According to the Life Association News, Americans paid $13.7 billion dollars for visits to alternative medical practitioners in 1990. More than half or $10.3 billion was paid out of pocket.
In 1993, 1 in 3 persons made 425 million visits to alternative practitioners, exceeding the number of visits to primary care physicians. Those numbers continue to grow every year.
In a recent study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association, by 1997 Americans made 628 million visits to alternative health-care practitioners. They were spending more than $30 billion of their own money on complementary and alternative therapies each year. Nearly half of those visits were to Chiropractors and Massage Therapists.
Nine out of 10 members who have used alternative or complementary medicine would use it again. 80% would recommend it to others according to the Consumers’ Association. 75% of patients surveyed after treatment report “greatly improved”, and 67% reported “improved” or “slightly improved”, 88% reported they still experienced improvements after 10 weeks as reported by Stephen Fulder in The Handbook for Complementary Medicine.
What this means is that Americans are looking for alternatives. They are fed up with what medical healthcare offers. Unfortunately, medical students are only trained to examine, diagnose then prescribe. And if those prescription drugs don’t work they are trained to prescribe different drugs. And if those pills don’t work still you will get more drugs. Too many times the next option would be injections and then surgery. It would be good for patients if more medical doctors referred to alternative healthcare practitioners.
Please don’t get me wrong. I’m not completely against the use of prescription drugs or surgeries. Some times those drugs and surgeries can save lives. But much has been written about the overuse and abuse of prescription drugs and needless surgeries.
I know from firsthand experience. I suffered from a motorcycle accident where I had a fractured shoulder blade and was told I needed surgery while in the emergency room at a local hospital. Being a Doctor of Chiropractic, I knew I did not need surgery and therefore refused and did not allow the doctors to operate. They were not happy with me to say the least. I cost the hospital several thousand dollars. The average person would have accepted what the doctors said and they would have ended up with a needless surgery.
On another occasion, I was involved in a bad car crash. I ended up having torn cartilage (meniscus) in my left knee after it slammed into the dashboard. I used magnetic therapy to heal my knee and prevented another surgery.
It is critical for you to become your own healthcare advocate. Read self care books, search on the internet and find a holistic practitioner who will find real solutions to your health problems. If you do not have a holistic medical doctor, chiropractor, naturopath or acupuncturist, I highly recommend you start looking. One of my favorite sayings is, “You don’t know what you are missing until you know what you have been missing”.
Discovery Health airs a program called Mystery Diagnosis. Patients may go for years bouncing from doctor to doctor and prescription drugs to more prescription drugs while the patients’ health continues to deteriorate. Eventually some doctor may really listen to the patient or recall a similar case and then the right diagnosis is finally made.
There are numerous books and websites warning the public of the dangers of the medical system and how hospital, doctor and prescription drug errors are now the fourth leading cause of death in the United States.
One of my favorite websites which provides excellent unbiased health information is www.mercola.com. Dr Joseph Mercola shares his knowledge and wisdom to help you become more informed to be able to make better educated decisions about your health.
Needless surgeries range from those performed on children for ear infections, to unnecessary hysterectomies, cesareans (c-section), knee and shoulder arthroscopies, gallbladder removals, carpal tunnel, ulnar nerve transpositions, gastric bypass, lapband and many other needless surgeries.
I would like to switch gears now and share an amazing story with you. Gary was a cattle rancher from Montana. His wife was unable to get pregnant. They had been to several specialists and he had himself checked for any sperm abnormalities. The specialists could not find anything wrong with either of them or why they could not conceive a child.
Finally their family doctor told Gary to take his wife to see another doctor. Gary asked what kind of doctor he was recommending and his family doctor said he was a Chiropractor. Gary was confused as his wife had no back pain. Their family doctor insisted and because Gary trusted his family doctor he took his wife.
One of the goals of Chiropractic is to remove or reduce nerve interference, particularly in the spine. Nerve interference can affect the different organs of the body. By removing that nerve interference, homeostasis can be restored to those organs where there might be nerve interference. Nerve interference was not allowing her ovaries to ovulate.
As a result of Chiropractic care, Gary’s wife had three beautiful healthy children. I met Gary, his wife and their three children while attending Chiropractic school. Chiropractic had made such a HUGE impact in their lives Gary decided to become a Doctor of Chiropractic himself.
If you’ve had a bad experience with Chiropractic you just went to the wrong Chiropractor. If you have never experienced good Chiropractic care, you don’t know what you are missing. I encourage you to experience the many wonderful benefits of the largest natural alternative healthcare system in the world, Chiropractic. It has achieved that status for a very good reason. It provides results.
Millions of adults and children all over the world have benefited. Their lives and health have been greatly improved because of safe natural Chiropractic care. Chiropractic is notjust for back pain as was once believed.
I hope you make the decision and commitment to make 2010 the best year ever for your health and that of your spouse and children’s health as well.
“If people let the government decide what foods they eat and what medicines they take, their bodies will soon be in as sorry a state as the souls who live under tyranny.” ~Benjamin Franklin
Just like you don’t wait until you have heart problems to start preventing them. You don’t want to wait until you start having spinal problems to do something about it either. Make that call today. Get yourself and your family started on a preventative approach to a pain free, drug free, healthy life. What are you waiting for? Join the millions of people worldwide in the self care wellness revolution.
“He who has health has hope, and he who has hope has everything.” ~ Arabian Proverb