We help a large number of people in our Jacksonville office, and Silver Chiropractic & Wellness has helped countless people eliminate a range of health issues. However, one worry that seems to stop a lot of women and men from getting treatment is whether or not chiropractic care is safe. Luckily, according to three separate studies (out of quite a few on the topic), the answer to this concern is a resounding: "Yes! Chiropractic is safe!"
The first research paper(1) was published in Spine and involved 183 women and men between the ages of 20 and 85. Each person reported suffering from spine-related pain, and half of the patients received real chiropractic care while the remaining patients were given two sham chiropractic treatment sessions. Information was collected after each real or fake adjustment to see whether or not any undesirable negative effects were caused by the actual chiropractic treatments.
The doctors reported that nobody reported any serious negative adverse reactions whatsoever after receiving one or two sessions of chiropractic care. Some individuals did report that they had a headache (9% of patients) or muscle stiffness (37%) after treatment, but the effects were not serious.
The next research study(2), also published in the prestigious medical journal, Spine, was performed in an attempt to determine the safety of chiropractic. The study group was much larger as it involved just under 20,000 people. Each participant received chiropractic adjustments of the neck, with over 50,000 total adjustments for all patients.
Once again, the researchers discovered no serious negative side effects. The authors computed the risk of total side effects to be about 6 out of every 10,000 consultations or every 100,000 treatment sessions. Plus, just as with the first study, some participants did report non-serious, milder, side effects such as dizziness (16 out of every 1,000 treatment consultations and 15 out of every 1,000 treatment sessions) or a headache (4 out of every 100), and this prompted the researchers to determine that "the risk of a serious adverse event, immediately or up to 7 days after treatment, was low to very low."
The third study(3) is different from the first two reports, as it concentrates on the safety of chiropractic care for children. In this case, researchers investigated data reported by both chiropractors and parents involving 816 children who participated in 7,173 chiropractic treatment sessions.
Out of 5,438 chiropractic visits made for the kids, chiropractors responding to the survey reported only three cases where there were adverse reactions. When parents were surveyed, they indicated only two adverse side effects out of 1,735 visits. Furthermore, both chiropractors and parents reported "a high rate of improvement with respect to the children's presenting complaints."
Based on studies like these, chiropractic care has been deemed safe and effective for everyone. To find out what chiropractic care can do for you, call our Jacksonville office and schedule an appointment today at (904) 634-0805.
References
Dr. Rita Hanania, D.C.
Dr. Rita is a Jacksonville native and graduate from the University of North Florida with a bachelors degree in health science. Her passion for helping others led her to pursue her Doctorate from Palmer College of Chiropractic in Port Orange, Florida where she graduated as Salutatorian of her class.
Dr. Rita utilizes a whole person approach and tailors each patient's care to their specific needs. She specializes in a variety of techniques, but not limited to, instrument-assisted soft tissue mobilization, diversified, gonstead, flexion and distraction, thompson, and activator. In addition, Dr. Rita is fluent in Arabic which allows her to provide comprehensive chiropractic care to the Arabic-speaking community.