Not so long ago, there was such a large divide between chiropractors and medical doctors that any type of collaboration would have seemed impossible.
Now, fewer than 25 years later, that divide has been bridged to a great extent. Some medical doctors and chiropractors even work together in private practices and clinics.
This is great news for patients like Tammy Welsh of Jacobus, York County.
Welsh, 42, has been a patient for several years at Leader Heights Healthcare, York, where she is treated by both a chiropractor and a medical doctor for pain resulting from her lifelong arthritis and other conditions.
Welsh has had chronic pain all of her life and has had many surgeries on her feet. She also has a condition called torticollis, which results in severe neck spasms and pain, and used to have daily headaches and bouts of vertigo.
“There hasn’t been one thing they haven’t been able to treat. They’ve fixed things other doctors couldn’t,” says Welsh. She credits Dr. Kim Carozzi, her chiropractor, with discovering that Botox injections could help Welsh get relief from the neck pain and headaches she’d had since she was 18. The injections are administered by Earl Edwards M.D. at Leader Heights.
Welsh, a workers’ compensation analyst who sits at a desk all day, especially appreciates the convenience of having chiropractors and medical doctors in the same office, along with physical therapy and medical devices she occasionally needs.
Welsh goes to Leader Heights once a week for treatment. “I don’t have to run all over…to different doctors,” says Welsh.
Carozzi of Leader Heights believes the patients benefit from the collaboration of the two medical professions in one office by knowing their doctors are working together on their case and being offered “different techniques and therapies that are simply not available elsewhere.”
“We are able to achieve better results than working alone,” says Carozzi.
In Lancaster, Dr. Lawrence Withum of Wenger Chiropractic Group also sees the benefit of medical doctors and chiropractors working together.
Withum has spent years building bridges between the two professions. The doctors at Wenger Chiropractic get referrals from local family and orthopedic doctors, he says, and if the chiropractors find they can’t resolve an issue for a patient, they refer the patient to a medical doctor.
In addition to working at Wenger, Withum has worked for 17 years at Southeast Lancaster Healthcare’s clinic. He is also a member of the credentials committee at Heart of Lancaster Regional Medical Center, and was on the same committee at the old Community Hospital.
“I’m not such a purist that I believe medicine has no place, but I try to accomplish as much as I can without chemicals,” says Withum.
Chiropractors use “all natural techniques to achieve an optimal level of health,” says Withum. He uses the analogy of the body as an electrical system. The impulses moving through the nerves are equated to the energy in the electrical system. This “energy” exits through the spine.
If a nerve doesn’t function well, then the body won’t function well, says Withum. It is like in a physics experiment when a light bulb isn’t connected well and the bulb does not burn as brightly, he says.
“We get road blocks out of the way so the body can restore itself to optimal health,” says Withum.
At Wenger Chiropractic, they do more than spinal adjustment. They also talk about nutrition, exercise, positive lifestyle choices and stress reduction.
Wenger has added complementary practices to its office, including massage therapists and most recently a traditional Chinese medicine practitioner who is an acupuncturist, Dr. Lei Zhang.
The techniques Wenger uses also include ultrasound, electrical stimulation, hydrotherapy, stretching and traction. Wenger’s doctors also use an instrument called an Activator that, either with a slow or fast pulse, is used to tap an area of the body to adjust it.
Chiropractors use these different types of therapies in addition to the traditional spinal adjustment. The spinal adjustment can be tailored to the patient’s preferences, says Withum.
“Everything is individualized. It is not one size fits all,” says Withum.
Carozzi says it is most important that a patient is comfortable and that chiropractors “vary their force and direction for patient comfort.”
The types of ailments that chiropractors work on include low back pain, sciatica, headaches, carpal tunnel syndrome and mid-back soreness, says Withum.
“It works. That’s what makes coming to work so gratifying,” he says.
Tammy Welsh has found the combination of chiropractic and traditional medicine to be just what the doctor ordered for her conditions.
“I don’t want to walk around medicated or on muscle relaxers,” she says.
When Welsh had chronic pain, her quality of life was severely compromised. Working with the doctors at Leader Heights gave her a new lease on life, she says.
“When you wake up and say you are not in any pain today, that’s a miracle.”