Johnson Chiropractic Offers Options to Opioids for Pain Relief

Opioids. Back Pain. Treatment Options. Chiropractic has a role in managing and relieving pain that should not be overlooked. Primary care physicians don’t feel very confident treating musculoskeletal pain. (1) Family practitioners are the leading prescribers of opioids. (2) Meanwhile, who treats 40% of pain patients? Chiropractors! (1) Your Richmond chiropractor at Johnson Chiropractic sees many pain patients and relieves plenty of Richmond back pain often exclusive of opioids.

STATISTICS ON OPIOIDS FOR PAIN

The following stats are based on a large study of 478,981 newly diagnosed, “opiate-naïve” patients who begin taking opiates for pain relief. (2)

• 40.4% of pain patients obtained opioid prescriptions for the first time inside the first year of pain but only 4% met the requirement for long-term use.
• Family practice doctors are the most usual first prescribers of opiates for pain whose risk of prescribing these early in the pain process is 24.4% while those patients then have a 2% risk of long-term, continued opiate use.  
• Patients who seek care from emergency medicine doctors (43.1%) or urgent care facility (40.8%) are most likely to be prescribed opiates early in their pain cycle.
• Patients diagnosed initially by a pain management doctor or physical medicine and rehab provider have a higher risk of long-term opioid use by 6.7% and 3.4%, respectively.

Johnson Chiropractic welcomes pain patients to seek Richmond chiropractic care first!

PHYSICIANS WHO TREAT PAIN

Primary care physicians (52%), pain physicians (2%), chiropractors (40%), acupuncturists (7%) treat chronic pain patients. Primary care physicians are the least likely physicians to feel confident treating musculoskeletal and neuropathic pain. (1) Chiropractors like yours at Johnson Chiropractic confidently offer non-drug management and/or co-management with other providers for the pain relief and pain control for Richmond back pain patients.

CHIROPRACTIC’S PLACE IN PAIN CARE

Johnson Chiropractic ponders why chiropractors aren’t more readily thought of in the process for Richmond pain relief, particularly Richmond back pain relief. Chiropractic services incorporate spinal manipulation (one of the top recommended forms of care for back pain by the American Pain Society and the American College of Physicians (3)), exercise, and nutrition. What stops some medical doctors from considering nutrition? A recent article states the reason in its title: “Nutrition: Push For Doctors To Learn Nutrition: Many Graduate Without Training.” It also notes that patients think their medical doctor knows about nutrition. (4) And that’s fine if healthcare professionals coordinated care along their lines of expertise, recognizing that each has a role in the care of the pain patient and has the best interest of the patient fundamentally. Chiropractors are well skilled in non-surgical and non-drug care of pain, back pain, and spine pain.

COORDINATING CARE

Knowing that a healthcare provider’s profession effects his/her treatment recommendations, guidelines for Richmond back pain patient care are developed to try to apply the expertise maximally. Interdisciplinary care challenges differences among professions and their recommendation standards so that a patient receives a consistent therapy message with current treatment guidelines. Activity messages do vary by profession though: nurses were more restrictive in their recommendations of activity; physicians were more consistent with guidelines; physiotherapists recommended much more activity but less work activity than physicians. (5) Johnson Chiropractic collaborates with other local Richmond healthcare providers for patient care, appreciating their expertise and involvement in Richmond back pain patients’ return to activities that they like to do.

CONTACT Johnson Chiropractic

Schedule a Richmond chiropractic appointment with Johnson Chiropractic for interdisciplinary care of your pain. Your Richmond chiropractor is ready and willing to work with fellow Richmond healthcare providers and to share with you options on managing your back pain beyond and/or alongside opioid drug care.