"In that article, I maintained that chiropractors are fully qualified to perform the required physical exa-minations. The core curriculum of every chiropractic college provides the necessary training and the National Board of Chiropractic Examiners (NBCE) assures clinical competency in all the required areas of examination.2 Every chiropractor who has successfully completed the national boards and who maintains a license has already demonstrated competency in the examination process. In fact, the NBCE had a clinical competency examination, Part IV, for over eight years before the medical profession developed one."
I disagree with this based on my knowledge of the curriculum at Life University, the largest institution that has graduated 20% of all practicing chiropractors. This institution taught many graduates an alternative unapproved system of diagnosis and graduates are not qualified to perform these examinations. Further, NBCE does not rigorously test on differential diagnosis and many individuals are able to pass the tests despite not knowing the subject well.
For these reasons I argue that chiropractors should not be given carte blanche to perform as care providers in the US military but only as therapists working under duly licensed medical physicians.
"Is Your Chiropractor Safe? Accreditor Admits 12% of Chiropractors Are Unqualified"
"In God we trust, all others bring data" -W. Edwards Deming
rulerboyz Guest
Re: DCs should not be permitted to do military exa « Reply #1 on Apr 22, 2006, 5:06pm »
Allen,
I would imagine that Nemo and I are as familiar with Part IV as anyone else here and we can vouch for the fact that this exam is not quite as grand a test of clinical competency as this author is suggesting. In fact the only "grand" thing about it is that it costs about a grand to take the test. There are so many holes in the chiropractic college experience that Chiropractors are really not even qualified to realize the full extent of their own inadequacy on the topics pertaining to diagnosis, physical examinations etc... Part IV is just another excuse to give to Chiropractors to help them think they are as qualified as primary care physicians as they would like to believe they are.
Nonetheless, amidsth such a lackluster educational experience, Part IV is actually probably the single closest thing that most of the Part IV candidates will get to knowing what a good testing/educational experience is like. Please note, this is not in any way a positive testimonial for the Part IV exam or for the NBCE. This exam is just another hoop to jump through in the bogus journey towards becoming a chiropractor.
As I've stated in the past, I often overheard Life students during board exams make comments such as: I've learned more this weekend than I have in the past 6 quarters. Board review instructors would even at times point out how weak Life's educational process was, while trying to top off our tanks with the Board passing mnemonics and tidbits we needed to be able to pass our boards. This is not to say that it isn't the same situation in Med school, certainly they take board reviews also with the same aim of trying to get just enough to help them make it through. However, I think that in the case of Life University students, they were even more desperately leaning on the help of board reviews to help give them a much needed edge. They after all need to be able to perform adequately on an exam that is also taken by the students from schools such as National where training in differential diagnosis is done much more competently. In fact, I recall a board review instructor mentioning that they would need to spend a little extra time on specific topics as compared to when they would teach the same material to National students.
Joined: May 2006 Gender: Male Posts: 2,376 Location: CA
Re: DCs should not be permitted to do military exa « Reply #2 on Apr 22, 2006, 10:09pm »
It's no secret that I think the NBCE people are rat bastards.
They call their test "valid", but the material they test on is invalid, unreliable, quackery, and often downright dangerous. The "valid" term is just referring to testing statistics and the possibility that any chiropractic dummy can pass.
On my first test, for example, I opted not to manipulate several times...One was an advanced case of AS ( fracture prone, osteoporotic, transverse ligament compromised, etc.) When I found out I was supposed to put manipulation in the treatment plan, I freaked....I have even asked the EB types on the spinedocs site and no one could tell me why I should have manipulated this fracture prone patient.
The whole test is chickenshit stuff like this. To pass, one has to place patient safety below the glorious chiropractic adjustment.
I just can't get myself to think like a chiropractor.
Joined: Mar 2006 Gender: Male Posts: 20 Location: Minnesota
Re: DCs should not be permitted to do military exa « Reply #3 on Apr 23, 2006, 1:05am »
I am aware that much of the clinical experience in chiropractic training consists of performing a required number of adjustments on patients, volunteers, relatives or whoever can be convinced or paid to participate. How many complete histories and physicals does a typical student do prior to graduation? How much time is spent on this? What range of pathology does the average student see?
