It’s a fact of life today: Chiropractic is becoming more of a cooperative venture between doctors and patients.

Passive care has gradually yielded to a new practice model — one that merges the best of traditional chiropractic care with patient-specific, active-care protocols.

If you are not already on-board with these methods, you may be surprised to discover that adding rehab to your services is relatively easy. And you may also be surprised by the peripheral benefits this “active ingredient” has to offer.

Whether your preference is active care or rehab, the reasons for adopting these services are similar: Improved patient outcomes, compliance with accepted standards of care, and satisfaction of various third-party concerns.

These factors, along with growing expectations for doctors to show patient progress under care, explain much of the current interest in providing office-based rehab services.

GROWING DEMAND

But are other forces driving this trend? “The very services doctors have felt compelled to implement may be the glue that’s bonding patients to their practices,” says Allen Woodruff, president of Synergy Therapeutic Systems in Lake Mary, Fla. And it makes sense.

Active care offers patients a higher degree of involvement, better outcomes, and new methods for measuring their progress. It’s a win-win situation, with doctors gaining more credibility in the process. “When it comes to making a positive impact on doctors, their practices, and their patients, rehab scores high on all three,” says Woodruff.

The growing momentum in rehab services is also being felt by the industries that support doctors with these endeavors. “We see this trend literally exploding,” says Glen David, chiropractic office designer and CEO of Davlen Associates Ltd., Yaphank, N.Y. “Active care is a perfect fit for wellness practices and it’s a big value-added service for patients.”

Steven Weiniger, DC, managing partner of BodyZone.com, is also author of a book for patients on posture and rehab. He sees increasing interest in rehab services from the DCs he meets. He observes that about 25 percent of chiropractors used to say they had in-practice rehab. “Now it’s about 66 percent,” Weiniger says.

THE EDUCATION ADVANTAGE

Also driving the interest in active care is chiropractic education, which is gradually shaping the practice preferences of new graduates. Joe Ferguson, DC, MS, CCSP, has extensive credentials in rehab — and he’s also dean of the college at Life Chiropractic College West, in Hayward, Calif.

Ferguson has observed chiropractic academia’s growing interest in rehab and active care. “Today, almost one-third of the questions on the national boards of the physiotherapy examination involve exercise, stretching, balance, and rehab. And in California, a minimum of 120 hours of physiotherapy, electrical therapies, and exercise are required to graduate.”

Like it or not, those requirements give recent graduates an advantage over their seasoned peers when it comes to integrating active-care protocols.

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