With all of the technological advancements in recent years, the chiropractic-based instruments that are currently available are better than ever.
Depending on which ones you use, some can help you more effectively diagnose the issue that is giving your patient pain or limiting their movement while others can help you treat issues faster and with more efficiency, providing your patients a higher quality of life in a shorter amount of time.
However, use of these newer and more advanced instruments aren’t just beneficial to patients, but they also provide advantages to DCs too. In fact, many chiropractors feel that they help improve their own health in many different ways.
Extending your career
Matt Tanneberg, DC, CSCS, specializes in sports chiropractic and believes in using tools and instruments to enhance his own physical health while still allowing him to give his patients the best in chiropractic care. Tannenberg he and his partner see approximately 300-350 patients over the course of a week at his practice, some of which include elite athletes from the National Football League (NFL), Major League Baseball (MLB), National Hockey League (NHL), and other higher level sports teams.
To help reduce the stress on his body when seeing this high number of patients (especially patients who rely on him to help them protect their health for their careers), Tanneberg says he performs manual adjustments on roughly 70 percent of them and mechanical adjustments the remaining 30 percent of the time. “Not only do mechanical adjustments help patients who are scared or new to chiropractic, but also it saves our bodies as well,” he says. ” For me personally, it has saved my hands and back, which will prolong my career.”
Stay in business
Jason Hare, DC and owner Pure Chiropractic agrees, stating that the use of instruments has even helped him continue to treat patients despite the fact that he was suffering with an injury.
“Last year I broke my hand. Not a serious break, but it needed two months to heal,” he says. “It could have been devastating for my practice, but I was able to shift over to instrument adjusting and there was no downturn.”
Hare also reports that he enjoys the use of a variety of different instruments to help him continue to provide quality patient care without damaging himself physically in the process. From the use of digital x-rays to avoid doing line analysis on x-rays, which is hard on the spine bending over those films for so long to software that helps with report writing using existing notes, all of these types of tools and instruments help save his body so he can treat his patients while still taking care of his own personal health at the same time.
Alleviating stress
Essentially, Hare says that anything he can do to relieve stress in his practice is huge because “the biggest demand on my health as a chiropractor is stress.” This is true for people in general as the American Institute of Stress reports that three out of every four doctor’s visits are for stress-related symptoms. Additionally, approximately 10 percent of all strokes are caused by work-related stress. On top of that stress is the basic cause of 60% of all human illness and disease, according to the American Institute of Stress. Thus, finding ways to reduce stress on the job is critical to helping protect your health.
Using instruments can help you both physically and mentally, which makes it one option worth considering. Especially if you want a long, healthy career in chiropractic.
