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[–] 106 points 7 months ago (18 children)

visited a friend's family reunion and met his chiropractor uncle. dude said he could cure diabetes and cancer.

he could barely pronounce diabetes. I will never ever understand chiropractor quackshit.

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  • [–] 8 points 7 months ago (2 children)

    I understand chiro quack shit the same way I understand crystals and essential oils quack shit. It’s all just quack shit.

    What I don’t understand is why insurance actually pays for chiro, at least sometimes.

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  • [–] 2 points 7 months ago

    I watch ASMR to fall asleep and quackery of all kinds is very relaxing to me. I’ve noticed that chiro and chakra/aura reading/crystal and herb touching all have the same vibe. The difference is that chiro sells itself as medical, uses a lot more scientific sounding jargon in a professional looking office, where aura stuff is mystical and spiritual with candles, incense, and mandala tapestries. It’s woo-woo for people who think woo-woo is beneath them.

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  • [+] -35 points 7 months ago* (11 children)

    don’t write it off completely… yes there’s a bunch of bullshit, but it’s also not entirely quack shit

    australia’s healthcare system covers chiropractic in limited circumstances, and our system is generally very good at evidence-based health (you’re allowed to get private health insurance to cover alternative medicines if you want but stuff the government pays for is well supported by evidence)

    with a GP referral and chronic condition management plan (written by your GP: this is an offical well defined thing) you get up to 5 total visits to “allied health” professionals which includes chiro, physio, dieticians, etc

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  • [–] 24 points 7 months ago (2 children)

    In germany some health insurances pay for homeopathy. It's still bullshit. Same for chiropractors.

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  • [–] 1 point 7 months ago*

    and i agree for things covered by health insurance alone: we have similar… you can get private health insurance in australia that covers crap like homeopathy too, and they also cover a huge amount more chiro than the government does

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  • [–] 4 points 7 months ago (3 children)

    The fact that insurance does or doesn’t cover something is not evidence of medical efficaciousness.

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  • [–] 1 point 7 months ago (2 children)

    i agree… the fact that public health care does, given the rigorous structures that are in place to follow medical advice, does though

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  • [–] 1 point 7 months ago* (1 child)

    We see this pretty differently. I take the fact that insurance covers chiro to be evidence that insurance doesn’t know what the fuck it’s doing. You assume insurance know what they’re doing and take them as evidence that chiro must have value.

    Taking assumptions out of it, what medical literature tells us is that chiropractic can be used to help alleviate lower back pain. This is an incredibly widespread ailment with no hard fix. A chiro adjustment offers a little pain relief. A massage or hypnosis or a blow job would probably perform as well in a blind trial.

    What has happened is that a whole universe of quacks has taken advantage of the fact that chiro is unregulated to get all manner of shit paid for by instance. There are chiropractors who will “cure” your allergies by adjusting you back while you hold a bag of weeds, “aligning your energy with the energy of the plant.” And a million other similar quack bullshit things.

    So yes, it’s not as if there is no case ever where chiro does anything. It’s probably about half as effective as a single ibuprofen at alleviating back pain. But it has become overwhelmed by quackery and fraud. Please tell me with a straight face that there is no fraud in the medical insurance area. Because that’s kind of what you keep saying. “Well insurance pays for it so that means it must be efficacious!”

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  • [–] 1 point 7 months ago

    no i’m saying that insurance has nothing to do with what i’m saying… government provided healthcare follows a whole different set of rules: i keep pushing back on that point and you keep bringing up insurance, which i agree would show absolutely nothing

    however anything that has the government paying for it has has to pass significant hurdles before it gets added to the list of approved treatments - scientific hurdles; not just hand wavy nonsense

    chiro might be unregulated where you are, but in australia it is regulated as a medical profession: https://www.chiropracticboard.gov.au/ which is part of AHPRA - the australian health practitioner regulation agency: https://www.ahpra.gov.au/

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  • [–] 3 points 7 months ago*

    To help you out, chiropractors and their practice are full quackery and pseudo-science. HOWEVER, osteopathic medicine practiced by a DO is real medicine. Osteopathic medicine and osteopathy are two related but different things. The difference being that osteopathic medicine originates from osteopathy but they ditched all the pseudo-science and actually backed it up with science.

    TLDR: If you want to get your back cracked scienctifically, find a Doctor of Osteopathic Medicine (aka a DO).

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