In alternative treatments, patients are told that “it will take time to regain your health.” Granted sufficient cultural authority, chiropractors and other alternative medicine practitioners could dissuade patients from risky and painful medical tests, dependence on addictive drugs and needless surgeries.
This makes what chiropractors do secondary to what they prevent. True natural healing may involve distracting patients with a good story and avoiding medical interference. Spinal manipulation at least gives patients time, reassurance and permission to recover — without a costly back surgery that often has no greater probability of success than time and encouragement. (Of course, alternative medicine can become the new dependence — and the new form of bloated expenditure — as “regaining health” creeps into ongoing treatment for “maintaining health.”)
The greater theme here is that so much of our health and well-being lies in our connection with others. My study found that people receiving care — even if it was sham therapy in a control group — showed greater improvement over those stuck on a waiting list.
The logical conclusion is that we are more resilient and more likely to recover if we have a plausible explanation of why we hurt and when the pain might end, and if we know that someone cares. How many other conditions might also require just patience, community and time to heal?
In praise of placebos - Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
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