Can Chiropractic End the Opioid Crisis? | Podcast Ep. 116

Hello and welcome to the Evidence Based Chiropractor. I AM your host, Dr. Jeff Langme. This week we are going to talk about an epidemic in the United States and beyond. We are talking opioids. We are going to dive into some of the statistics and also talk about how and why chiropractic care can and should be in the middle of the solution. So you do not wanna miss this episode. So this week is about opioids and I want to give some context to the opioid epidemic and really to how chiropractic fits as the prime solution. So here's a couple statistics that might surprise you. Did you know that in a Gallup poll by Palmer College of chiropractic, nearly 80% of the public said that they prefer a non pharmacologic approach to managing spinal and physical pain? 80% of people do not want to be taking medications for physical or spine related pain. That's a vast majority. There is opportunity there for sure. But here is some of the bad news. Did you also know that over 42,000 people died of opioids? Died, were killed by opioids in 2016. So just a year and a half ago, less than two years ago, opioids killed 42,000 people and 40% of all opioid overdose deaths involved a prescription opioid. So nearly half of those 42,000 people, that was a prescription that they were taking from their doctor, trusting it and ended up in a tough spot, needless to say. So how does chiropractic fit into this? Well, I took a look at a study that came out just this year, 2018 in the Journal of Alternative and Complementary Medicine and it was titled Association Between Utilization of Chiropractic Services for the Treatment of Low Back Pain and Use of Prescription Opioids. Now get this. Here is the really exciting news with this. When people had chiropractic services, they were 55% less likely to fill a prescription for an opioid analgesic, 55% less likely to fill a prescription for a opioid analgesic that is exceptionally, exceptionally powerful. Imagine cutting the number of opioid prescriptions in over half by just availing a service that actually does a far better job, is far safer and far more cost effective, effective on top of all that. And that is what I believe we should be with chiropractic and what we do each and every day in our practices. So not too long ago, how did we get here? Well, not too long ago, opioids were marketed actually to the medical community as A safe alternative, believe it or not. So needless to say, many years later, we realized that that was a farce. They are unbelievably powerful medications that are exceptionally addictive and they get their claws into millions upon millions of individuals each and every year that result directly in tens of thousands of deaths. So that's the bad news. Now the good news is, as we just talked about, research out there showcases that people are literally 55%. They are like half as likely, more than half as likely to fill an opioid medication if they're under chiropractic services. So the question then becomes, where does chiropractic services fit in and how do we make that change occur? And to me, that is really where we can go with this episode of the podcast. So if we look statistically, we're very aware that over 90% of individuals let's. We'll set the stage a little bit. 90% of individuals have a spine related. Will have a spine related complaint at some point in their life. So 90%, almost everybody. Now the good news is, is that 50% of those people will recover within one week. So it just was a, you know, they were a weekend warrior and their back was sore on Monday and by Tuesday they, they don't even realize there anymore. So many of those people are probably not going to see. They might be seeing their chiropractor concurrently, but they don't really stimulate a new doctor visit, let's say. So but that still leaves 50%. So we take the entire population, we're gonna say almost everybody's gonna have back pain. And half the people are never, it's never gonna get too serious. And they manage it on their own, either just through time or some stretching, et cetera. But that leaves half the people, a lot of people that are gonna seek some form of medical intervention for that. So statistically we know that 30% of the daily volume in a primary care doctor office is related to spine musculoskeletal. So 30% of what they're seeing every single day is related to spine or musculoskeletal care. We know that chiropractic utilization is somewhere between 12 and 20%. I know there was a recent study that came out saying it was a little bit over 20%. I'd hedge still maybe towards the 12 to 15% marker. But the bottom line is this. Our utilization in my opinion, should be specifically for low back pain, should be 80% or more. And that's the low hanging fruit. I'm not stopping us at low back pain or stopping us at neck pain necessarily. But I'm saying until we have 80% utilization there, we still have a lot of work to do. So let's look at the ways that we can really get out there. One is to educate your community and I would encourage every doctor, everybody listening to do that, getting out and showcasing how and why your practice is a viable alternative to those medications. We know 80% of people don't want to take medications. So all you have to do is show the benefits of your practice, reduce fears and get people excited about, not about your care, about not reaching for that bottle, reaching for that medication. That's exceptionally important and that is something all of us can definitely do online and offline. Now the other component to that is as we discussed, many people are going to see their medical doctor, their primary care physician. We know that based on upon just the volume that these guys are seeing related to musculoskeletal and spine related complaints. Now here's the interesting part is that we look at another piece of research and we know 90% of primary care doctors have been asked about chiropractic care, yet only 11% have made a formal referral. That's a huge chasm, that is a gap that needs to be closed. 90% have been asked about chiropractic, 11% have made a formal referral. So that gap is the opportunity. People are going in and unfortunately being diverted many times from chiropractic care by their medical doctor. We know the medical doctor. The medical community relies on three things more often than not for spine related complaints. They rely on medications, they rely on physical therapy, or they rely on referral to another specialist, AKA more medications. So when we can bridge the gap and showcase how our practice, why it is safe, how it is effective, what we do and bridge the gap, building relationships. I am going to go absolutely on record saying we can absolutely save lives. This is about building your practice? Yes. Is this about getting more people exposed to chiropractic care? Yes. But let's look higher, let's look bigger. I truly believe that when you build relationships with other medical providers in your community, you have the ability to change and save the lives of many people in your community. And to me that is research, that's evidence based. Because when we look at these statistics and see nearly 40 plus thousand people dying because of opioids, half of them being because of a medication and many of these medications coming from medical community and them not having great options and they're obviously not well versed in what we do as chiropractors, I think all of us are doing a fantastically better job than in the past, getting out there and bridging the gap. But if you're listening to this and you have not started that process yet, I'd encourage you check out the free tools and resources that we have@the evidence basedchiropractor.com you can check out Resources tab and then Free Tools tab and you will find five secrets to MD referrals. If you want to set up meetings, you'll see the MD meeting guide. You will see reports and guides to help you start bridging the gap in your community. It can not only help improve your practice, not only get chiropractic out there to more people, but again, in my opinion, it can absolutely, absolutely change and save lives. And that is the most important mission, the most important calling that any of us could have. Now, additionally, I will say if you're looking for, as we talked about just a couple minutes back, if you're looking at kind of how to get out there to your community, if you want to really get out there, not B2B, not to those other physicians, which I would encourage you to do, but all of us should absolutely be getting out to the people in your community, there's a variety of fantastic tools and resources to do that as well. Now with, with myself, I am involved in the Smart Chiropractor. So that is social media driven information for your community and it's all about the exact type of things that we're talking about each and every week on this podcast. So the opioid epidemic is real. I think that the pendulum is going to start swinging back the other way because there obviously this has been an exceptionally large public health concern. It's gotten a lot of attention. And that is something that you know, and I say this right earnestly, we should use that to our advantage. Meaning what we do as chiropractors is exceptionally effective. It's been proven, it's exceptionally safe and it is many times the best option for these individuals that if they are not exposed to chiropractic care, can quite often go down the road of opioids. And we know where that road leads. So this is a really, really pivotal opportunity while this conversation is fresh in your community to make sure that you get out, make sure that you properly position your office, bridge the gap with other healthcare providers and really change and save the lives of people in your community. You can do it. And if you have any questions, if I can be of any assistance at all, Hit me up jeff@the evidencebasedchiropractor.com and I am happy to help guide any way that I can. I hope you have a fantastic week in practice and I will talk to you soon.

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