We care for a large number of people in our Las Vegas clinic, and Dr. Forsyth has helped countless people manage a range of health issues. However, one concern that seems to prevent some women and men from pursuing care is whether or not chiropractic adjustments are safe. Fortunately, according to three separate studies (out of countless on the subject), the answer to this question is a clear: "Yes! Chiropractic is safe!"
The first study(1) was published in Spine and included 183 men and women between the ages of 20 and 85. Each person reported suffering from spine-related pain, and half of the people received real chiropractic care while the remaining patients received two sham chiropractic adjustments. Information was collected after each real or fake adjustment to identify if any unpleasant reactions were caused by the actual chiropractic adjustments.
The authors found that no one reported any serious negative adverse reactions whatsoever after getting one or two sessions of chiropractic. Some participants did state that they had a headache (just 9% of people) or muscle stiffness (37%) after treatment, but the results were not of a serious nature.
The next study(2), also released in the influential journal, Spine, was done in an attempt to establish the safety of chiropractic. The study group was much larger as it involved just under 20,000 people. Each participant received chiropractic adjustments of the neck, with over 50,000 total adjustments for all study participants.
Once again, the researchers discovered no serious adverse side effects. The authors calculated the risk of total negative effects to be approximately 6 out of every 10,000 consultations or every 100,000 treatment sessions. And, just as with the first study, some participants did report non-serious, milder, side effects such as dizziness (about 1.6%) or a headache (4 out of every 100), and this caused the researchers to determine that "the risk of a serious adverse event, immediately or up to 7 days after treatment, was low to very low."
The third study(3) is different from the previous two pieces of research, as it focuses on the safety of chiropractic care for children. In this article, the authors investigated data reported by both chiropractors and parents involving 816 children who participated in 7,173 chiropractic treatment sessions.
Out of 5,438 chiropractic appointments made for the young children, chiropractors responding to the survey reported only three cases where there were adverse effects. When parents were questioned, they indicated only two adverse side effects out of 1,735 visits. Furthermore, both chiropractors and parents reported "a high rate of improvement with respect to the children's presenting complaints."
Based on these three studies (and many more!), chiropractic has been deemed safe and effective for everyone. To find out what chiropractic care can do for you, call our Las Vegas clinic and schedule an appointment today at (702) 722-2225.
References
Dr. Bobby Forsyth, DC is a Chiropractor in Las Vegas, NV. He is accepting new patients. Be sure to call ahead with Dr. Forsyth to book an appointment.
