Effective Back Pain Treatment

We see a number of people with back pain in our Woburn & Chelmsford, MA office, and Dr. James Ellis & Dr. Lyndsay Martin has been able to help a lot of them get relief with chiropractic care. At the same time, dealing with back problems doesn't necessarily mean having to make a choice between chiropractic care and medical treatment, as many people utilize both types of care with great success.

Study Confirms Chiropractic and Medical Care Work Well Together

In a report published by the journal Spine researchers¹ looked at a group of active-duty military personnel between the ages of 18 and 35 who reported both acute pain and limited function due to back pain. Some of the test subjects received treatment via standard medical care, while the rest were given chiropractic adjustments in addition to regular medical care, as researchers wanted to determine which group fared better.

Researchers observed that the patients who received standard medical care in combination with chiropractic scored "significantly better" than the group that got medical care alone; 73 percent reported positive benefits compared to just 17 percent of the medical care only group who indicated the same amount of improvement. This was true regarding both pain and level of function at two and four weeks.

Accordingly, incorporating these two forms of care can greatly benefit you--the patient--offering advantages when compared to medical care alone. However, while chiropractic and medicine can work together, chiropractic offers some unique strengths over medical therapy.

Where Chiropractic Care Wins

Although it may seem as if each method plays a 50/50 role, there is one major advantage that chiropractic care has over medical treatment and that is in patient satisfaction. In fact, a piece of research from UCLA² that was published in the American Journal of Public Health found that, on average, chiropractic patients are generally more satisfied with their recovery than people undergoing medical care.

According to the experts, the main aspects that patients liked over medical treatment were "self-care advice and explanation of treatment." This isn't surprising, as chiropractors frequently spend much more time consulting with their patients as to how they can improve their health on their own, as well as explaining more carefully what to expect from chiropractic.

Chiropractic Care Offers a Non-Invasive Approach

Certainly, the strategies associated with chiropractic are very different than those available with medical therapy, but a large amount of the distinction is the fact that chiropractic is a holistic approach to health and wellness. In contrast to focusing on simply relieving the symptoms, chiropractic means tracking down the primary cause of your pain, which often results in greater improvement as you are tackling the problem at its source.

Additionally, while medication is sometimes helpful for treating certain conditions, many health issues respond well to natural forms of treatment such as chiropractic care. This means fewer negative responses to drugs and more permanent recovery.

You don't have to endure back pain or other health issues. Give our Woburn & Chelmsford, MA office a call today at (781) 460-0939. We'll do our best to help you get and remain free from back pain.

References

1. Goertz CM, Long CR, Hondras MA, Petri R, Delgado R, Lawrence DJ, Owens EF, Meeker WC. Adding chiropractic manipulative therapy to standard medical care for patients with acute low back pain: results of a pragmatic randomized comparative effectiveness study. Spine 2013;38(8):627-634.
2. Hertzman-Miller RP1, Morgenstern H, Hurwitz EL, Yu F, Adams AH, Harber P, Kominski GF. Comparing the satisfaction of low back pain patients randomized to receive medical or chiropractic care: results from the UCLA low-back pain study. American Journal of Public Health 2002;92(10):1628-1633.