend
Top Ten pages recommended to friends:
