Health is the state of optimum well being, not merely the absence of disease.

Why should I try chiropractic?
This a good question and one we often hear. A better question would be, why not? There are many research papers showing the benefit of chiropractic treatment, it's safety record is the highest in any treatment group and the results are sometimes close to miraculous. 

Short video on Chiropractic and the research supporting it.

What are some of the conditions chiropractic can help?

Below are a few quotes from articles concerning chiropractic.

Gross AR, Goldsmith C, Hoving JL, Haines T, Peloso P, Aker P, Santaguida P, Myers C; Cervical Overview Group.

Conservative management of mechanical neck disorders: a systematic review.

Rheumatology 34(3):1083-1102, 2007.

"We noted strong evidence of benefit for maintained pain reduction, improvement in function, and positive global perceived effect favoring exercise plus mobilization/manipulation versus control for subacute/chronic mechanical neck disorder".

Comments:
This article is a very in-depth overview of the level of evidence supporting the various types of management for mechanical neck disorders. It included all major literature databases, including chiropractic and the Cochrane Register of Controlled trials (Central). This is the largest and most up to date analysis to date.  Conspicuously absent: justification for medical or pharmaceutical therapies of any kind.

Newly released practice guidelines published in the Annals of Internal Medicine (10/1/07) stress a conservative approach to treating low-back pain and recommend spinal manipulation as one treatment with proven benefits. In light of these new guidelines, doctors and patients should strongly consider chiropractic care for the treatment of acute and chronic back pain, says the American Chiropractic Association (ACA).

(short excerpt from article)

Britian Had a Study Brewing for Ten Years

Few people knew that the British Medical Research Council was studying the chiropractors as an opportunity instead of as a problem and had been since 1979. They compared chiropractic treatment of back pain patients with hospital out-patient management chiefly involving medications and physiotherapy in a multicenter study. The multicenters allowed the varying techniques of both professions to be enmeshed within the whole so that the study truly involved multiple doctors and multiple techniques of both groups.

Thus Sayeth the British

The Research Team, which did not have a chiropractor as a member, reported back to its parent and the report was made public in the most respected medical journal in the entire world: the British Medical Journal. (June 2, 1990) 

It said chiropractic was more effective, especially with chronic and severe pain patients.

It said that chiropractic patients lost less time from work; 21 percent of chiropractic patients vs. 35 percent of hospital managed patients.

It recommended inclusion of chiropractic into the National Health System because it would save an estimated L 10,000,000 per year, which converts to $19,000,000.

No Shock to American Doctors -- Who Knew Already

Is this news to American doctors? No, not if they read with their eyes open. Then, of course, the workers' compensation figures from the computers of insurance carriers all across America say the same thing. Begin with the California Report back in 1972 where Dr. Richard Wolf, M.D., found that chiropractors, when compared with their medical counterparts on similar cases, got their patients back to work in half the time, at half the cost, with half the residual injuries.

There were studies in Utah, Texas, and many other states which bore the figures out, but in 1988 a Florida study of several thousand closed workers' compensation cases was done and reported to the Foundation for Chiropractic Education and Research. The same message was in the conclusion: Chiropractors beat their competition badly. The carriers' talk of cost-containment is an obscenity until they take advantage of the chiropractic profession's cost reductions.

Opposition Now Cruelty -- Or Incompetence

It has finally and happily reached that point where opposition to chiropractic can be justifiably accused of a failure to keep up with the medical advances around the world: They are medical doctors in Germany who are the leaders in physical medicine; they are medical doctors in New Zealand who have accepted chiropractors; they are medical doctors in Sweden, Norway, and Australia who have put chiropractic in the university systems; and finally they are medical doctors in Britian who are asking that chiropractors be added to the public health system.

1   Khan S, Cook J, Gargan M, Bannister G. Journal of Orthopaedic Medicine I 999;21 (1):22-25
2   AbbottJH, Pat/a CE, Jensen RH. Man Ther200l Aug;6(3):163-169
3   Tal-Akabi A, Rushton A. Man Ther 2000 Nov;5(4):214-22
4   Flynn T, Fritz J, Whitman J, Wainner R, Ma gel J, Rendeiro D, Butler B, Garber M, Allison S. Spine 2002 Dec 15;27 (24):2835-43
5   Burton AK, Tillotson KM, Cleary J. Eur Spine J 2000 Jun;9(3):202-7
6   Pellow JE, Bra ntin gham JW. Journal of Manipulative and Physiological Therapeutics 2001 Jan;24(1): 17-24
7   Deyle GD, Henderson NE, Matekel RL, Ryder MG, Garber MB, Allison SC. Ann Intern Med 2000 Feb 1; 132(3): 173-81
8   Rao JK, Mihaliak K, Kroenke K, Bradley J, Tierney WM, Weinberger M. Ann Intern Med 1999 Sep 21; 131(6):409-16
9   Winters JC, Sobel JS, GroenierKH, Arendzen HJ, Meybom-de Jong B. British Medical Journal 1997 May 3;314(7090): 1320-5
10 Tuchin PJ, Pollard H, Bonello R. JMPT 2000 Feb;23(2):91-5
11.  Eur Spine J. 2006 Jul;15(7):1070-82