Chiropractic opinions sought

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Rikkitic

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#248464 27-Mar-2019 13:34

I would like to know what people think of chiropractic treatment for lower back pain. Is it snake oil or does it actually work? Do those tapping devices actually do anything? No rants please, but I would be interested in the experiences of others, positive and negative. I have a problem with lower back pain that occasionally has debilitating flare-ups but most of the time is just a dull ache in the background. I have never been injured and can function normally when not having a flare-up but the ache is almost always present to some degree. I am currently having treatment at First Chiropractic but I can't decide if it is actually doing anything. Should I continue or am I wasting my money?

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#2205656 27-Mar-2019 13:38

I think chiropractors are snake oil salesmen. It can sometimes reduce symptoms, but I found it's rarely effective resolving the root cause of a problem. Choripractors want to bill you for multiple visits per week forever. For example, I woke up with a sore back one day, so I went to a chiropractor in Johnsonville. I ended up going twice a week for about 4 weeks, and at the end it was in, crack crack crack, out 5 minutes later, that'll be $50 please. Things were feeling ok by the end of that, not sure if they fixed me or it was just healing naturally, but they wanted me to keep coming back. I didn't.

See a good osteopath. They're awesome, they find and address the root cause, and they want you fixed but don't want you back unless you need help. For example, with a more recent minor back injury they identified it was rib related, and also found that tight tissue around my hip is playing a part. I have stretches that should help. Osteo's are always busy. I pay about $70 per half hour, most minor injuries like back pain I tend to go 3 to 5 times before I'm fixed.

I much prefer structural osteopaths to cranial or other types. Structural work with bones and muscles. Cranial seem to want to mostly work with your head to fix problems anywhere in the body.

I find physio's good for a subset of things. They're good at working out causes and helping find stretches and exercises to mitigate it, which in my case has helped me avoid surgery. One downside is they want to keep doing testing that can aggravate an injury. With a rotator cuff injury once they had me in 2 or 3 times a week for a few weeks, but their testing each time hurt. Once I stopped going it healed by itself.

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#2205663 27-Mar-2019 13:45

Medical community seems somewhat divided.

I believe there is certainly decent evidence to suggest that chronic lower back pain and other forms of neck & related pain/discomfort/muscular and skeletal issues can benefit from Chiropractic manipulation especially when combined with other treatments (pain killers/muscle relaxants/steroid injections/whatever)

Problem is that there is an awful lot of quackery that goes with it and for every decent operator you have a brace who believe that putting you in a half-nelson and making your joints snap like it was the Fourth of July will treat everything from infertility to asthma.

Caveat emptor I guess!

I have been tempted a few times, but found my best treatment for previous musculoskeletal woes to lie with a good Physiotherapist and a targeted exercise regime instead.

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#2205735 27-Mar-2019 15:41

The problem with pretty much any alternate form of treatment, at least IMHO, is that there often isn't a huge amount of research or governing bodies or ethics guidelines, etc so you're more likely to find quacks. I'm sure there are good chiropractors and osteopaths but finding them may be a bit hit or miss. If it were me I'd start with my GP, ask what they recommend and go from there.

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Rikkitic

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#2205740 27-Mar-2019 15:57

Been there, done that, didn't really help much.

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MikeB4

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#2205743 27-Mar-2019 16:05

PM sent

Here is a crazy notion, lets give peace a chance.

robjg63

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#2205768 27-Mar-2019 16:54

I think much like accupuncture, it's the time that will fix it if anything.
Best thing for back pain is to try and keep the weight down and keep moving (carefully).

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gehenna

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#2205770 27-Mar-2019 16:57

Witch doctors. Go to a musculoskeletal physiotherapist instead.

MikeB4

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#2205771 27-Mar-2019 17:00

robjg63: I think much like accupuncture, it's the time that will fix it if anything.
Best thing for back pain is to try and keep the weight down and keep moving (carefully).

yep, keeping weight down may not necessarily fix the issue but sure as heck makes dealing with it a whole lot better. I have lost 47 kilos now 68 Kg and it is sure easier to deal with things.

Here is a crazy notion, lets give peace a chance.

Rikkitic

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#2205778 27-Mar-2019 17:10

I have always been slim. In my old age I have gained weight with metabolic slowdown and lack of exercise and I am now heavier than I like but I would not qualify as obese, or even overweight. I do carry too much fat tissue and not enough lean muscle.

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#2205780 27-Mar-2019 17:23

Treatment depends on the cause

Degeneration without impingement - no cure, most common cause
Degeneration with impingement (eg spinal stenosis) - surgery may improve, may not, because it then converts to Degeneration without impingement

Bad things - aortic aneurysm, cancer involving bone, bone infection inc TB

Medium bad things - vascular insufficiency

If it's the first one, then what mikeb4 says. Sometimes muscle imbalance is causing it, one stronger group of muscle compensating for weaker muscles, putting strain on your lower back.

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#2205787 27-Mar-2019 17:49

I've got plenty of experience with backpain, and a diagnosed condition... I agree with others, go to an osteopath or physiotherapist, but just like chiropracters they will all vary in how orthodox or openminded they are about "complementary medicine" which is a recognised synthesis of techniques approved of commonly by insurers and sometimes progressive medical boards in the UK and Europe. That is - the crossover between allopathic scientifically backed medicine and alternative medicine. This is an advancing field and not static by any means.

Be careful about suddenly adopting a set of intense new exercises including yoga or bodyweight exercise systems, especially if you are aging and may have weaker than usual connective tissue (eg joint problems, clicking joint capsules,etc) as you could worsen your existing condition.

