How Often Should You See a Chiropractor?
(It Depends on This!)

Jeffrey Jones 

Going to be highly dependent on the type of condition we’re dealing with. But I’ll answer this as two common scenarios. So, first one being somebody comes in with acute low back pain, right? How often we’re gonna see you? for how long are we gonna see you. Typically when somebody’s in really bad acute pain, we’ll probably wanna see you 2 or 3 times for a few weeks, make sure we get that pain under control, start identifying some of these functional indicators that may have led to that pain, are you developing that condition. But usually in that acute phase, we like to be fairly aggressive, see you quite often for a couple of weeks, 2 or 3 weeks usually.

Once you’re out of that initial pain phase, we’ll start to see less often, maybe once or twice a week, for a few weeks as we really dig into those functional indicators, how you’re moving, things that you need to be doing outside of here. We identify, hey, are you lacking the basic fundamental movement skills to be able to do that in a confident, pain-free way that doesn’t lead to potential future injury? If we identify any weaknesses, we address those, and then once we get you out of that kind of functional rehab phase, we’re more in the maintenance realm, you know, once a month, some people like to come in. I would say for regular care, but once every 2 to 3 months, probably at most. That allows us to be able to basically identify if are you losing joint range of motion that you don’t normally notice throughout your day to day life. Are the functional exercises going well? Do we need to change anything about the way that you’re exercising and the way that you’re moving so that we can keep you out of that acute phase where we’re having to see you quite as often.

OK, now that second scenario, let’s say you’re wondering that you read somewhere, somebody told you that, hey, you should see a chiropractor on a regular basis, I think it’d be a good idea. Not a bad idea. I really think as somebody’s wanting to do that just cause they think it’s gonna help them be healthier or move better, yeah, of course, we can address that, as far as just basic joint mobility goes. Like I said, in the previous scenario though, we also would take that a step further and look at your movement patterns, especially if you’re in the gym or you’re being active. We definitely want to take a look at what it is you’re doing. Do you have the skills, the movement capability to do that in a safe way that you’re not gonna re-injure yourself. But yeah, for the person who’s just looking to get on regular chiropractic care because they think it’s gonna help them live healthier move better once a month, once every 3 months if you’re really on top of your health, I think that’s totally sufficient.

Now, that being said, that’s under the assumption you’re seeing a good high quality chiropractor who’s got the ability to look at those movement patterns. If you’re in one of these offices that they’re trying to sell you, you know, 3 times a week for the indefinite future, several months or whatever, relying solely on traditional chiropractic things run from that office, that’s not what you need. Make sure you’re going to somebody that knows how to look at those functional movement patterns that’s gonna take into account what you’re doing outside of the office and help manipulate things about the way you’re living your life, from a movement rehabilitation standpoint.