Scoliosis and Chiropractic

Photo by cottonbro studio: https://www.pexels.com/photo/x-ray-images-of-the-spine-5723884/

A patient of mine recently made the statement to the effect that she wished that I could help a relative of hers, but the person she was thinking of had scoliosis and that she knew chiropractors couldn’t treat scoliosis.

As I explained to her, it depends on the specifics of the case and how you define “treating scoliosis”.

The experiences that led me to become a chiropractor illustrate this well.

I was the first person in my family to be treated by a chiropractor, back when I was in my early teens, and I was treated for… scoliosis.

Prior to seeing the chiropractor, I’d had a few years of management of the condition with a medical orthopedist, who happened to be the team doctor for the Miami Dolphins – so he was a pretty highly-regarded doctor.

My scoliosis was relatively mild, and in such cases then, much as it is now, the medical approach was to wait until the curve progressed to the point where a brace was needed and if it progressed despite the brace, metal rods would be surgically implanted to hold the spine straight.

In my case, the orthopedist also gave me a heel lift in my shoe to correct a difference in the length of my legs that he believed was at least part of the cause of my scoliosis.

After about three years of my curve gradually worsening, my parents were growing somewhat frustrated that the orthopedist wasn’t being more proactive. A friend of my mother’s suggested we get a second opinion from her chiropractor.

My parents were quite skeptical of chiropractic, but given that the orthopedist wasn’t doing very much, they decided to at least find out what the chiropractor could offer.

The chiropractor, Dr. Paul Fisher, took some X-rays and did an examination and basically agreed with the orthopedist that my curve was still relatively mild and was not yet suitable for bracing, let alone surgery. But he disagreed with the orthopedic doctor’s assessment that I had an actual difference in the length of my legs.

Dr. Fisher said that I had a “functional” difference in my leg lenghts due to misalignment of my sacroiliac joint and that the shoe lift was probably actually making things worse. He was able to demonstrate this quite clearly by having my parents look at the length of my legs before and after my first chiropractic adjustment – my legs were completely even after he corrected the misalignment!

To make a long story short, using a combination of chiropractic adjustments and exercises to correct muscle imbalances, my scoliosis was mostly eliminated within a few months.

It was at that point that my father, who had a severe double (“S” shaped) scoliosis related to having polio as a child, asked Dr. Fisher if he could help his scoliosis. To give you an idea of the severity of my father’s curvature, each curve was about 45 degrees and the outer edge of his spine actually went underneath his right shoulder blade.

I remember Dr. Fisher’s response, “Mr. Best, I’m good. That’s the word with two o’s, not one. I can’t correct your scoliosis, but I do think I can make you feel better.”

My father was all for feeling better, as his back would go out periodically and he’d be bed-bound for a week or more at a time. This was happening a few times a year and the episodes were gradually becoming more frequent over time. So, my father started treatment with Dr. Fisher as well and he continued seeing chiropractors on a preventive basis for the rest of his life. From the day he got his first adjustment, other than a few isolated and brief episodes, he rarely had any back pain, despite still having a rather extreme scoliosis.

In addition, it is well-accepted that people with severe scoliosis typically have reduced life spans due to mechanical constriction on the heart and lungs caused by the distortion of the rib cage. My father lived to the age of 81. There’s no way to know whether chiropractic care had anything to do with that, but I suspect that the quantity of my father’s life was improved in addition to the obvious improvement in the quality of it.

Getting back to the general considerations of chiropractiors treating scoliosis, again it depends on the specifics of the case and what you mean by “treating.”

As with my scoliosis, in mild to moderate cases in which the patient has not yet reached “skeletal maturity” (which typically occurs in one’s early 20’s), actual correction of the curvature can often be achieved. Chiropractors typically employ treatments that may include spinal adjustments, massage techniques and other symptom-control therapies, exercises, and sometimes using braces (that are usually worn at night when sleeping).

In more severe cases, and in older patients with spines that are fully developed, correction of the curvature is much more difficult and may not be possible without surgery. Likewise, when complicating factors are present, such as my father’s polio-related nerve damage, curve correction is probably not possible through non-surgical means.

Regardless of whether or not the curvature is correctable without surgical intervention, there’s generally no contraindication for chiropractic treatment for patients with scoliosis, and in my experience, chiropractic care is usually helpful in managing the pain and discomfort associated with spinal curvatures, even rather severe ones.

That’s all for this newsletter.

Until next time,

George Best, D.C.