A quality deep tissue massage can help a lot, but it will be best to see your GP, and Osteopath or Physio in that order, so as to ascertain the bigger picture. The body is a mix of many complex systems afterall.

If you end up interested in gentle self therapy for your condition I'd recommend you look up and consider purchasing ageless mobility or intuflow dvds by scott sonnon. He's put together a good combination of common yoga,calisthenics,physiotherapy and mild bodyweight exercises specifically targetted at those with injuries or impairment due to age. I've used intuflow to good effect several times in the past for immediate relief.

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#2206109 28-Mar-2019 09:42

Chiropractors only ever made me worse, and kept asking me to come back. Money down the drain. The osteopaths I've seen gave temporary relief or did nothing; again money down the drain. The solution that worked best for me was going to the gym, starting very slowly, with very light weights. I eventually became pain free for a few years. Unfortunately, my back deteriorated as I've aged and the muscles in the affected area have become very abnormal in their function. Going back to the gym no longer works for me, makes me worse. My advice; start with a very gentle exercise program when the pain has subsided, then treat your back with the greatest respect. My mistake was that once I became pain free I started loading my back like when I was young. Moderate exercise was the key for me. Backs are idiosyncratic things, so what works for some does not for others.

networkn

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#2206157 28-Mar-2019 11:19

timmmay:

I think chiropractors are snake oil salesmen. It can sometimes reduce symptoms, but I found it's rarely effective resolving the root cause of a problem. Choripractors want to bill you for multiple visits per week forever. For example, I woke up with a sore back one day, so I went to a chiropractor in Johnsonville. I ended up going twice a week for about 4 weeks, and at the end it was in, crack crack crack, out 5 minutes later, that'll be $50 please. Things were feeling ok by the end of that, not sure if they fixed me or it was just healing naturally, but they wanted me to keep coming back. I didn't.

See a good osteopath. They're awesome, they find and address the root cause, and they want you fixed but don't want you back unless you need help. For example, with a more recent minor back injury they identified it was rib related, and also found that tight tissue around my hip is playing a part. I have stretches that should help. Osteo's are always busy. I pay about $70 per half hour, most minor injuries like back pain I tend to go 3 to 5 times before I'm fixed.

I much prefer structural osteopaths to cranial or other types. Structural work with bones and muscles. Cranial seem to want to mostly work with your head to fix problems anywhere in the body.

I find physio's good for a subset of things. They're good at working out causes and helping find stretches and exercises to mitigate it, which in my case has helped me avoid surgery. One downside is they want to keep doing testing that can aggravate an injury. With a rotator cuff injury once they had me in 2 or 3 times a week for a few weeks, but their testing each time hurt. Once I stopped going it healed by itself.

I would agree with some of the sentiment here. I have seen just about every type of person for back issues. Chriros and Osteopaths are all quacks in my opinion. Even Physios who don't have an excellent understanding of backs are useless.

I have suffered terrible back issues since I was 12. Pretty much every 6 weeks like clockwork my back would go "out" which caused agony for me and reduced my mobility severely. Resolved itself with time and lots of pain killers, but something like leaning down to tie a shoelace or drying my hair vigorously with a towel could cause it to happen (also sleeping awkwardly with a too high pillot or anything small like that). Could happen in any part of my back but most painful and most common was lower back. Over the years I have been desperate to solve it and spent over 50K over a number of years trying to resolve it. I ended up talking to a customer of mine who is also a GP about it in passing and he sent me to a musculoskeletal specialist on the North Shore. He examined me and then asked for a copy of my xrays and MRI's etc. I said I had never had some and he was shocked to say the least.

After getting those he determined pretty quickly I have a genetic issue with my lower discs which means they have less "fluid" in them than they should which effectively means that if strain on my back lying flat and fully supported is a factor of 1 for most people, I am at a 10, and that standing fully supported was a factor of 5 for most people I am 50. The solution was for him to enroll me with a very good physio who specialized in back issues. They did a core program with me over 10 weeks. 4 weeks of isolated machine based specialist machines to just work on specific deep core muscles and then 6 weeks of a general core issue. I didn't have a SINGLE back issue for 4 years after that! I recently started having back issues again, and due to bad habits had let my core deteriorate. I am back to the core program. It's already helping. I feel more stable and much more "centered".

I have sent many people with Chronic Back Pain to the Doctor on the Shore and he has helped them all. He literally changed my life. I'll take traditional medicine over the other quackery every day of the week, twice on Sundays.

Rikkitic

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#2206172 28-Mar-2019 12:05

That sounds very similar to my issue. Sudden, crippling agony for no apparent reason. Something I do a thousand times with no problem suddenly triggers my back on the 1001st. The only differences are that my issue happened for the first time in my 50s when I sat down after I had been sliding some not-heavy boxes around. It just hit out of nowhere with no warning. I was literally crippled by pain for a couple days. Nothing I did, no position, not lying down, nothing, had any effect on the pain. Over time it gradually improved until I could hobble again and eventually it subsided to a dull background ache that I have more or less had ever since. This has been going on for 19 years. Most of the time it is 'bearable' and some of the time I hardly notice it. At random intervals it suddenly goes critical for no apparent reason, most recently as I was getting into the bath. It was nothing I haven't done millions of times and I didn't do it any differently than I ever do. But suddenly I was crippled by agonising piercing pain up and down my spine and now, after a couple weeks, it is back to 'normal' again.

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networkn

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#2206173 28-Mar-2019 12:10

I'd highly recommend a musculoskeletal specialist.

A core program may help too

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