Chiropractors Can Do A Lot More Than Just “Crack Your Back!”

Did you know chiropractors can sign death certificates? Perform phlebotomy services? Conduct physical exams for schools or the Department of Transportation? Although it varies from state to state, in one particular survey, more than ninety percent of the responding regulatory boards in the U.S. agree that chiropractors can perform routine physical examinations, draw or order clinical lab procedures, perform some aspect of physiological therapeutics, supplement with vitamins, adjust extremities whether be your shoulder, elbow or knee, and provide rehabilitative services. In the same survey, more than eighty percent of the responding regulatory agencies permit chiropractors to conduct a variety of X-ray procedures, order CTs and/or MRIs, conduct female breast exams and male genital exams, provide EMG and/or nerve conduction studies, and perform electro-cardiographic studies. Obviously, the scope of practice has widened in North America.

It goes without saying that even though a particular diagnostic or treatment procedure may be permitted under a practice act, this does not mean that this procedure is widely practiced by the chiropractic community in that jurisdiction. For example, although chiropractors are trained to perform breast and prostate exams, most chiropractors do not bother marketing such services because irrespective of permission, what is the point? Patients are still going to go to a gynecologist or a proctologist for those types of services and for obvious reasons. But the overall point should not go amiss right! Chiropractors do a lot more than what the general population currently perceives. And some of these services can probably be done by a chiropractor for cheaper than what a medical doctor may bill for! The chiropractic profession and its associations, be it national or state associations, should do better in educating and getting this message out!