The Truth About Chiropractic… Is It a Scam? (2024)

For decades, the most popular natural healthcare approach for treating back pain in the United States has been chiropractic.

And for good reason…

Chiropractic adjustments can help remove misalignments (“subluxations”) in your vertebrae.

Since virtually every function in your body is controlled by nerves which travel through and exit the spinal column, any spinal misalignment could potentially pinch a nerve.

Pinched nerves may cause pain. But they can negatively impact your health whether you have pain or not.

For example, a spinal subluxation might cause back pain. But it could just as easily affect the function of your heart, lungs, gallbladder, liver, stomach, kidneys and other organs.

So yes, a chiropractic adjustment could make a positive improvement in your life. But before you make another appointment with your local chiropractor, ask this question…

Why must you visit the chiropractor so often?

Many chiropractors encourage their patients to come in for adjustments as frequently as three times per week.

After an initial assessment, expect to spend a lot of time travelling back and forth to their office for 5- to 15-minute spinal adjustment sessions for the chiropractor to “crack your back” and neck.

And since “adjustments don’t hold” and “anything can subluxate your spine” from picking up a baby to watering the lawn, you’ve just signed on for a lifetime of treatments.

That’s led many to ask: Is chiropractic a scam?

There are two good reasons why those adjustments don’t hold. I’ll share both in a moment.

But first, let me reveal one of chiropractic’s best-kept secrets:

When chiropractors perform properly, you don’t have to visit them often at all!

Yet many chiropractors today have taken a different approach than chiropractic was founded on.

Rather than getting incredible results in one session, you’ve simply become their cash cow.

I know the difference firsthand.

My own chiropractor here in Austin (yes, I use one – but only once or twice a year!), Dr. Stephen Berman, follows the comprehensive approach developed by D. D. Palmer, the “founder of chiropractic,” in the late 1890s.

As Dr. Berman explains in the video below, D.D. Palmer’s patients in the age of horse and buggies and riverboats didn’t come to town three times a week. More like three times per year.

Those were the same patients that spread the fame of chiropractic after single adjustments… because a single session with the chiropractor worked.

Chiropractors trying to get their patients to come in three times a week would have been laughed out of town.

Or, honestly, the chiropractor might even have been thrown in jail for fraud.

Which brings me back to why most chiropractic adjustments don’t hold.

Good chiropractors adjust the whole body

Most chiropractors typically adjust only your back and neck. That wasn’t always the case.

It’s like the old kid’s song…

“The foot bone’s connected to the leg bone. The leg bone’s connected to the knee bone. The knee bone connected to the thigh bone.” And so on.

That’s the first reason typical chiropractic adjustments have limited effect and don’t hold… you’re only getting a partial adjustment!

Early chiropractic treatment was far more comprehensive. Every joint in the body was manipulated to ensure it was properly aligned.

That’s the approach my chiropractor takes.

In his video, Dr. Berman shares a brief history of chiropractic, then demonstrates on actual patients what legit chiropractic assessments and manipulations should look like.

Watch the video then compare his comprehensive chiropractic technique – the one I get once or twice a year, based on the original chiropractic method – with the adjustments given at your local chiropractor’s office (especially if they’re asking you to come back again in three days).

There’s still another reason chiropractic adjustments fail to hold.

It was summed up nicely by one of our customers several years ago:

“Bones only go where our muscles put them.”

Yes, your spine and other bones and joints may be out of proper alignment. And a chiropractic adjustment can help restore balance.

But muscle imbalances – where one set of muscles are overdeveloped and tight in one area of your body while the opposing muscles are weak and stretched out of their normal position – will quickly pull your skeletal system back into old patterns.

While your bones and joints may seem “frozen” in a misaligned position, it’s your muscles which put them there.

For example, one of the most common postural dysfunctions I see is a forward tipped pelvis.

Years of sitting… at work, in the car, at the dining room table… tightens and strengthens those muscles in your hip flexors, quadriceps and lower back used to keep you in a seated position while stretching out and weakening the opposing, less used muscles in your hamstrings, glutes and abs.

This muscle imbalance pulls your pelvis forward, creates numerous muscle strains and, when left uncorrected, causes severe pain and physical dysfunctions.

The cure is simple.

Align your muscles to align your bones

Stretch only the overly tight muscles. And strengthen only the weak muscles. This imbalanced form of exercise eliminates the muscle imbalance so your body can naturally assume a neutral posture.

Notice, that’s not the same as the generic chart of exercises most chiropractors hand out to every patient presenting with back pain.

You’re an individual. And your body has its own unique set of muscle imbalances and postural dysfunctions created over your lifetime.

Which is why you need a personalized, comprehensive approach to assessing and reversing muscle imbalances just like you need a chiropractor who takes a personalized, comprehensive approach to chiropractic.

You can get the right chiropractor by finding one who practices the technique demonstrated by Dr. Berman in the video above.

And you can ensure your chiropractic adjustments “hold” with the correct stretching and strengthening exercises to eliminate your own muscle imbalances.

Our Lose the Back Pain^® System was developed precisely for that purpose. It walks you step-by-step through easily identifying your own postural dysfunctions and related muscle imbalances, then gives you the exact stretching and strengthening exercises – for your unique situation – to return you to a normal, neutral posture.

And… like most who try it… you may never need a chiropractor for back pain again.

Click Here to See How You Can Try Lose the Back Pain® Risk Free for 90 Days!

The biggest problemwith chiropractic care

Like I said earlier, I personallyuse chiropractic care. But I don’t visit Dr. Berman expecting him to solve every health issue I may have.

Yet manychiropractors seem to suggest everything short of a broken bone can be helped by chiropractic.

That’s little different than your typical MD who thinks drugs or surgery are the answer to virtually every complaint.

Both have fallen victim to “single-tool mentality.”

You’ve heard the adage before. When the only tool you have is a hammer, every problem begins to look like a nail.

Yes, chiropractic care may help. But what if your pain is caused by a trigger point in your upper back?A spinal adjustment probably won’t get it to release.

Or perhaps a magnesium deficiency is causing your back pain? Again, an adjustment won’t help.

For optimal health and pain-free living, you must adopt a holistic, big-picture view of how your body operates.

For decades I’ve studied the pathways to – and back out of – pain. And I’m here to tell you no single solution fits everyone.

Yes, there are common root sources of pain, such as muscle imbalances. But you still have to look at diet, trigger points, spinal compression, stress, mental attitude, and more. The list goes on and on. I’ve covered these major sources of pain, and how to overcome them, in my Complete Healing Formula package.

If you’d like to discover for yourself how to live a truly healthy, pain-free life, I’d like to give it to you FREE.

All I ask is that you give it a fair shake. Listen to bothaudio CDs and make some simple changes in your life.

To make sure you enjoy life to the max, without fear of pain, I’ll also give you a free trial of my monthly Live Pain Free^® newsletter so you can stay on the right track.

Each month, if you decide to remain a subscriber (no obligation!), I’ll forward you another issue jam-packed with the latest natural health news and actionable tips for living a pain-free life. Plus, I include a CD in every issue where I interview another top natural health experts to bring their valuable insights direct to you.

What do you have to lose, but your pain?

Click here now to watch a personal video from yours truly explaining the most common sources of pain andask for yourFREE copy of the Complete Healing Formula…

Filed Under: Back Pain, Video
Written By: Jesse Cannone, CFT, CPRS, MFTUpdated: July 14,2016