Chiropractors

Chiropractors, also known as doctors of chiropractic, diagnose and treat patients whose health problems are associated with the body's skeletal, nervous and muscular systems, especially the spine. Chiropractors understand that interference with these systems impairs the body's normal functions and lowers its resistance to disease. They also hold that spinal or vertebral dysfunction alters many important body functions by affecting the nervous system and that skeletal imbalance through joint or articular dysfunction, especially in the spine, can cause pain.

The chiropractic approach to healthcare is comprehensive, stressing the patient's overall health and wellness. It recognizes that many factors affect health, including exercise, diet, stress, environment, and heredity. Chiropractors provide natural, drugless, nonsurgical health treatments and rely on the body's inherent recuperative abilities. They also recommend changes in lifestyle-in eating, exercise, and sleeping habits, for example-to their patients. When appropriate and necesssary, chiropractors consult with and refer patients to other health and medical practitioners.

Like other health practitioners, chiropractors take the patient’s medical history, conduct physical, neurological, and orthopedic examinations, and may order laboratory tests. Chiropractors also employ a postural and spinal analysis common to chiropractic diagnosis. X rays and other diagnostic images may also be prescribed, as they are important tools used to rule out other pathology.