Avoid Back Surgery With Chiropractic

In our Moon Township office, we see a lot of patients who are dealing with back pain, and a few of these people have been advised they might need surgery to recover. Fortunately, Dr. Spiropoulos has helped many people get pain relief without the need for any type of surgical treatment. The science confirms the results we see in our practice. One study published in the journal Spine found that consulting with a chiropractor as your first move in overcoming with your back pain may literally keep you off of the operating table.

In this research study, medical experts from Dartmouth analyzed statistics from about 1,900 workers from Washington state who first saw either a surgeon or a chiropractic doctor for their low back issues. They then looked at three years' worth of follow-up medical information to ascertain whether the patients ended up having back surgery in an effort to treat the issue.

What the authors found was that 42.7% of the individuals who first consulted with a surgeon for their back problems ended up having a surgical procedure in that 3-year time frame, whereas only 1.5 percent 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 results. Visiting a chiropractor dramatically reduces 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 distinguished medical publication on spinal injuries.

Surgery: The Last Resort

Any surgery has risks, but a major problem linked to spine surgery is that there's a very high rate of failure. In an important review 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 authors of 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, Dr. Spiropoulos is convinced 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 research studies have confirmed the effectiveness of chiropractic for back pain.

If you live in Moon Township and you need care for your back pain, give our practice a call today at (724) 513-0521 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.