Two years ago, I injured my back. I'm not sure exactly what did it, but I had trouble walking across a room while using a cane -- it was bad.
Despite the recommendations of friends, I DIDN'T go to a chiropractor and within a month I was much much better. Today my back has never felt better. I'm not sure that this proves that one shouldn't go to chiropractors, and I'm just a random guy on the internet so what does this prove?
I've also had tinnitus, and it too subsided WITHOUT chiropracty. I'm glad that not going to a chiropractor cured me.
The efficacy of any kind of treatment is hard to determine, and the subjective interpretation of our own experiences is always hard to keep in perspective. Anyway, I'm glad that you're ailments abated (with the chiropractor's help).
I understand what you're saying, and I appreciate the logic, but I had constant pain for years and this was a sudden, dramatic improvement within HOURS of seeing this chiropractor. Maybe it was all just a coincidence, I'm not making a scientific claim, only that the success should garner further study. If you read the case study I linked to above, you'll find I'm not the only one.
Allow me to come to your defense and congratulate the skeptics in the audience for completely missing the goddamn point.
There is no need to be afraid of the idea that a chiropractic procedure might have possibly worked. If an alt-med procedure works, and there are rigorous scientific studies to back it up, congratulations, it is now science-based medicine. Science-based medicine is not particularly picky, and if physical manipulations or sticking people with needles is shown to work as a treatment for a particular condition, it's no worse a modality than any other.
The reason to reject chiropracty and acupuncture as fields despite their occasional successes because of their lack of rigor, and tendency to keep using treatments after they have been shown to be ineffective or dangerous or both. Some practitioners still adhere to the original, discredited foundations of their fields (sublaxations, nonallopathic lesions, qi), some practitioners will happily treat for conditions for which their methods have been proven completely ineffective, and some practitioners will happily injure patient after patient with fractured vertebrae and punctured lungs. And their professional organizations have shown no ability or desire to regulate their practitioners.
Despite the recommendations of friends, I DIDN'T go to a chiropractor and within a month I was much much better. Today my back has never felt better. I'm not sure that this proves that one shouldn't go to chiropractors, and I'm just a random guy on the internet so what does this prove?
I've also had tinnitus, and it too subsided WITHOUT chiropracty. I'm glad that not going to a chiropractor cured me.
The efficacy of any kind of treatment is hard to determine, and the subjective interpretation of our own experiences is always hard to keep in perspective. Anyway, I'm glad that you're ailments abated (with the chiropractor's help).