Medical doctors “putting down” Chiropractors is nothing new. It has been commonplace since the beginning of Chiropractic. But why?

Very often, it is easier to put someone else down than to lift yourself up. This is part of the human condition. Medical doctors included.

For thousands of years, Medicine was the established authority in healthcare. Chiropractic as a profession is only around 125 years old. It was once thought by medicine that if they couldn’t cure the patient, nothing or no one could. Medicine was the end all be all to health.

Chiropractic questions this authority by its mere existence. The Chiropractic model runs counter to the medical model. Some medical doctors see this “paradigm shift” as a threat to medicine’s control of healthcare.

Chiropractic though doesn’t want to be in control of healthcare. Chiropractic wants the individual person to be in control of their health, not the medical doctor.

It didn’t take long for Chiropractic to grow in popularity as an alternative to medicine. Medicine’s animosity towards Chiropractic grew as well.

This hostility came to a head in 1963 when the American Medical Association (AMA) created a “Committee on Quackery.” The committee sought a “containment of the chiropractic profession” that would “result in the decline of chiropractic.” Joseph Sabatier, the chairman of the committee said that “rabid dogs and chiropractors fit into about the same category…. Chiropractors were nice but they killed people.”

The bylaws of the AMA also forbid medical doctors from referring patients to a Chiropractor. Medical doctors who evened suggested Chiropractic as an option were quickly ostracized. The AMA considered Chiropractic “unscientific” and Chiropractors were called “quacks, cultists and charlatans.”

Chiropractic as the proverbial “underdog” had to fight tooth and nail in the courts and in the culture to prove these slanderous remarks false.

20 years and many lawsuits later, the U.S. District Courts confirmed that the AMA was violating the Sherman Antitrust Act against Chiropractic. The U.S. Court declared that “the AMA decided to contain and eliminate chiropractic as a profession” and “to destroy a competitor.”

Even though Chiropractic won its day in court, years of misinformation had taken hold of medicine and society. Facts might be on the side of Chiropractic, but belief systems don’t always line up with facts.

Many medical doctors who still today “put down” Chiropractic are ignoring the medical man or woman in their own office mirror.

Yes, there are still some old wounds between the two camps. Today, the majority of medical doctors and Chiropractors work together in healthcare symbiosis. Most Medical doctors and Chiropractors understand that helping people live healthier lives is what really matters.

No matter who you are, when you don’t understand something you either try and understand it more or try and understand it less. Medical doctors who “put down” Chiropractors are doing the latter.

- Jarek Esarco, DC, CACCP

Jarek Esarco, DC, CACCP is a pediatric, family wellness and upper cervical specific Chiropractor. He is an active member of the International Chiropractic Pediatric Association (ICPA). Dr. Jarek has postgraduate certification in Pediatric Chiropractic through the ICPA. Dr. Jarek also has postgraduate certification in the HIO Specific Brain Stem technique through The TIC Institute. Dr. Jarek is happily married to his wife Regina. They live in Youngstown, Ohio with their daughter Ruby.