Who is a chiropractor?
Chiropractors diagnose, treat, and prevent spine, neck, and joint disorders using adjustments or hands-on therapies. They do not prescribe medications. They focus on the body's self-healing ability to ease pain and support overall health. They can treat conditions like headaches, back pain, and neck pain. Most chiropractors use alternative treatment methods, like exercises and stretches, adjustments, joint bracing, and soft tissue therapy. They encourage learning proper body positions when standing, sitting, and sleeping.
Prospective students must complete four years of training for a Doctor of Chiropractic (D.C.) degree. This training involves learning basic, clinical, and chiropractic sciences. It also provides training in performing assessments and spinal adjustments. Additionally, they must pass the National Board of Chiropractic Examiners test to get a license.
What are the specializations of chiropractors?
Some chiropractors may complete additional postgraduate training in specialized fields. These include:
- Radiology: This field involves training to read X-rays, sonography, and other imaging.
- Rehabilitation: This domain involves helping patients recover from back, legs, feet, or arm injuries. Often, the goal is to build strength and improve endurance, balance, and motor control.
- Clinical nutrition: This specialty trains chiropractors to offer dietary advice and nutritional guidance.
- Internist: This area focuses on infections, eczema, autoimmune diseases, and gastrointestinal disorders.
- Neurology: Focuses on treatment options for neuromuscular and orthopedic problems. These specialists can adjust the spine, arms, and legs to enhance healing.
- Forensics: Trains chiropractors on assessments required for criminal investigations and legal proceedings. These chiropractors can advise a judicial bench.
- Sports medicine: This subspecialty involves preventing and managing sports injuries without medication or surgeries.
- Acupuncture: These specialists receive training in acupuncture or traditional Chinese medicine. It deals with the needling of specific points on the body.
- Pediatrics and pregnancy: Trains chiropractors to maintain the spinal health of children and women who have given birth. You can search for a prenatal chiropractor near you if you require chiropractic care while pregnant.
What conditions do chiropractors treat?
While chiropractors do not prescribe medicines or perform surgery, they can help improve some conditions through chiropractic adjustments. Chiropractors can treat health conditions that affect nerves, bones, and muscles. Some common problems that chiropractors treat are the following:
- Back pain: Chiropractic care involves treating acute or chronic back pain caused by an injury, a pinched nerve, a disc problem, or arthritis.
- Neck pain: Chiropractors can treat neck pain that may stem from an injury, whiplash, osteoarthritis, disc disease, or poor posture. Neck adjustments improve mobility and increase motion and movement of nearby muscles.
- Headaches: Chiropractic care can alleviate tension headaches, migraines, and other headaches that originate in the neck.
- Whiplash: Chiropractic care helps improve pain and stiffness caused by whiplash, which may happen due to car accidents. It may also result in dizziness and pain when you try to turn your head.
- Sacroiliac pain: This joint is at the bottom of the spine. Problems at this joint cause a different type of pain affecting the buttock and back of your thigh. Chiropractic adjustments help treat this problem.
- Shoulder pain: A chiropractor can help with stiffness or pain in the shoulder, also known as a frozen shoulder.
- Knee pain: Wear and tear at the knee joint may cause osteoarthritis, which can improve with knee and back adjustments.
What is a chiropractic adjustment?
A chiropractic adjustment is a treatment offered by a licensed chiropractor. This treatment uses special instruments or hands to adjust the spine. It helps manage conditions like arthritis, frequent headaches, whiplash, joint pain, lower back pain, neck pain, and sciatica.
It is an effective treatment method for all age groups, including adults and children.
Chiropractic adjustments focus on relieving symptoms to treat pain, muscle stiffness, or chronic conditions. They also restore spinal motion, improve posture, and boost balance.
At the first appointment, your chiropractor will perform a physical exam and learn about your medical history. They may also order diagnostic imaging tests to better understand your musculoskeletal system. Once they know what may be causing you discomfort and pain, the chiropractor will develop a treatment plan to help you.
You will lie on a table divided into segments during the chiropractic adjustment. This will help lift certain body parts higher than the rest so the chiropractor can apply pressure to a specific area. They would use their hands or small instruments to apply controlled pressure to a joint and stretch your joints gently. This helps align the vertebrae if they are slightly off-center. Chiropractic adjustments also release gasses trapped in the joints, such as oxygen, nitrogen, and carbon dioxide. It may produce popping sounds and sensations similar to when you crack your knuckles.
There is little to no pain during the procedure. You may experience soreness and minor aches in the affected areas. These symptoms generally go away within 24 hours. After the appointment, your chiropractor may recommend specific exercises and stretches. Other recommendations may include icing/heat therapy, topical analgesics, and advice on diet and nutrition to improve health.
What to expect during an appointment with a chiropractor?
During the first appointment with a chiropractor near you, they will assess your medical history and ask about your mobility issues. Then, they will conduct a physical exam, which includes muscle strength comparisons, reflex tests, neurological and orthopedic tests, and a range of motion tests. They may also order diagnostic tests such as CT, MRI, and X-rays.
These assessments will help chiropractors understand the affected area and create the relevant treatment plan. Subsequently, they may perform chiropractic adjustments as part of the treatment.
