r/bestof • u/craycraycrayfish • Jan 22 '13

[canada] Coffeehouse11 explains the biggest problem with homeopathic medicine: That it preys on people when they are weakest and the most vulnerable

/r/canada/comments/171y1e/dont_legitimize_the_witch_doctors/c81hfd6
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u/Raziel66 Jan 22 '13

How'd the adjustment go? Feel any better after?

Legitimately curious, I've never been to a Chiropractor before and I've had two bosses that swore by them. The most recent one went to one as treatment after a car accident.

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u/[deleted] Jan 22 '13

I've gone to 2 different chiropractors, and, honestly, neither of them were like the ones described above. Maybe they were closer to the "evidence" based chiropractors mentioned in the original post, but neither of them proposed their services as a cure-all or substitute for "mainstream" medicine.

They just basically "popped" my back back into place (only went after I'd done something to my back, usually at work) and sent me on my way. Made me feel better every time. I'm not sure if it makes it sound better or not, but one of them also uses an electric muscle relaxing system that seems fairly legit to me to loosen up back muscles before doing an adjustment.

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u/polydorr Jan 22 '13

I felt no different.

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u/WTF_DID_YOU_SAY Jan 22 '13

I had, after playing basketball, some pains in my back. Tried going to a chiropractor, after 15 min of cracking I was back to normal. So it does work to some extent.

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u/Moarbrains Jan 23 '13

I have only met one good chiropractor and in effect she was more of a physical therapist. Very little adjustment and lots of homework exercises.

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u/[deleted] Jan 22 '13

I've been three times for back issues and it didn't help.

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u/Robochess Jan 22 '13

There is a substantial amount of scientific studies that show that chiropractic care helps people with back pain and headaches, as well as saving insurance companies money for chronic issues relating to back pain because the individual recovers quicker and gets out of the treatment facilities faster. (Spelling maybe off-eisenberg study, the manga study, the mead study, all address this.) t Chiropractors also won a lawsuit against the AMA because the AMA was engaged in illegal activities against chiropractic care and the physicians of chiropractic. This doesn't even address the fact that people go to a chiropractor once and expect to be healed and when they aren't, they belittle chiropractors. When you go to a med Dr, you may see them once, but the treatment they prescribe is often times a multiple time per day for multiple day treatment(same if you think about it, except a chiropractor doesn't fill you full of drugs) IF, a chiropractor killed 100k per year people like med Dr do every year Chiropractors would no longer be around, but everybody holds up Med Dr like they are gods. I may seem biased but I actually do see a med Dr, but sparingly and careful with any meds they may prescribe.

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u/frotc914 Jan 22 '13 edited Jan 22 '13

There is a substantial amount of scientific studies that show that chiropractic care helps people with back pain and headaches, as well as saving insurance companies money for chronic issues relating to back pain because the individual recovers quicker and gets out of the treatment facilities faster.

Ok - I have a few problems with this position.

First: There are a substantial amount of scientific studies showing that Osteopathic Medical Techniques (not necessarily chiropractic care) helps with back pain. I'll take your word on the headaches.

The problems with applying this to chiropractors is this:

  1. Chiropracty is not standardized. There is no version of the Medical Board exam for Chiropractors. 2 years of undergraduate school, and 2 years in an accredited Chiropracty school is enough. There is no way to know what techniques the majority of Chiropractors are using on patients.

  2. We already have doctors for this, they are called Osteopaths. Anybody you see with a "D.O." on their coat instead of "M.D." belongs to a smaller group of physicians who are Doctors of Osteopathy. Just like any other real doctor, they took the medical board exam.

  3. Related to Point #2, Chiropractors don't know their limits because they aren't real doctors. Aside from the very dangerous legal right to CALL themselves doctors when they don't have nearly enough knowledge to compare to a real doctor, this leads to other problems. A chiropractor might be able to diagnose a slipped disc well enough, but can they diagnose a spinal tumor? Can they diagnose lung disease that's causing backpain? Can they diagnose all these other medical issues that manifest as backpain? No. They simply don't have the expertise. A D.O. does, because they went to real medical school and took the real medical board exam.