There is an excellent training and testing program already in place to qualify to do these exams. It's called medical school and Parts 1, 2 and 3 of the United States Medical Licensing Examination. Part 3 is taken after 1 year of training beyond medical school. This qualifies one as a "general practitioner". To become board certified in a specialty, including family practice, there are typically 2 or more extra years of extensive clinical work followed by another board exam.
Vertebral subluxations and adjustments have nothing to do with evaluating a patient's medical status or ability to safely perform a given job or task.
Joined: Mar 2004 Gender: Male Posts: 6,331 Location: USA
Re: DCs should not be permitted to do military exa « Reply #4 on Apr 23, 2006, 3:13pm »
I have to disagree with you Grim and agree with Nemo. Compared to the med school standard chiro training is a joke.
fam>How many complete histories and physicals does a typical student do prior to graduation?
12
>How much time is spent on this?
About two hours per patient so that's 24 hours.
>What range of pathology does the average student see?
Malingering, hypochondriacs, sore backs and necks-maybe a headache if you're lucky. I once had a patient with a suspected prolapsed disk and I wasn't allowed to neither order a diagnostic test nor treat. The patient was discharged to an outside physician.
Joined: Mar 2006 Gender: Male Posts: 20 Location: Minnesota
Re: DCs should not be permitted to do military exa « Reply #5 on Apr 23, 2006, 5:09pm »
So, do the legislators who are deciding who is qualified to do this type of exam have the slightest clue that chiropractors have essentially no training? In medical school it would be common to do 2 or 3 H & P's in one day on a hospital rotation (med students are green and need lots of time). In family practice residency, the numbers could easily hit 6-8 or more in one day on an inpatient internal medicine rotation. These are patients that are being admitted to the hospital either for treatment of known serious disease or with pathology that requires further diagnostic workup to arrive at a diagnosis. I wouldn't consider 12 H & P's enough to pass a 6 week med school clerkship, much less qualify to do this work unsupervised.
Joined: May 2005 Gender: Male Posts: 426 Location: CHIROPOLIS
Re: DCs should not be permitted ... « Reply #7 on Apr 24, 2006, 9:30am »
Quote:
[Life students] after all need to be able to perform adequately on an exam that is also taken by the students from schools such as National where training in differential diagnosis is done much more competently.
Well, that's the rumor that's circulating on both Life and National campuses. Lifers think Nationals are "more medical" -- a concept existing only in the deranged world of the chiropractor -- and Nationals (believing they are "more medical," too) think that Lifers must then be "more 'chiropractic.'" It's impossible to know who is being "more moronic" -- since, stepping back for the moment from this hair-splitting distinction -- no one is "more medical" than an MD and no one is more "chiropractic" than a chiropractor. Graduates from Life and National are chiropractors, in case you hadn't noticed.
Quote:
In fact, I recall a board review instructor mentioning that they would need to spend a little extra time on specific topics as compared to when they would teach the same material to National students.
Yep -- keeping the rumor alive and reinforcing the very stupidities that keep this particular chiropractic ball rolling.
The medical portion of a chiropractor's education is a simulation, required to play a doctor in real life. There are good imitations and imitators and bad ones, I suppose. Some might even argue, for example, that Nationals do the best medical impersonations -- just like there are good Elvis impersonators and some totally laughable ones. Still, chiropractors are doing medical impersonations at best, since chiropractors are not MDs practicing medicine. The short of it is, chiropractors didn't go to medical school to become MDs ... they went to chiropractic schools to become chiropractors.
That said, take two chiropractors and call me in the morning.
Joined: Mar 2004 Gender: Male Posts: 6,331 Location: USA
Re: DCs should not be permitted to do military exa « Reply #8 on Apr 24, 2006, 3:17pm »
>So, do the legislators who are deciding who is qualified to do this type of exam have the slightest clue that chiropractors have essentially no training?
No they don't. They get the same public relations as the article above-that chiropractors get the same number of didactic academic hours as medical doctors and that they have some kind of national board exam. The experience part is not covered.
There was no national pick up of that press release I did which showed that thousands of chiropractors can't diagnose-despite including adobe PDFs of the death certificates of student who died as a result.
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