Manual therapy to the body can commonly be described as providing manipulation. Within my profession we prefer the term adjustment. The adjustment to the spine is an art as well as a science. Those persons who choose to look after their body in a proactive fashion in the UK can visit their chiropractor, usually for neck, back or head discomfort.

Exercise is one of those things we all know is good for our body yet can struggle to find time to be able to exercise the body. I also say as we exercise, we exorcise the tensions, worries and stresses of the day out of the body. Tensions can build up insipidly otherwise.

In 1995 a study was published comparing Chiropractic with hospital outpatient management. Considering hospitals get funding from Government and chiropractors do not there really shouldn’t have been any competition. Yet the people in the study reported benefit from chiropractic 3 years later and most continued with regular chiropractic once their trial treatment had completed. Chiropractic was 29% better than hospital outpatient management for low back pain (1). That’s amazing considering the David and Goliath comparison.

About 10 years later another trial was undertaken to compare chiropractic to another Goliath, this time exercise. Chiropractic was found to be slightly better than exercise at 3 months and at 12 months. In fact, the effect of exercise was not significant at 12 months, yet the effect of Chiropractic was (2).

Quite possibly the best outcome was for those who did both exercise and Chiropractic. Rather than pitch the two alternatives to body health against one another the best outcome was attained when exercise and Chiropractic were utilised together (2). Aim to get a variety of movement for your body and…

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References:

1. Meade TW et al (1995) Randomised comparison of chiropractic and hospital outpatient management for low back pain: Results from an extended follow up. BMJ 1995;311:349
2. Underwood M et al (2004) UK BEAM randomised trial effectiveness of physical treatments for back pain in primary care. BMJ 2004;329-1377