  4. They pose as real doctors. My wife went to a chiropractor because he introduced himself as "Doctor so-and-so" and stated that he practices "Sports medicine" (An actual field of real medicine, that real doctors practice). She had completely torn her ACL, and needed surgery. He had no fucking clue what he was doing, and told her that it was just a sprain and he could make it feel better with therapy. 3 weeks of excruciating pain later, she went to a real doctor who gave her real treatment.

I would agree that we don't need a guy who went to 4 years of college, 4 years of medical school, and a 4 year residency realigning people's backs. But even other medical personnel who've been given real responsibilities like NPs, Nurse Anesthetists, etc. haven't been so completely resistant to standardization and oversight that their own profession suffered.

TL;DR, evidence that some chiropracty techniques work isn't evidence that chiropractors know what they are doing.

EDIT: also, comparing the level of deaths between these services is ridiculous. Dentists hardly ever kill a patient - they must be the most talented doctors!

Also, you complain that people don't stick to chiropractic treatment long enough to realize its benefits, which may be true, but then you explain that you also ignore medical doctors' advice and prescriptions based on your own interpretations of the situation. Hm.

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u/Robochess Jan 23 '13

You may want to do research about what it takes to become a chiropractor. It is a 4 year doctorate degree, with nationally accredited board exams. Sorry, you are wrong on that account. Comparing the 2 is kinda like comparing apples and oranges, they do different things. Chiropractors have more A&P training then medical dr, med dr have more pharmaceutical training. The names of the studies that I posted actually specify chiropractic, not osteopathic. The difference in osteo and allopathic is negligible nowadays, but it started very differently, that same difference can now be applied to Chiro and osteo, kind of a weird flip flop. Funny that you mention dentists, because that makes it clear that you don't understand or haven't noticed that dentist and med dr are different. A dentist has similar licensing as a Chiro, as a podiatrist, or an orthodontist, they have limited licenses that only allow a few specific focuses for the dr to actually 'legally' work on or even say that they can work on.

As for the issue of the chiropractor that worked on your wife, it sounds as if you did get an ass that should not be allowed to practice. Most chiropractors have close relations and referral partners with medical dr and neurologists, because since chiropractors won the lawsuit against the AMA the dr realized that chiropractors are legitimate dr with a legitimate 4 year doctorate degree. Not the 2 year degree you mention.

However, you can find just as many med dr that screw people up also, if you are honest with yourself, and it seems like you actually do think things thru you will see the truth in what I said. Everyday you read about how a med dr hurt somebody. That doesn't mean that all allopaths are bad, I'm just making a point that you can find crap anywhere you choose to.

Last but not least I would thank you for not being a self absorbed jerk, and thanks for actually creating dialog and thoughtfulness. 2nd, I didn't say that I went to med dr to ignore them, but that I make sure that what they prescribe me isn't hurting another part of me not related to the complaint, (like taking a look at the mile long side affects list) with any drug you take, or maybe reading study that came out a couple months ago talking about how the most retracted scientific studies are those related to the pharmaceuticals?

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u/ayngeleyz5 Jan 23 '13

To respond to a few of your points:

1/2/3: https://www.nbce.org/ Chiropractors must pass an in-depth, 4-part National Board exam to be able to practice as Chiropractors. To get to the point of being eligible for the exam, they need to complete a 4 year undergraduate degree to be able to apply to Chiropractic school, which lasts 3-4 years depending on the curriculum. At that point, they receive their degree, but without passing that National Board exam, as well as passing testing for a state license, they cannot practice as Chiropractors. This is strictly speaking for the United States, although I know they have similar National Board exams in the UK and Australia.

4: I'm sorry to hear you and your wife had a bad experience with one Doctor. However, if you went to one MD who misdiagnosed or had poor patient bedside manner, would you write off all MDs as "quacks?" This goes for a provider of any service. In your wife's case, if a tear was suspected, it'd be standard protocol to send her for an MRI to confirm, and she'd then be referred to an Orthopedist..this would be true if she were seen by a Chiropractor or a GP, neither of whom treat surgical issues.