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Archive for category Musings

Why You Should Look Beyond Weight Loss for 2010

Dec 18

Posted by arinehart in Musings, Patient Education | Comments

Think beyond the weight...

Think beyond the weight...

Well it’s that time of the year again. Time to take a look back at 2009 and review your successes and failures. What goals did you set out to achieve? How long did it take for those goals to be forgotten? What new year’s resolutions are you going to set out to achieve in 2010?

The holidays are a fantastic time of the year to review your successes and failures because it’s a time when we are reminded of the important things in life. Perhaps now is the best time to outline what goals are important to you and begin establishing a detailed plan to attain them.

I don’t like “New Year’s Resolutions”. Even the wording rubs me the wrong way. Why not call them “New Year’s Commitments”? Better yet, last year Chris Guillebeau from “The Art of Noncomformity” talked about the process of conducting your own annual review. According to Chris “The idea is to create a road map for the year ahead – not a rigid daily schedule, but an overall outline of what matters to me and what I hope to achieve in the next year.”

Unique to Chris’s annual review is the concept of having a yearly theme. You see when we choose goals like “Weight Loss” and “Get Rid of Debt” it limits us to only achieving weight loss and becoming debt-free. There are 3 things to consider when making your 2010 New Year’s Commitments. Read the rest of this entry »

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Strange Swine Flu Stat

Nov 6

Posted by kschuster in Musings | Comments

Swine Flu... its not the pigs fault!

Swine Flu... its not the pig's fault!

This article is considered a “musing for entertainment” as it is solely based on statistical information (and possibly poor information). The author takes no stance pro or con vaccination.

Whether or not the swine flu vaccine is safe or effective continues to be a debate and is the basis for many families deciding against receiving the vaccine. So here’s an interesting consideration for you all. (But please don’t forget that correlation do not equal causation)

Mongolia has a population of roughly 3,000,000 people. According to the World Health Organization, as of November 4th there has been 6 deaths associated with swine flu. That means that 1 out of every 500,000 Mongolians have died of the swine flu.

The United States has a population of 305,000,000 people. According to the CDC on November 1st, there have been 4000 swine flu related deaths. That means that 1 out of every 76,250 Americans have died of the swine flu.

The kicker… Mongolia does not have the vaccine, the USA does. Is it that Mongolian Hospitals are superior to the US? Hardly… Mongolia’s health-care system is considered the 147th of 190. The USA ranks at 37. Is it because Mongolia is less densely populated? Unlikely. 1/3 of the population lives in a single city alone. Read the rest of this entry »

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Chiropractic’s Branding Problem (…and What to DO About it)

Oct 22

Posted by arinehart in Musings | Comments

Is this the best we can do?

Is this the best we can do?

A Critical Point in Chiropractic History:

It is no secret that Chiropractors only see 6-10% of the population while some 85% or more of people will experience back pain at some point in their life. Underutilization of chiropractic is not a result of chiropractic not working or failing to provide value to the health system. In fact, of all the therapies for low back pain, spinal manipulation is one of the few therapies (pretty much the only one alongside exercise) to show clinical utility. Chiropractic has also been shown to be cost-effective as chiropractors manage back pain cases more efficiently – keeping patients from becoming chronic back pain patients.

Chiropractors, if you haven’t learned by now, we’ve been fighting too long for a decreasing chunk of the healthcare pie in a system disproportionately focused on acute, reactionary care. While delivering the message of chiropractic for back and neck pain, we are still seeing the same 6-10% of the population with the same message. If we were a publicly traded company, Chiropractic would be bankrupt or at least receiving a bailout. Now, I don’t see a bailout coming our way anytime soon either. Ever since I started Chiropractic college, I’ve struggled to figure out why chiropractic is so underutilized by the general population. What has Chiropractic done wrong? More importantly, what can we do to reverse the trends? Read the rest of this entry »

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Professional Unification

Oct 18

Posted by kschuster in Musings, Your Money | Comments

Better together?

Better together?

The 2000’s has been a time of significant change for the chiropractic community. One of the more interesting to me is the increasing occurance of state chiropractic associations unifying. Just last month Virginia’s Virginia Chiropractic Association and the Virginia Chiropractic Society (which had a great Acronym, VSC!), unified, and more states are considering similiar moves.

My question to you. Do you feel that unification of straight and mixer chiropractic associations is a good idea, for either the state or national level? Please comment.

In my personal opinion, I think this is a great idea. I believe that our professions biggest enemy is ourselves, not MDs, the government, or insurance… gasp! I know our profession has its significant differences, but really we should provide a unified front for the community.  Look at the AMA, they are an increadibly diverse group or individuals and opinions, and believe me they argue in house, but they speak to the population as a unified force. If as a profession we were to band together, I feel we would finally be able to exercise some power in government and insurance… one group of 70,000 is far more powerful than 4 groups of 18,ooo people.

What are your thoughts? or thots…

Should the national associations unify?

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Some Nutritious Food For Thought for the Gym-goer

Oct 16

Posted by kwatkins in Exercise, Musings | Comments

Everyone needs exercise

Everyone needs exercise

*This article is considered a musing. Musings are articles of interest, but not of research quality. Instead, they are designed for entertainment or personal opinion.

My remarks for this most recent pearl of wisdom stemmed from a couple of different incidents molding together. I finally got myself back into a formal strength training program after being on hiatus for about 3 months (ah ah ah…doesn’t mean I wasn’t running around. Remember, exercise is the meaningful execution of preplanned and purposeful physical activity) when I realized I was only about 6 weeks away from my first internship and I needed to get some hypertrophy going if i was going to be of any use to my future patients (first internship is in outpatient neuro rehab – very taxing). So I wandered down to the health club, which is in a fairly affluent area and on my way in, as well as while taking inventory of what this place really had to offer, I saw a decent amount of people who were interested in their health. Lots of people, biking, running, playing basketball, lifting, etc., but knowing these white collar types, a thought instaneously flashed through my head – what does he have need to be that big for? – as I passed by one gentleman. Very prejudicial, I know, but I can’t help it – first impressions were always snap and uncontrollable with me.

After my 30 min jog on the treadmill, I stretched out and made my way to the weight room to again assess what equipment the administration thought was necessary. Outside the weight room and above the water fountain hung pictures and credentialing of all the personal trainers (serendipitously convenient, no? These guys are good). I was happy that everyone had at least a Bachelors degree in something related (although my ears pricked after reading one girl was touted as having experience with physical therapy as a result of an internship she had, but there wasn’t anything after her name to suggest she was actually a P.T.), but under one gentleman’s mini CV he only had written “Fitness is a Lifestyle!” This is true, however….
Read the rest of this entry »