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Chiropractors are bullshit

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Re: Chiropractors are bullshit

#71

Post by themantalope »

arkades wrote: post #46
closed wrote: post #17

This made me curious about its effectiveness for back pain, so I tried to find a meta-analysis. Turned up this on plos one. (note, I can't speak for the article's quality). > Moderate evidence suggests that chiropractic care for LBP appears to be equally effective as physical therapy. Limited evidence suggests the same conclusion when chiropractic care is compared to exercise therapy and medical care although no firm…

Standard of care for LBP is almost entirely ineffective. So... no surprises that chiropractic meets that standard.

The current recommendation for LBP is to not treat, unless they have long-standing radiculopathy.

Re: Chiropractors are bullshit

#72

Post by Para2016 »

gnicholas wrote: post #70
Para2016 wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>a quick jerking of the head Please don't ever let anyone do that again. The two vertebral arteries that supply blood to your posterior brain (occipital lobe, cerebellum, medulla, pons) are encased in your cervical/neck vertebrae transverse processes. Quick manipulation of your neck with a "jerk" can injure these arteries and lead to dissection and infarct of your brain with permanent loss of function or it can even…

I asked my (medical) doctor about the safety risks of chiropractic adjustment, and he said there are rare cases of permanent injury from neck adjustments. He said it was less than 1/1000, but enough to be worried about. I have found that whenever I (infrequently) go in for lower back pain, the chiro always goes up the back and neck also — especially if his attempts at adjustment lower down were not successful. I alwa…

That's good advice. I'm just a puny resident but I totally agree with your doctor. I won't comment on chiropractors in general, but just on the neck manipulation part, which is a risk factor for arterial dissection.

Here's a cohort study supporting your doctor's advice to you. http://m.neurology.org/content/60/9/1424.short

And just for some Pop culture connection - here's a link to an article about a Playboy model that died after a carotid dissection due to neck manipulation by a chiropractor. http://people.com/bodies/playboy-model-katie-may-died-after-...

Re: Chiropractors are bullshit

#73

Post by E6300 »

dnh44 wrote: post #32
E6300 wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Hospitals alone kill close to 100,000 Americans alone each year. > 2) Modern medicine consists of prescribing drugs, or high risk surgeries. Paralysis for life is a real risk. This is reminiscent of the arguments used by creationists. "Creationism isn't bullshit! Look at all the flaws in evolution!" > 1) Personal experience. There's people who use homeopathy who swear by it. That doesn't make homeopathy any more le…

No but placebo is real and what's wrong with people trying to induce placebo to help themselves?

Placebos don't help. At best they provide temporary relief; on some people they don't even work. A placebo is like you car engine making a funny noise and the mechanic telling you to turn the stereo up so you won't hear it. Or, to make the analogy more appropriate, it's like the mechanic telling to come back twice a week so he'll turn the stereo on for you, while charging you $10 each time. Meanwhile the shop across the street charges $100 but actually takes a look at your engine.

Re: Chiropractors are bullshit

#74

Post by Terretta »

Phlow wrote: post #63
pwinnski wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you suggesting that belief in the efficacy of chiropractic correlates with belief that climate change isn't real, or the reverse? It seems to me that skepticism of the medical establishment and skepticism of mainstream environmental science would go hand-in-hand, but I also think chiropractic is bullshit (and I've been to a chiropractor for back and neck related problems).

I'm rolling my eyes and guessing there's a significant positive correlation between people that believe chiropractics is bullshit and people that believe climate change isn't real.

Anecdotally, I see the reverse equally often.

In communities with enough time and money to act precious, I see stronger correlation between pro-chiropractic, anti-gluten, and anti-vax.

Re: Chiropractors are bullshit

#75

Post by dlwdlw »

abatilo wrote: post #9

This generalization is insane. I don't go to chiropractors regularly, and my situation was clearly be anecdotal, but there was one afternoon where any movement in my back caused me extreme pain. I scheduled a body massage to try to alleviate at least some of the pain but when I went it didn't help. Then my fiance suggested trying a chiropractor and I walked in, explained my pain, and in about 30 seconds it was all go…

Almost all signal can have most of it's information expressed as a sine wave, but it's the jitter in the wave that has all the 'important' information. There's a fallacy where getting the majority of certain types of information leaves you blind to the important but "smaller" types. I think medicine and personal health is one such domain where this fallacy is abundant.

The weakness of heuristics is that they don't turn into reusable models but vice versa models can leave you blind. The constant disdain for heuristics is a huge weakness of many scientifically minded people IMO.

Re: Chiropractors are bullshit

#76

Post by ice109 »

dlwdlw wrote: post #75
abatilo wrote: post #9

This generalization is insane. I don't go to chiropractors regularly, and my situation was clearly be anecdotal, but there was one afternoon where any movement in my back caused me extreme pain. I scheduled a body massage to try to alleviate at least some of the pain but when I went it didn't help. Then my fiance suggested trying a chiropractor and I walked in, explained my pain, and in about 30 seconds it was all go…

Almost all signal can have most of it's information expressed as a sine wave, but it's the jitter in the wave that has all the 'important' information. There's a fallacy where getting the majority of certain types of information leaves you blind to the important but "smaller" types. I think medicine and personal health is one such domain where this fallacy is abundant. The weakness of heuristics is that they don't tu…

>almost all signal...

this the silliest misinterpretation of Fourier analysis I've ever seen and I'm not going to try refute it except to say that with the clarity you're implying Fourier decomposition applies only to periodic signals (ie saying that a signal that has a continuous time FT "has most of its information expressed as a sine wave would be an egregious exaggeration so you must talking about series expansion and that only applies to periodic signals [and I'm at a loss for how to interpret info about chiropractors as periodic]).

Re: Chiropractors are bullshit

#77

Post by closed »

arkades wrote: post #46
closed wrote: post #17

This made me curious about its effectiveness for back pain, so I tried to find a meta-analysis. Turned up this on plos one. (note, I can't speak for the article's quality). > Moderate evidence suggests that chiropractic care for LBP appears to be equally effective as physical therapy. Limited evidence suggests the same conclusion when chiropractic care is compared to exercise therapy and medical care although no firm…

Standard of care for LBP is almost entirely ineffective. So... no surprises that chiropractic meets that standard.

That's part of what made me curious about LBP+chiropractic research! Pretty wild.

Re: Chiropractors are bullshit

#78

Post by influnza »

I visited a chiropractor in Denmark. It was manual therapy, the doctors were knowledgeable and used massage and acupuncture in addition to "breaking bones" - all was very relieving and made a lot of sense. The one here in the US I did not trust. I looked more like a waster of money.

Re: Chiropractors are bullshit

#80

Post by aisofteng »

BooneJS wrote: post #53
aisofteng wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Deadlifting and squatting regularly has eliminated my lower back pain.

I'll give that a shot as well. Sounds like I'll need some equipment to do that.

If you've had lower back injury, I strongly suggest you ask a medical professional first. In my case, it was muscle pain, which was alleviated (apparently) by making those muscles stronger. I did not have an actual injury; weight lifting after an injury can cause serious damage.

If you do find it reasonable to try, a gym membership would be best, for at least a few months, and a couple sessions with a trainer. Poor form with these exercises can also lead to damage.

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