Not everyone believes that medicine is the key to relieving physical problems; some believe that our innate immunity is self-sufficient for that. Well, in the world of newly evolving infection and fulminant diseases, we might need effective medication to solve the problems, but is self-healing possible in case of a muscular-skeletal subluxation?
Moreover, chiropractic therapy is one of those practices which has full belief in self-healing and is based on the fundamental principle that maintaining a proper spinal alignment can solve most of the subluxation problems. So, is chiropractic therapy effective then?
Contents
Basis Introduction of Chiropractic Therapy
Daniel David Palmer introduced chiropractic therapy in 1890. This therapy is an alternative medicine that is mostly concerned with the diagnosis and treatment of mechanical disorders of the body, especially the spine.
This therapy believes that the healing of musculoskeletal problems is through the nervous system; therefore, proper alignment of the spine is given the priority, and correct posture is of high preference in this therapy. Chiropractic therapy has many pseudoscientific beliefs that are yet to be verified as scientific and well accepted.
Is Chiropractic Therapy Affective?
1. Korthals-de Bos et al (2003), British Medical Journal
According to one of the articles published in this journal, a randomized control trial was conducted on 183 patients with neck aches. These patients were randomly allocated to manual therapy ( spinal mobilization), physiotherapy, and general practitioner (counseling and medication) for a 52-week study.
Later it was found out that those receiving the manual therapy (Chiropractic therapy) had a speedy recovery than the two other treatments. However, chiropractic therapy was found to be quite expensive than the rest of them.
2. Nyiendo et al (2000), Journal of Manipulative and Physiological Therapeutics
One of the articles reviewed that out of the people with severe backache and neckache, 56% have had practical and satisfactory improvement with just practicing chiropractic therapy, while the remaining 13% complained of severe lower backache.
Basic Benefits of Chiropractic Therapy
1. Reduces the Risk of Surgery
It was found according to one of the studies ( Keeney et al. (2012), Spine ) that the risk of surgery was reduced, and 1.5% of people who had some trauma and who sought for chiropractic therapy did not need any surgery at all.
2. Decreased Headache
Those people who had to complain of severe headaches had specific improvements after cervical manipulation. This information was reported by McCrory, Penzlen, Hasselblad, Gray (2001), Duke Evidence Report, which also said that chiropractic therapy is under trail for neck pain and neck dysfunction.
3. For Neck Pain
According to a study done by NIH’s National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine on 272 participants with severe neck pain, it was reported that 75% showed positive outcomes without head or neck pain after practicing Chiropractic therapy. And the remaining 25% wasn’t entirely healed after taking the required medication.
4. Prevention from Side Effects of Drugs
Everyone is pretty aware of the fact that all kinds of medication that we take have some types of side effects, which is harmful to our body. While practicing chiropractic therapy, these side effects can be minimized to zero levels, as chiropractic therapy doesn’t promote the use of any drug for healing.
Is Chiropractic Therapy Safe?
Well, everything has it’s own prone and cones, and when it comes to this therapy, we can’t ignore these risk factors that it holds. Firstly, as this is not a scientific or medical proven therapy, there are many contradictory opinions about this therapy. The following are some of the points which verify the safety of this therapy:
– No specific recognition of the instructor
As chiropractic therapy is not a medical practice, the instructor of this therapy also doesn’t have any medical certificate for practicing this therapy. Therefore, it makes this therapy more challenging to evaluate and is sure to raise trust issues on people who want to try this therapy – in general questioning its safety.
– Doesn’t believe in taking Medication
I understand that the human body has its potential and healing power, but sometimes, when the human body fails to fight off some severe infection, the use of medication can improve the fighting effort of the human body to a high level. However, this therapy is totally against medicine, which sometimes can result in the death of the patient – questioning its safety further.
– Vaccination is Discarded
I am quite unsure why this therapy doesn’t accept vaccination. Moreover, some vaccines have antigens in it and challenge the formation of antibodies in the human body, which helps the human body to prosper (called active vaccination). Believe it or not, but this is a very essential factor and is one of the best things supported by science. Nonetheless, this therapy is strictly against the use of the vaccine; therefore, its safety is doubtful.
– Not Appropriate For All Musculoskeletal Problems
It is of no surprise that chiropractic therapy solves many musculoskeletal problems, but we can’t ignore the fact that a single therapy can’t solve these entire problems. Problems like cervical disc dislocation, embolus formation, stroke can develop by the use of this therapy. Moreover, chiropractic therapy is also painful to practice, making it not so feasible in many patients.
In Conclusion
Chiropractic therapy is cost-effective and better preferred than surgical management. Moreover, it needs more verification to be called as “effective practice.” Nevertheless, it is built in a firm belief of our immunity, so I, personally, think that it can have a positive effect on the health of people. Therefore, more research and furthermore modifications are needed to be taken to conclude the effectiveness of this therapy.