“Given a choice, would you rather work in a solo practice or as part of a multidisciplinary hospital team” (Dynamic Chiropractic, January 15, 2011)? They say there is no right answer to a wrong question but apparently 225 responding chiropractors believed that they had the correct answer, at least for them. The scary part is that 57% wanted to be part of a “hospital team.” That means they see chiropractic as part of the disease treating model of health care. Of course, their thinking could be that everyone, even those in a hospital, need to have their spines checked for vertebral subluxations. Perhaps if that were the case we would no longer have to sneak into hospitals to check our practice members. I wish that were the reason why 128 made that choice. I think it’s more likely that they wanted to be part of the team for the same reason that chiropractors have desired hospital privileges in the past. The 43% who chose “solo practice” raises some questions as to their choice. Are they anti-medical/hospital? Do they see chiropractic as an alternative to medical care that can and should keep people out of hospitals? Or do they see the role of a chiropractor as no more part of a hospital team than say, an automobile mechanic or a plumber? Now that I think about it, that may be a good argument…Obama-care would then pay for auto and plumbing repairs. After all, an argument could be made that both bad plumbing and an incorrectly-working car are dangerous to your health. Actually, everything affects your health in one way or another.
I would hope that chiropractors do not see a trip to a hospital or that which is done in a hospital as relative to health in any way. If they do, it means that despite being a chiropractor, they have an outside-in perspective of life and health. If 43 % of the chiropractors understand that and that is why they said they would choose a solo practice, that’s encouraging. But I still believe it is the wrong question to be asking.
Sad and scary stuff, Joe. I think that the DC’s who take the time to answer Dynamic Chiropractor’s polls tend to be outside -in oriented. Perhaps it’s because they are lonely and bored in their (my judgement) un-inspired back-pain practices, so they wind up participating in useless internet polls instead of checking spines.