Avoid Back Surgery With Chiropractic

In our Nashville practice, we see a large number of patients who are troubled with back pain, and a few of these folks have been informed they might need surgery to recover. Fortunately, Sweeney Chiropractic has helped many people get relief without the need for any type of surgical treatment. The scientific research confirms the success we see in our office. One research study published in the academic journal Spine found that seeing a chiropractor as your first move in overcoming with your back pain may literally keep you off of the operating table.

In this report, medical researchers from Dartmouth analyzed data from 1,885 workers from Washington state who first saw either an orthopedic surgeon or a chiropractic doctor for their back pain issues. They then looked at three years' worth of follow-up medical data to ascertain whether the patients wound up having back surgery in an effort to treat the issue.

What the authors determined was that 42.7% of the individuals who first consulted with a surgeon for their back issues ended up in surgery in that 3-year time span, whereas only 1.5% of those who first consulted with a chiropractor had the same fate. The authors wrote:

"Even after controlling for injury severity and other measures, workers with an initial visit for the injury to a surgeon had almost nine times the odds of receiving lumbar spine surgery compared to those seeing primary care providers, whereas workers whose first visit was to a chiropractor had significantly lower odds of surgery."

These are impressive findings. Seeing a chiropractor significantly decreases your odds of having back surgery, plus the chiropractic patients in this scientific study "had lower odds of chronic work disability" and they also had fewer expensive MRI tests.

Let's also take note this important point: this study was carried out by orthopedic surgeons from Dartmouth College, and published in the world's most prestigious medical journal on spinal injury.

The Risks of Surgery

Any surgery has risks, but a major problem associated with spinal surgery is that there's a very high rate of failure. In an important analysis in the European Spine Journal, researchers wrote:

"Failed back surgery is a problem that has become sufficiently widespread to even warrant its own special conferences, with recent reviews reporting failure rates ranging from 5 to 50%."

The experts in this same study concluded:

"It is extremely difficult to identify unequivocal predictor factors that can be used to accurately predict the outcome of surgery."

As a chiropractor, Sweeney Chiropractic believes that surgery should be the absolute last resort for treating back pain. Chiropractic works to restore your spine to its normal function--without risky surgery or drugs--and many studies have established the efficacy of chiropractic for back pain.

If you live in Nashville and you need relief for your back pain, give our office a call today at (615) 331-7040 for a consultation or an appointment. We'll help get you back on the road to a pain-free life!

Studies

• Keeney BJ, Fulton-Kehoe D, Turner JA, Wickizer TM, Chan KC, Franklin GM. Early predictors of lumbar spine surgery after occupational back injury: results from a prospective study of workers in Washington State. Spine 2013;38(11):953-964.
• Mannion AF, Elfering A. Predictors of surgical outcome and their assessment. European Spine Journal 2006;15(Suppl 1):S93-S108.