Debunking the Fear of Chiropractic

I find in my practice that many people who come to me for their first ever chiropractic adjustment are very nervous.  While there is no clinical term for such a fear, I was able to find a somewhat funny term on Urban Dictionary, termed Crackaphobia.  Crackaphobia is defined as: “The fear of going to the chiropractor, that the chiropractor will break your neck in the process of adjusting you.”  While there is no such word, it is sort of a funny term.  It sums up most of the fear people sometimes have when going to the chiropractor for the first time.  There are so many crazy stories that people tell about chiropractors, and most of them are unfounded.  Let’s walk through some stories, both crazy and true.

First, let’s address the possibility of breaking one’s neck.  Put simply, it is a myth.  I couldn’t even find a statistic of that happening.  I have never even heard of that happening!  Somehow it seems to be a major concern for some new chiropractic patients.  It is simply not true!

So what is the risk of chiropractic?  The major risks that most chiropractors disclose to their patients in a consent for treatment are: fractures, disc injuries, dislocations, sprains, and stroke.  In the case of fracture risk, it is related to patients with osteoporosis, osteopenia, or other bone related disorders.  Weakened bone structure will break under force.  In the case of disc injury, the caution would be if a patient already has an existing disc injury that could possibly be unstable.  Don’t get me wrong!  I believe chiropractic care can absolutely help patients with a mild, even moderate disc bulge, but the chiropractor must exercise caution and be very precise in how the area is adjusted.  In the case of dislocations and sprains, I would say that is an extremely rare occurrence and would also relate to the type of adjustment performed.  Stroke seems to be the hottest topic among risk in chiropractic.  People who aren’t educated enough on the topic love to blame chiropractors for strokes.  So let’s address that.

The risk of stroke from a chiropractic adjustment is with a rotary adjustment, which means turning/twisting the head.  The stroke would be a result of tearing of the vertebral artery or a plaque or clot breaking loose from a vertebral artery.  IT IS NOT THE CAUSE OF STROKES IN THE CAROTID ARTERY.  Research has shown that the rotation to interrupt the carotid artery is far greater than what is performed in a chiropractic adjustment.  So if you find yourself thinking about some horror story about someone having a stroke after an adjustment, there are a few questions to ask.  Was the adjustment performed by a licensed chiropractor?  Did the stroke originate from the vertebral artery?  Was the person in question already having a stroke and got adjusted that day because they were feeling bad?  There are many statistics showing the risk of stroke after chiropractic adjustment.  The most common statistics are ½ to 2 incidents per one million treatments.  In case you were wondering, that is 0.000002% chance.  The risk of getting injured in a car crash on the way to the chiropractor is greater. 

There are some patients who enter my office and are just nervous because they think the adjustment is going to hurt.  In my opinion it doesn’t hurt most patients at all.  You do get an occasional patient that is so inflamed and so tender that there could be some discomfort, but I would say in that scenario that the reward far outweighs the risk, and again it is rare.  Pain is truly different for each person.

Now that I am done being the boogie man, I would like to share some amazing stories.  Chiropractic has the potential to free up your nervous system to work like it should.  My last year of chiropractic school I was seeing a lovely lady that had slipped and fallen when exiting the bathtub.  After the fall she started having problems with her low back and she also had really bad hemorrhoids.  She wasn’t able to sit or stand for long periods.  She was miserable, didn’t want hemorrhoid surgery, and was ready to try anything.  Enter chiropractic!  After just 2 adjustments to her sacrum (which is what most people call the tail bone) the hemorrhoids went away.  She was amazed, as was I!  And bonus, I was able to adjust her ankle, which she had twisted when falling, and that felt better too.

One time I had a patient that suffered from sinus and allergy problems, although that is not what brought him to my office.  He noticed that when I adjusted his neck his sinuses did better.  So he showed up to my office one day because his sinuses were really swollen and irritated.  When I adjusted his skull, I could hear an audible sound a few seconds later.  You know that sound you hear inside your own head when your ears pop?  That’s what I heard, but coming from my patient.  His sinuses opened and made an audible sound!  It was both gross and exciting.  When I asked him what the sound was, he stated that it was his sinuses opening.  Great googly moogly!  I could not believe it.  He consistently had sinus relief after getting adjusted, although we never got the sound with the sinuses opening again. 

Chiropractic is safe enough for children and babies too!  I know you are thinking, “Oh my gosh!  Is she crazy?”  Obviously you don’t use the same adjusting method or force on children, but they need adjusting too.  The birth process alone is rough on babies.  If someone pulled you out of a hole by your head, you would have problems too!  Plus, picking up babies by their arms and under their arms can cause issues for them as well.  Kids and babies won’t tell you they are hurting.  They become cranky, and that is their way of telling you something is wrong.  I had a patient that had just given birth to her baby a few weeks prior.  The baby had not been having bowel movements like she should and was super fussy.  My patient noticed that when her massage therapist friend rubbed the baby’s low back she had a bowel movement that day.  I explained to her that the nerves that exit the spine in the low back go to the genitals, bowels, legs and feet.  She asked if I could do anything to help, so I made an adjustment in the baby’s lumbar and pelvic region.  The next time I saw the mom, she stated that the baby had five bowel movements that day.  I said, “Oh no!  I released the dogs on you!”  She said it was great because the baby was no longer fussy.  I guess we all get fussy when we don’t go to the bathroom like we should.

When I was in my mid-twenties I suffered from migraines that were progressively getting worse.  I was beginning to miss a lot of work and was worried I would be fired.  (I was not yet a chiropractor nor had I ever been to one.)  The medications made me feel terrible and the next step was anti-seizure medications.  I didn’t suffer from seizures so decided that might not be my best plan ever.  My sister-in-law told me that I should go see a chiropractor to get adjusted because that’s what got rid of her headaches.  I thought, “Well, what do I have to lose?”  So I started seeing a chiropractor and have never had another migraine since.  The thing is… when I started seeing the chiropractor for headaches I noticed my mid back started feeling awesome, and a host of other things really felt better.  Eventually I decided to become a chiropractor myself.

The one common thread in all these stories is that there was a problem, an adjustment was made, and the body started working better.  When you have misalignments in your spine it causes a bad signal relaying to and from your brain.  When a chiropractor puts everything back in place, things start working right!  That is the easiest way to explain it in layman’s terms.  It takes years of studies for a chiropractor to graduate.  You must have a bachelor’s degree before entering and then you spend 4 more years learning graduate level sciences and chiropractic itself.  Chiropractors must pass a minimum of 4 boards in order to practice in each state.  Chiropractors are highly educated and highly trained in their field.  Don’t let anyone tell you otherwise.  And if you really want to get down to brass tacks, our malpractice insurance rates are very low… meaning the risk is low. If chiropractors were continuously breaking necks and causing strokes the cost of malpractice insurance would be much higher.

The great thing about chiropractic is that I am not the only one that could share amazing stories all day long.  All chiropractors have these amazing stories.  Most chiropractic patients can share their own story and tell you about the amazing capabilities of chiropractic.  Just find a chiropractor with whom you are comfortable and will take time to listen to your problem.  I am certain you will be pleased and notice a positive difference in your overall feeling of health.  You can ask yourself the same thing I asked myself, “What do I have to lose?”