Shoreline Medical Services/ Hutter Chiropractic Office Offers Options to Opioids for Pain Relief

Opioids. Back Pain. Treatment Options. Chiropractic has a role in managing and easing pain that shouldn’t be ignored. Primary care physicians do not feel much confidence treating musculoskeletal pain. (1) Family practitioners are the leading prescribers of opioids. (2) Meanwhile, who treats 40% of pain patients? Chiropractors! (1) Your Groton chiropractor at Shoreline Medical Services/ Hutter Chiropractic Office takes care of many pain patients and eases a good deal of Groton back pain often without opioids.

STATISTICS ON OPIOIDS FOR PAIN

These statistics are based on a huge study of 478,981 recently diagnosed, “opiate-naïve” patients who start taking opiates for pain relief. (2)

• 40.4% of pain patients received opioid prescriptions initially inside the first year of pain while only 4% met the requirement for long-term use.
• Family practice doctors are the most common first prescribers of opiates for pain whose risk of prescribing these early in the pain process is 24.4% while those patients then have a 2% risk of long-term, continued opiate use.  
• Patients who look for care from emergency medicine doctors (43.1%) or urgent care facility (40.8%) are most certainly to be prescribed opiates early in their pain cycle.
• Patients diagnosed first by a pain management doctor or physical medicine and rehab provider have an increased risk of long-term opioid use by 6.7% and 3.4%, respectively.

Shoreline Medical Services/ Hutter Chiropractic Office welcomes pain patients to seek Groton chiropractic care sooner than later!

PHYSICIANS WHO TREAT PAIN

Primary care physicians (52%), pain physicians (2%), chiropractors (40%), acupuncturists (7%) doctor chronic pain patients. Primary care physicians are the least probable physicians to feel confident treating musculoskeletal and neuropathic pain. (1) Chiropractors like yours at Shoreline Medical Services/ Hutter Chiropractic Office confidently offer non-drug management and/or co-management with other providers for the pain relief and pain control for Groton back pain patients.

CHIROPRACTIC’S PLACE IN PAIN CARE

Shoreline Medical Services/ Hutter Chiropractic Office wonders why chiropractors aren’t more immediately thought of in the process for Groton pain relief, especially Groton back pain relief. Chiropractic services intergrate spinal manipulation (one of the highest recommended types of care for back pain by the American Pain Society and the American College of Physicians (3)), exercise, and nutrition. What stops some medical doctors from considering nutrition? A recent article states the reason in its title: “Nutrition: Push For Doctors To Learn Nutrition: Many Graduate Without Training.” It also notes that patients believe their medical doctor understands nutrition. (4) And that is ok if healthcare professionals coordinated care sharing their expertise, recognizing that each offers value in the care of the pain patient and has the best interest of the patient at heart. Chiropractors are proficient in non-surgical and non-drug care of pain, back pain, and spine pain.

COORDINATING CARE

Knowing that a healthcare provider’s profession influences his/her treatment recommendations, guidelines for Groton back pain patient care are established in an attempt to apply the expertise maximally. Interdisciplinary care challenges differences among professions and their recommendation standards so that a patient gets a consistent therapy message with current treatment guidelines. Activity messages do vary by profession though: nurses were more restrictive in their recommendations of activity; physicians were more aligned with guidelines; physiotherapists recommended much more activity but less work activity than physicians. (5) Shoreline Medical Services/ Hutter Chiropractic Office collaborates with other local Groton healthcare providers for patient care, appreciating their expertise and involvement in Groton back pain patients’ return to activities of daily living that make each day more pleasant.

CONTACT Shoreline Medical Services/ Hutter Chiropractic Office

Schedule a Groton chiropractic appointment with Shoreline Medical Services/ Hutter Chiropractic Office for interdisciplinary care of your pain. Your Groton chiropractor is willing and able to work with fellow Groton healthcare providers and to share with you options on managing your back pain beyond and/or alongside opioid drug care.