CF 075: Chiropractic Residencies, Fat Cat Drug Dealers, Osteoporosis & Yoga, & Pain Science

Today we’re going to talk about chiropractic residencies, fat cat drug dealers, Osteoporosis and Yoga, and we’ll talk a bit about some pain facts. You’ll find something for everyone in this episode so just sit back and enjoy a cornucopia of tasty knowledge nuggets won’t you?

But first, here’s that bubbalicious bumper music

OK, we are back. Welcome to the podcast today, I’m Dr. Jeff Williams and I’m your host for the Chiropractic Forward podcast.  

You have skipped gleefully into Episode #75

Introduction

We’re here to advocate for chiropractic while we also make your life easier using research and some good solid common sense and smart talk. 

F4CP

We has launched an athletes and opioids eBook called “A case for chiropractic: disrupting the cycle of pain, prescriptions, and addiciton.” I’m linking it in the show notes so go get and check it out. 

DACO

Let’s talk a bit about the DACO program. I freshened up my info on BPPV recently while going back through the drills and reviewing the material. Did you know that 85%-90% of BPPV is caused by the particles drifting off into the posterior canal? Epley maneuver is the best technique to take care of it when in the posterior canal. 

As a side note: If you want to sound smart, those particles are actually called otoliths until they move into a semicircular canal. When they do that, they become canaliths. Probably because they’re in a canal? Makes sense to me. 

Epley Maneuver knocks out BPPV of the posterior canal in about 85% of cases. However, if it does not knock it out, start looking at the horizontal canal, 10% of the time, or check for the anterior canal. There are other head maneuvers to try for those different instances so you’ll have to get smarter at that point or refer to a specialist. When they’re in a different canal, they can get a bit nasty. 

Personal Happenings

I have to tell you all that 2019 has been a bit of a freak year for growth around here. Absolutely crazy. April was a record-breaking month for me as you’ve probably heard me talk about in past episodes. We are looking at bringing on an associate to help us with the load. The thing you worry about is, “Is it a fluke and we slow down to the point that we don’t need the extra help and now I’m stuck with an associate?” 

I don’t move into anything quickly without a lot of thought. But, even if it did slow up a bit, an associate should be there to help grow the practice rather than just take some heat off the owner, right? These are the thoughts keeping me busy at the moment. I’m sure I’m not the only one out there thinking them either. 

If you have any comments or suggestions, shoot them to me at [email protected] and I’ll probably share them in a future podcast. That may be an interesting topic. 

Let’s get to the good stuff

Item #1

Our first item is called “Establishing a residency program for a chiropractic specialty in a public hospital system: Experiences from Denmark” by O’Neill, et. al. and published in Journal of Chiropractic Education in April of 2019[1]. 

As you may guess, this one has to do with establishing a residency program for chiropractors in Denmark. Just as the title mentions. The paper describes experiences and lessons from a 5-year postgraduate, hospital-based residency program. 5 Years. 

One word – two syllables – Day-um

Three pilot programs were done between 2009 and 2016. What they decided so far is that there needs some improvement to structure and content that they’re on the right track for sure. And…..wouldn’t you agree?

How much better would we be individually and as a group if we had a year or two of residency in a hospital setting? Our profession would be in a completely different space right now. That’s a guarantee I don’t mind making. 

While I’m sure students aren’t quick to jump on the idea, just imagine the network you’d build while doing your residency. The connections. The learning going forward. The benefits of residency programs throughout the globe are endless. 

I’d love to see our profession move in that direction sooner rather than later. I know a couple of schools have started this in American and I believe Canada but I’m not sure which ones and to what extent just yet. If you have that info, shoot it to me. I’d love to hear more about it. 

Item #2

Let’s move on to a Fat Cat Drug Dealer – aka John Kapoor, the owner of Insys Therapeutics. His claim to fame? The first pharmaceutical boss to be convicted in a case linked to the US opioid crisis according to an article in BBC News[2]. 

“A Boston jury found Kapoor and four colleagues conspired to bribe doctors to prescribe addictive painkillers, often to patients who didn’t need them. The former billionaire was found guilty of racketeering conspiracy for his role in a scheme which also misled insurers.”

“The court heard that Kapoor – who was arrested in 2017 on the same day President Donald Trump declared the opioid crisis a “national emergency” – ran a scheme that paid bribes to doctors to speak at fake marketing events to promote Subsys.”

