How Important is Maintenance Care?

To really understand the importance of maintenance care in Chiropractic, it is necessary to understand the other types of care as well.  There are three main types of care that an individual will undergo while at a Chiropractic office:  1) initial intensive care, 2) corrective care, and 3) maintenance care.  Each of these three types of care is essential in the process of getting an individual better and, just as important, keeping them better for the long term.

One important fact to remember as we go through the different types of care is that symptoms are only part of the injury, not all of the injury.  This point cannot be emphasized enough (if I could make that last sentence bigger and bolder I would, but I don’t think it would fit).  When an injury or problem occurs, the symptoms are what motivate us to get care, but they are not necessarily what require care.  Pain is the most common symptom associated with an injury.  Some other common symptoms include numbness, tingling, loss of function, swelling of the area, redness of the skin, and increased temperature of the injured area. 

Initial Intensive Care:

This is the first step when a new injury occurs or an old injury resurfaces.  Initial intensive care consists of a large number of visits in a short period of time, often three times a week for three to four weeks.  This allows for the Doctor to make significant changes fairly quickly and often decrease the amount of pain or discomfort an individual is experiencing.  It is not uncommon for individuals to experience significant improvements in both symptoms and function during this period. 

Corrective Care:

Corrective care is the second step in the healing process.  Although a majority of your symptoms may have improved, muscle and other soft tissue damage may still be present depending on the severity of the initial injury.  Visit frequency is decreased during corrective care, and stretching and exercises are often used to further the healing process.  This stage is very important in attempting to fix the underlying problem that originally caused the symptomatic state.  Often times the symptoms will vanish completely in corrective care, but it is important to remember that this does not mean that the problem is solved.

Maintenance Care:

Once maximum improvement is reached through the initial intensive care and corrective care steps, maintenance care is highly recommended.  Although maintenance care cannot guarantee that the problem will never return, it does significantly decrease the chances of a recurrence as well as ensure that recurrences are easier to manage.  Individuals who receive maintenance care tend to have fewer reoccurring problems and recover more quickly when they do.  Maintenance care is also beneficial in detecting other issues early to make sure they are dealt with before they grow into more serious problems.  Suggested maintenance care is generally one visit every four to six weeks.

 

            A great example of how maintenance care can help is illustrated in these factual cases about two different patients who presented to our office recently.  Both of these patients originally came to the office for low back pain in the past.  Both had made it through the initial intensive care and corrective care stages and were pain and symptom free.  Patient 1 (whom we will call Ned) decided to pursue a maintenance care schedule, coming in every six weeks for continued care.  Patient 2 (whom we will call Marie) decided to discontinue care after her she was feeling better and her symptoms had decreased.  This is where the story starts--Ned and Marie, two patients with similar problems, decide to take different routes after feeling better.

Fast forward to this past September, when Ned and Marie present to the office on the same day with an exacerbation of their original low back issue.  Both Ned and Marie were experiencing pain that was a 9/10 (ten being the worst possible pain), both were having difficulty functioning, and both were seen five times over the next ten days.  Both patients were treated with similar Chiropractic techniques as well as therapies.  Ned, who had previously been following the recommended maintenance care schedule, improved to a 2/10 pain level and experienced increased functionality after only five visits.  Marie, who had discontinued care after starting to feel better from her previous injury, improved to a 7/10 pain level after five visits.  Marie continued with care and was down to a 4/10 pain level after 10 visits, and she currently continues to improve with care.  This is a drastic difference in response to care!  Ned was able to get back to his daily routine much faster than Marie and with significantly less care.  Returning to normal faster means less time off work, less time in pain, less time being immobile due to pain, and a quicker return to being active and enjoying life.

Maintenance care is the best way that you can help keep your spine and nervous system functioning at peak performance.  As I mentioned before, following a maintenance care schedule does not mean you will never have another problem again.  It does, however, significantly decrease the likelihood that you will have further issues, and if you do, it can help you get through them much faster.