New York City Chiropractics Role in Back Pain Guidelines
Guidelines and recommendations for so many things from how to properly replace a light bulb to appropriately decide on whether to do back surgery pervade our world. Guidelines are valued by people confronting a new task or a new health condition for the first time. Guidelines for the care of back pain have been available for years, many citing non-surgical care including spinal manipulation as first line treatment. Just how well are those guidelines followed by involved healthcare practitioners, by back pain patients? Rosenberg Wellness Center found these recent reports attention-getting and thought our New York City chiropractic patients would, also. We can all use them to design and go along with a guideline-based treatment plan.
BACK PAIN TREATMENT GUIDELINES
Your New York City chiropractor is aware of the current guidelines to best help you, our New York City back pain patient. Back in 2009, the American College of Physicians added spinal manipulation to its guidelines’ recommendations of suitable spinal pain care options. (1) Rosenberg Wellness Center utilizes the well-documented Cox® Technic System of Spinal Pain Management which has a published algorithm of decision-making for patients with pain below the knee and patients who experience pain that does not extend below the knee with a goal of 50% improvement in a month of care. These guidelines came out in 1996 and have been tested in clinic-based data collections in the years since. (2) Such guidelines with research support and proper clinical application build confidence that there is hope to our New York City chiropractic patients!
ARE GUIDELINES BEING FOLLOWED?
We hope so! Nearly 64% of chiropractors say they use (Cox®) flexion distraction with their spine pain patients and have the algorithm/guideline available to them. Rosenberg Wellness Center is one of those chiropractors. Beyond chiropractic, broad guidelines for back pain care are also accessible. Are they followed? A recent review of chiropractic and OT/PT use among 146,087 adults with low back pain in the past 3 months documented that chiropractic care or OT/PT care for low back pain increased after clinical guidelines recommending their care were announced in 2016. Between 2002 and 2018, a little less than a third of those adults with low back pain said that they were getting chiropractic and/or PT/OT with an increase to a third after the 2016 clinical guidelines were published. (3) This does show that guidelines help with treatment direction but are not always followed. In Denmark where guidelines for low back pain care are defined for primary care before being referred found that 33% of patients had not undergone an adequate course of treatment in primary care before referral. The patients were on average 53 years old with nearly 50% of them saying that they’d had pain for more than a year, and 75% reporting pain below the knee. (4) Struggles in the healthcare system to abide by guidelines are seemingly global.
CHIROPRACTIC’S ROLE
A group of chiropractic leaders assembled their ideas on the role of the chiropractor in his/her own practice, with his/her own patients, within the healthcare community, and within society for healthcare. Quite interesting! Individually, chiropractors reported themselves as capable and well-educated spine and musculoskeletal care experts who offered evidence-based care based on the latest research, clinical expertise, and patient values. They delivered patient-centered care that extends to cooperating with other healthcare providers with the best interest of the patient in mind. (5) Using guidelines, chiropractors are sure that they can assist their back pain patients with their best interests in mind.
CONTACT Rosenberg Wellness Center
Listen to this PODCAST with Dr. Ted Siciliano on The Back Doctors Podcast with Dr. Michael Johnson as he illustrates how he used The Cox® Technic System of Spinal Pain Management to relieve a patient dealing with back pain and foot drop.
Make your New York City chiropractic appointment today. Facing a serious bout of back pain is certainly not comparable to changing a light bulb for the first time, but it’s comforting to know that there are available to properly manage each task!