Accordingly, you must prepare beforehand for a chiropractic adjustment. This includes wearing comfortable clothing and removing accessories. Also, avoid wearing dresses, skirts, or stiff jeans. Chiropractors will perform chiropractic adjustments and manipulations by applying pressure on the affected area in various postures. They may also direct you to lay flat/face down on a drop table as they perform the techniques.
Moreover, the healthcare provider may schedule multiple appointments based on the severity of your condition. Hence, they will perform chiropractic adjustments across weeks or months until you feel any improvement. Immediately after a chiropractic adjustment, you may experience a few side effects like soreness, fatigue, or mild headache. Rest assured, these are temporary, and you will feel relieved over the long term.
Chiropractors can also educate you on your condition and advise you on some lifestyle changes to improve it. These may include dietary changes, exercise, and understanding good posture when sitting, sleeping, or standing. They may advise cold or heat therapy, suggest ways to manage stress and relax muscles, and proper ergonomics to improve posture.
Follow the chiropractor's recommendations even if you feel alleviated. Some conditions, like back pain, require ongoing care. Hence, it may recur if you stop doing exercises or stretches. However, you must consult your primary care doctor if you feel that there are better treatments than chiropractic adjustments.
Risks associated with chiropractic treatment
Chiropractic treatment is safe when a trained and licensed chiropractor performs it. Despite that, serious complications might occur in rare cases. These complications include:
- Herniated disk
- Worsening of an existing disk herniation
- Pinching (compression) of lower spinal nerves
- A certain type of stroke that results from neck manipulation
To avoid these, avoid seeing a chiropractor if you have any of the following ailments:
- Spinal cancer
- High risk of stroke
- Severe osteoporosis
- A bone abnormality in the upper neck
- Tingling, loss of strength, or numbness in an arm or leg
Can pregnant women seek chiropractic treatment?
When you are pregnant, you experience various hormonal and physical changes, some of which can impact your comfort and posture. As your baby becomes heavier, your center of gravity shifts, and your posture adjusts accordingly. These changes can lead to:
- Misaligned spine or joints
- Pelvic changes as your body starts to get ready for labor
- A protruding abdomen that causes an increased curve of your back
Regular chiropractic care during pregnancy can benefit you in several ways, such as:
- Relieve neck, back, and hip pain
- Help manage symptoms of nausea
- Decrease the time you spend in labor
Make sure you consult your OB-GYN before visiting a chiropractor to ensure the treatment will not cause any complications. If you experience any of the following, avoid seeing a chiropractor:
- Vaginal bleeding
- Ectopic pregnancy
- Moderate to severe toxemia
- Placenta previa or abruption
How to find the best chiropractor near you in West New York, New Jersey?
Fostering overall well-being by increasing energy, preventing disease, and strengthening immunity is essential. It is important to visit the right specialist to manage aches and pains. Consulting a chiropractor is vital for accessing safe, drug-free treatment. You may want to search for a prenatal chiropractor if you are or know someone pregnant and seeking chiropractic benefits.
With Zocdoc, you can easily find the best chiropractor in West New York, New Jersey. Zocdoc's mission has always been to give power to patients. Zocdoc can connect you to the right provider. You can look for doctors on Zocdoc by entering your symptoms, location, and insurance plan. A comprehensive list of doctors will appear based on your search criteria. You can narrow down results based on filters like gender, hospital affiliations, languages spoken, and whether or not they treat kids.
Each doctor's profile contains information about their education and training, areas of expertise, professional membership, experience, certificates, and other details. Zocdoc invites patients to write reviews for the doctor after the consultation. They are verified and posted on the profile.
Using Zocdoc’s insurance detector, you can easily identify in-network doctors. If you do not see your plan listed, try taking a picture of your medical insurance card and uploading it. The website will automatically scan the image and show you your most likely plan. You can get in touch with Zocdoc’s service team if you face any problems uploading the picture. Check Zocdoc's patient help center for more insurance-related queries.
On Zocdoc, you can schedule in-person and video appointments. You can also use a filter to see who offers video visits. You can search for the specialist by preferred appointment time and date. On Zocdoc, booking an appointment with a chiropractor near you is simple, secure, and free.
Chiropractic health in New Jersey and the United States
Based on data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, during three months in 2019, the percentage of adults with back pain was about 39.0%, lower limb pain was approximately 36.5%, and upper limb pain was about 30.7%. Statistics by the American Chiropractic Association highlight that one of the leading causes of missing work was back pain.
According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, in 2023, there were around 41,480 chiropractors who actively provided services in the U.S. Around 470 specialists worked in outpatient care centers. Additionally, there were nearly 720 chiropractors in New Jersey.
According to the National Health Interview Survey in 2017, about 10.3% of adults received chiropractic care the previous year, compared to 9.1% in 2012 in the U.S. The 2017 data show that people aged 45 to 64 were more likely to have seen a chiropractor during the past year than older or younger adults. Additionally, more women visited a chiropractor than men. According to the same national survey, in 2017, the percentage of adults more likely to have seen a chiropractor was non-Hispanic white (12.7%), Hispanic (6.6%), or non-Hispanic Black (5.5%).
Sources
WebMD
Cleveland Clinic
Verywell Health
American Chiropractic Association[1]
American Chiropractic Association[2]
U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention[1]
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention[2]
National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health[1]
National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health[2]
Healthgrades
Mayo Clinic
Healthline
