Revitalize Chiropractic Newsletter
Discover Chiropractic in North Fort Worth
Not all super heroes wear capes, and I know this for a fact after almost 10 years in a chiropractic practice.
I have seen and learned so many things within our office and the chiropractic community over the years, and one clear observation is that chiropractic children and families thrive! They seem happier and brighter, get sick less, and often have a totally different outlook than families not under care. Seeing a chiropractor at any age should be considered a positive health option in my opinion. Unfortunately, like many good things, it isn’t always that easy.
Recently in Australia, we’ve been under pressure once again around adjusting children in our offices. This isn’t a blog post to go into politics, but rather to demonstrate how the positive impact of chiropractic with children clearly shines through even when some are trying to show the opposite.
I’ll set the scene for you: Back in 2019, the state of Victoria in Australia called for a public review of chiropractic care for children. Specifically they decided, “to undertake an independent review of the practice of chiropractic spinal manipulation on children under 12 years” and the results in theory could determine if chiropractors in Australia should see children under 12 years old. It may not be stated in the results, but listening to the coverage at the time it was clear the people pushing for this review didn’t intend for this to be a positive review for chiropractic, but rather to prove it was dangerous for children.
The public consultation formed as a part of the Safer Care Victoria review was one of the largest in Australian history, and still years later the results aren’t being reported or promoted the way they should be. To help remedy that, I wanted to share some of the results with you.
If you want to stop reading here, let me say that the public consultation was a resounding success for chiropractic! 99.7% Of the over 21,000 parents and guardians who took the time to respond to the Safe Care Victoria survey, 99.7% responded positively about their experience with chiropractic for their children.
The parents/guardians made it very clear that they wanted the right to choose care for their child, and they appreciated the time that their child’s chiropractor took to engage with them and their child. They indicated they went to the chiropractor for a range of reasons ranging from maintaining general health and wellbeing to concerns like posture, colic, neck pain, back pain, difficulty with breastfeeding, and headaches.
An equally (if not more) important result from this review was that no evidence of harm or adverse effect was found! A very small minority of respondents (0.3% small) reported a negative experience of any kind, citing dissatisfaction with the cost, use of x-rays, or perceived pressure to avoid advice provided by different practitioners. What a resoundingly positive endorsement of chiropractic care for children! Even when there was some lack of satisfaction, it wasn’t for the adjustment itself, but other concerns—and a minimal 0.3% at that. I think any business or profession would dream of having a 99% satisfaction rate or a less than 1% dissatisfaction rate! (Whichever way you like to phrase it—it’s a pretty good thing!)
Some key highlight numbers to take away from the review:
21,824 submissions from people who had accessed chiropractic care—the largest of any public stakeholder engagement (26,319 submissions total—about 4,500 respondents hadn’t accessed care for their child)
98.4% indicated that the child was “much improved” or “somewhat improved” after treatment.
99.1% of respondents indicated that they were either “satisfied” or “very satisfied” with information provided by the chiropractor about the benefits of care.
95.8% stated they were “satisfied” or “very satisfied” with the information provided about the risk of treatment.
This is a major testament to the effectiveness of chiropractic—over 20,000 real people with real positive results! When all of these families who have seen chiropractors take the time to write and support them, you know the profession is doing the right thing. What chiropractic does for children and families is absolutely amazing!
And yet, today in 2024, we find our profession under attack again in Australia for seeing children. Is there any other health profession that can boast this kind of satisfaction response and still be told it’s dangerous or not worth pursuing?
Again, I share all of these facts mostly to get you excited about the amazing things that happen when families are under chiropractic care, but I also hope it serves as a small wake-up call. Please make sure you don’t take your ability to adjust families or take your family to a chiropractor for granted. This is a lifestyle that every family should have the choice to pursue, and anyone trying to misconstrue that truth or limit that option needs to be challenged. While I hope it doesn’t come to a review like this in the US or any other countries, the public has spoken in resounding fashion here in Australia and they shouldn’t be ignored.
Chiropractors and their teams are doing heroic work everyday keeping people of every age functioning at their best. Take the time to share your positive stories and continue to celebrate how amazing chiropractic is for you and the children in your life, and just maybe no one will ever dare to propose taking this choice away from us in the future.
Amanda Gaffey-Smyth
Appears in Pathways to Family Wellness Magazine
Issue #83
Provided and published by ICPA. For more information, visit discoverkidshealth.com
