It is often been said that healthcare is a science, but not an exact one. While healthcare practitioners go through years of extensive training, it would be impossible to learn everything necessary to treat every malady known to mankind—and effectively. To make this easier, medicine, and healthcare in general, are broken down into specialty areas; each providing a more concentrated focus pertaining to a related malady. However, even with this more precise approach to healthcare, the word "exact" is still far from describing the science of diagnosing and treating illness and injury. What typically takes place is a guessing process. Fortunately, what most patients receive is an educated guess.
Because an internal-medicine practitioner does not specialize in spinal care, it can be difficult for such a doctor to diagnose a back injury—or the effect that injury may be having on the rest of the body. For example, a patient might go to their family practitioner complaining about pain in their lower back and hip area. The doctor would typically order x-rays to determine the cause. If nothing obvious—to him or her—appears on the x-ray, the doctor may diagnose a simple a muscle strain and subsequently prescribe pain medication, heat/ice treatment, and rest. If the problem persists, advanced methods of diagnosis such as MRIs or CT Scans are used. However, such scans usually focus directly on the area where the patient is complaining of pain. Due to expense and protocol, rarely does a diagnostic process such as this expand its view to see whether or not the reason for the pain may be elsewhere.
Specializing in spinal health, a chiropractor’s x-ray or scanning process would focus on the entire spinal structure from brain stem to tail bone, revealing additional areas where the actual problem may stem. For example, a small subluxation in the vertebrae directly above the lower back area could result in pain in that area. Yet, such a problem would never be detected on an x-ray or scan taken of the lower area—or be apparent to a practitioner who does not specialize in treatment of the spine thereby understanding the correlation of the two areas.
Just as you would not go see a dentist to treat a knee injury, it makes more sense when suffering from a back-related malady to see a chiropractor who specializes in such and can offer a great source of hope for healing. And, by the same token, a medical doctor who specializes in internal medicine would be the one you would want to see if you’re suffering from the flu or some other internal injury or illness. At Integrated Wellness, we do not claim to have all the answers. One of our greatest strengths is knowing when to rely on the which diverse area of specialized medicine that would best help a particular patient. We even go so far as to offer multi-specialty workshops featuring trained practitioners who share our philosophy that each field is important and has its place in the process of restoring optimal health.
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