Alright, there is more to the article but that’s good enough for our purposes. I have to say that it’s hard for me to get excited about someone going to jail for up to 20 years but I have to say, in this case, gimme a hell yeah, and amen, and why didn’t he get more time? Really, when you consider this dude contributed to over 72,000 opioid related deaths in one freaking year…..why isn’t he getting life in prison?

And this dude looks like a fat crypt-keeper. Like an unsavory Mr. Scrooge. He fits the part perfectly. I don’t know how anyone can get in this dude’s corner. Seriously. Terrible. Good riddance and if someone ever deserved to be worth 1.8 billion and then lose it and go to prison, it’s someone like this knucklehead. 

I’m not against medication. Hell, I’m not even against opioids when absolutely necessary and with close oversight. Medication certainly has its place. But not when it’s done like this guy did it. 

Good riddance and take out the garbage. 

Item #3

This next item is called “11 Important Things To Know About Pain” written by Nick Efthimiou who is an osteopath. It was published on April 30, 2018 so just a little over a year ago….published in Integrative Osteopathy and cited in the show notes[3]. 

I mentioned a week or so ago that pain has really started to move into my head space in a way that it never did prior to going through the DACO program. Pain plays a big part in the DACO and, as a result, I find myself more and more fascinated with the topic. 

I love the way the article suggests that we know more about pain typically than our patients know and it is hard to convey that information effectively so they suggest we use concrete language rather than abstract language, we use examples that relate well to us or the patient, and we repeat the key concepts until they stick with the patient so there’s no misunderstanding. 

1. Pain doesn’t equal tissue damage – He says this is the most important thing to understand about pain. He says there are countless examples of people experiencing tissue damage and not feeling any pain at all and vice versa. 
2. Pain is protective – Whether it is protective of an injured body part or protective of a threat to our brain’s concept of self pain is a biological process that is meant to keep us safe.
3. Pain is produced by the brain and localized to the body – Our brains produce a conscious experience based on input from the sensory nerves. Nociception is “noise” from the body. Sensory nerves that respond to thermal, mechanical or chemical stimulation are constantly sending signals to the spinal cord. Most of this is blocked, because it is just that – noise. However, when when those nerves are stimulated to a greater degree – think an injury, or contacting a hot surface – then your brain becomes aware of the change to the noise levels. Your brain, not knowing exactly what is going on, will respond by producing pain, and will decide to protect the area where the increased nociception is coming from. To make matters even more complex, we can have pain in the absence of nociception – think of amputees with phantom limb pain
4. Chronic Pain is Different To Acute Pain – Acute pain is usually a response to either a tissue injury or other immediate threat, it subsides as the injury or threat does. Chronic pain is the result of changes to the nervous system which make it more sensitive. This means the nervous system and brain become “hyper protective”, generating pain with little or no provoking stimulus. If something is wrong with the central control room, then everything linked to it (which is everything), can be affected.
5. Recurrent pain and multisite pain are both forms of chronic pain – Both recurrent pain and multisite pain are forms of chronic pain, and need to be managed as such. Often multisite pain starts as a single site, and progresses to multisite, chronic pain. 
6. Pain is never simple, even when it seems so – Pain is not linear, as in this happened and now this hurts. It is emergent. An emergent process is when two or more things combine to form something that doesn’t share the properties of the things that make it up. Because of this, and all the invisible and unconscious factors that contribute to us experiencing pain, we can never say that pain is simple.
7. Pain is not caused by “poor posture” weak muscles or being “out of alignment.” – It actually, many time, just the reverse. Poor posture is more likely caused by pain and poor posture is adopted as a defensive mechanism. Bam. That’s where I see minds exploding across our listenership. Kapow! 
8. Osteopaths (and other practitioners) don’t “fix” pain – When it comes to pain, the resolution lies within your own body and brain. Even pain relieving drugs can only work if you are in the right context – morphine doesn’t always help, while sometimes a placebo pill works better than the real thing. Pow. Snap. Kabam!
9. Everything can “work” –  There are claims from therapists, doctors and other kinds of healers about all kinds of treatments for all kinds of pain. It’s likely all of these people have numerous success stories to confirm that what they do works. This is not a bad thing at all. It is actually the goal of many therapies. The problem comes, when interventions are sold in misleading ways, i.e. they are sold as doing something unrealistic or impossible. Uhuh. I know some pretty whacky chiropractors. Of course let’s be fair. I know some wacky medical physicians as well. 
10. 10.Inflammation is a good thing – Inflammation is the body’s way of healing.Yes, it can be painful, but pain is a protective response. And you know what needs protecting? Injured tissues. That is not to say you need to completely rest an injured tissue by the way. It is simply saying that suppressing inflammation (particularly with drugs) can impair and delay healing. Stop with the ice. They also say though, chronic inflammation is not a good thing and should be managed differently than acute inflammation. 
11. How you live is more important than what you do – What is most important, particularly for sufferers of chronic pain, is living well, despite your pain. Healthy lifestyle habits contribute to healthy bodies and brains.

