Back Pain is Common & Costly
Spine pain is one of the most common and costly utilizations of health care in the United States, and the bulk of that cost comes from primary care medical physicians. A 2017 study showed that 60% of people in the U.S. with some form of lower back pain (LBP) paid a visit to a medical physician, 10% sought care from both a medical physician and an osteopathic physician, and only 30% saw a chiropractor.
Chiropractors Associated with Lower Medicare Costs
Researchers are now agreeing that chiropractic care may reduce the number of Medicare patient visits to primary care physician, and that this could save up to 83.5 million dollars per year in Medicare expenses.
The Medicare system is beginning to realize medical physicians simply do not know how to, nor are equipped to take care of the spine the way chiropractors do. There have been several studies that report chiropractors have more confidence in their ability to manage spine pain than medical physicians do.
Everyone Can Benefit
Many of these studies confirm that patients with spine pain have higher levels of satisfaction when working with a chiropractic doctor than with a medical physician. The effects of chiropractic care are not only being studied in Medicare groups, but in every age group. They continuously find that better neuromuscular and skeletal health, maintained by a chiropractor, is proven to have a positive impact body wide, and that may mean less visits to the doctors office.