Chiropractic is a health care profession that focuses on disorders of the neuromusculoskeletal system and the effects of those disorders on general health. Chiropractic services are used most often to treat neuromusculoskeletal complaints, including but not limited to neck pain, low back pain, pain in the joints of the arms or legs and headaches.
The Doctor of Chiropractic practice is a hands-on, drug free approach to health care that includes patient examinations, diagnosis and treatment. Chiropractors have very broad diagnostic skills and are also trained to recommend therapeutic rehabilitative exercises, as well as to provide nutritional, dietary and lifestyle counseling.
In many cases, such as lower back pain, chiropractic care may be a patient’s primary method of treatment. When other medical conditions exist, chiropractic care may complement or support medical treatment by relieving the neuromusculoskeletal aspects associated with the patients condition.
Like their MD colleagues, Doctors of Chiropractic are subject to the boundaries established in state practice acts and are regulated by state licensing boards. Further, their education in a four-year doctoral graduate school program is nationally accredited through an agency that operates under the auspices of the U.S. Department of Education. After graduation, they must pass national and state board licensing exams. Then annually earn continuing education credits through state approved programs.
One of the most common and well-known therapeutic procedures performed by Doctors of Chiropractic is the spinal manipulation (sometimes referred to as the “chiropractic adjustment”). The purpose of spinal manipulation is to restore joint mobility by manually applying a controlled force into specific joints that have become hypomobile or restricted in their movement as a result of tissue injury. Tissue injury can be caused by a single traumatic event, such as improper lifting of a heavy object or through repetitive stresses, such as sitting in an awkward position with poor spinal posture for an extended period of time. In either case, injured tissues undergo physical and chemical changes that can cause inflammation, pain and diminished function for an individual. Manipulation or adjustment of the affected joints and tissues restores mobility thereby alleviating pain and muscle tightness allowing tissues to heal.
Chiropractic’s conservative approach offers a safe and effective option for initial primary care for neuromusculoskeletal problems and more.
Functional Medicine is a systems biology-based approach that focuses on identifying and addressing the root cause of disease. Each symptom or differential diagnosis maybe one of many contributing factors to an individuals illness.
All clinicians take a patient history but what makes Functional Medicines timeline different is that it has the effect of giving the patient insight into previous life events to motivate them to change and participate in treatment. As an intake tool for organizing the patient’s history chronologically, the Functional Medicine timeline is a graphical representation that allows clinicians to identify factors that predispose, provoke and contribute to pathological changes and dysfunction responses in the patient. In this way, practitioners will be able to view temporal relationships among events which can reveal cause-effect relationships that might otherwise go unnoticed.
Commercial Driver License Department of Transportation
Professional drivers have been getting DOT-CDL exams for a long time but only recently have standards called for the providers of those exams to be certified. This certification process reduced the number of medical providers that perform DOT/CDL exams from over 440,000 to just over 40,000. Consumers need easy to access information that provides the means and opportunity for these busy professionals to get their exams, know their options and to provide feedback on their experience.
DOT URINE DRUG TESTING
We adhere to the DOT regulations (49 CFR Part 655) for urinary drug testing and can test in the capacity of:
- Pre-employment
- Post-accident
- Return to duty
- Random
- Reasonable suspicion
- Follow-up
Bitterroot Functional Medicine Clinic has been part of this transition from the 2008. We are here to answer any questions and provide a high level of service to all drivers and employers.