Do you worry about the cost of your healthcare?

Research shows that chiropractic care is a great option to help you feel your best without breaking the bank. 1,2

The cost effectiveness of chiropractic care

Cost can be a big factor when we make decisions about our healthcare. Researchers have been looking at what the most cost-effective healthcare options are for people with back and neck pain. Keep reading to find out what the research says.

Chiropractic care can save you money and help you to get back to work faster

For patient with neck or back pain, chiropractic care is a very cost effective option and costs less in the long term than medical care or physical therapy. 1,3

What does the research show?

Researchers reviewed 9 years of claims data from an insurance scheme in North Carolina that included about 660,000 people and over 6 million back and neck pain claims. 1,2

They took into account things like the patients age, gender and health history, and then looked at how much each claim cost based on whether the care provider was a medical doctor, physical therapist or a chiropractor. They also looked at the cost of the claim if all they did was offer the patients advice. hoping that they’d get better by themselves and not need any healthcare.

What they found in these studies was that the claims for the patients who were seen by a chiropractor cost significantly less than the patients managed by another healthcare provider. In fact, by the final year of this 9 year study the cost of a claim was from 2 to 5 times more expensive when a chiropractor was not one of the care providers.

And the claims managed by a chiropractor cost even less than the claims for patients who were given advice alone, because it would appear that those people ended up taking more time off work than the people who saw a chiropractor.

Disclaimer and References

This information is provided for educational purposes only. It is not intended to be professional advice of any kind. Whitetree Chiropractic Ltd encourages you to make your own health care decisions based on your own research and in partnership with a qualified health care professional.

1. Neck Pain in North Carolina. 2000 to 2009. A Statwide Claims’ Data Analysis. J Manipulative Physiol Ther 2016;39(4):240-51.doi:10.1016(j.jmpt.2016.02.007(published Online First: 2016/05/12). 2. Hurwitz EL, LI D, Guillen J. et al Variations in Patterns of Utilization and Charges for the Care of Low Back Pain in North Carolina, 2000 to 2009. A Statewide Claims’ Data Analysis. J Manipulative Physiol Ther 2016;39(4):252-62 doi. 10.1016/j.jmpt.2016.02.006(published Online First: 2016/05/12). 3. Jarvis KB, Phillips RB, Morris EK. Cost per case comparison of back injury claims of chiropractic versus medical management for conditions with identical diagnostic codes. Journal of occupational medicine: official publication of the Industrial Medical Association 1991;33(8):847-52 (published Online First: 1991/08/01)

With thanks to Dr Heidi Haavik