National Chiropractic Health Month (NCHM) is a national public awareness and education campaign held each October. NCHM strives to teach health care consumers about the benefits of chiropractic services and to promote the importance of reaching optimal levels of health and wellness.

This year’s  theme is “Conservative Care First!” Teaching the public to use a “Conservative Care First!” approach to pain management and health enhancement is both sensible and effective.

For years, many patients would find relief through conservative forms of care such as chiropractic services only after unsuccessfully trying a range of other, more complex and riskier treatments.  Today this approach has been reversed. There is more medical research and guidelines supporting the idea that patients should exhaust conservative approaches to pain management before moving on to other options.

Chiropractic is a conservative approach where the focus is gentle joint manipulation to restore lost range of motion and muscle rehabilitation to stabilize the body. It is a wonderful non-invasive procedure repeatedly shown to reduce pain and help patients function better in daily life.