This stuff lines up with the DACO, it’s crazy. The folks that generated the DACO information, Dr. Anthony Nicholson and Matthew Long could have written this article. Word for word. In fact, before I got the end of the article and finally saw the name of the author, I emailed the article to Dr. Nicholson asking him if it was him that wrote it. Lol. 

Item #4

One more very short one. This one is called “Soft tissue and bony injuries attributed to the practice of yoga: a biomechanics analysis and implications for management.” It was authored by Lee, et. al. and published in Mayo Clinic Proceedings in March of 2019[4]. 

Here’s the conclusion, “Yoga potentially has many benefits, but care must be taken when performing positions with extreme spinal flexion and extension. Patients with osteopenia or osteoporosis may have higher risk of compression fractures or deformities and would benefit from avoiding extreme spinal flexion. Physicians should consider this risk when discussing yoga as exercise.”

News you can use people. I do hope you enjoy the show as much as I enjoy bringing it to you. It’s a blast. Do us a favor and tell someone won’t you?

This week, I want you to go forward with these points:

1. Establishing a chiropractic residency program for every school should be priority #1. For the school, the student, the patients, and the profession. 
2. Drug dealers usually get what they have coming to them. 
3. Chronic pain is a beast although it IS a fascinating beast. 
4. Don’t do any crazy yoga if you have osteopenia or osteoporosis.

The Message

I want you to know with absolute certainty that when Chiropractic is at its best, you can’t beat the risk vs reward ratio because spinal pain is primarily a movement-related pain and typically responds better to movement-related treatment instead of chemical treatments like pills and shots.

When compared to the traditional medical model, research and clinical experience show that many patients get good or excellent results through chiropractic for headaches, neck pain, back pain, joint pain, to name just a few.

Chiropractic care is safe and cost-effective. It can decrease instances of surgery & disability. Chiropractors normally do this through conservative, non-surgical means with minimal time requirements or hassle to the patient. 

And, if the patient develops a “preventative” mindset going forward from initial recovery, chiropractors can likely keep it that way while raising the general, overall level of health of the patient!

Key Point:

Patients should have the guarantee of having the best treatment offering the least harm.

That’s Chiropractic!

Contact

Send us an email at dr dot williams at chiropracticforward.com and let us know what you think of our show or tell us your suggestions for future episodes. Feedback and constructive criticism is a blessing and so are subscribes and excellent reviews on iTunes and other podcast services. Y’all know how this works by now so help if you don’t mind taking a few seconds to do so.

Help us get to the top of podcasts in our industry. That’s how we get the message out. 

Connect

We can’t wait to connect with you again next week. From the Chiropractic Forward Podcast flight deck, this is Dr. Jeff Williams saying upward, onward, and forward. 

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About the Author & Host

Dr. Jeff Williams – Chiropractor in Amarillo, TX, Chiropractic Advocate, Author, Entrepreneur, Educator, Businessman, Marketer, and Healthcare Blogger & Vlogger

Bibliography

1. O’Neill SFD, Establishing a residency program for a chiropractic specialty in a public hospital system: Experiences from Denmark. J Chiropr Educ, 2019.

2. Insys Therapeutics founder John Kapoor convicted in US opioid case. BBC News, 2019.

3. Efthimiou N 11 Important Things To Know About Pain. Integrative Osteopathy, 2018.

4. Lee M, Soft Tissue and Bony Injuries Attributed to the Practice of Yoga: A Biomechanical Analysis and Implications for Management. Mayo Clin Proc, 2019. 94(3): p. 424-431.

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