DC student wants chiropractors more active .. 2-25-00 I have been reading your frequent emails for a few weeks now and I have never responded just because I never thought you may be interested in all the feedback that could be possible from your extensive mailing list, but per your comments I have a couple of comments and questions for you. I agree that the medical profession and the pharmaceutical industry wield a great power in exactly what you stated..."As conservative healthcare providers we see our medical friends and their pharmaceutical cohorts always exerting their will and power on a naive public. Fear used as a tool is very powerful .. ", however, I see Chiropractic having access to an even greater source of power...Information. You see, if the public was not as naive as we both agree for the most part that they are, then we take that power of information and empower the pubic, and for that matter the patient. And through the power we as "educators of the patient/public" give the patient we are empowered with the trust that we earn from our own giving. It sounds so simple yet even as a 1st quarter student I can see the complexity involved in the implementation. Money, the often used scope goat when we are asked "why aren't we doing more?" Our profession is divided amongst itself between the ICA and ACA. I understand that we do not have the 1 billion dollars per month to spend on "educating" the public. Yet, there is another tactic and I hope what will be soon a call to arms among D.C.'s. We have to spend our own resources locally. Even if it means several practices joining together and funding different programs for television, radio, print and especially the internet. I am not talking about "infomercials", but the highest quality "public service commercials". Designed without direct referral to any practice or mud slinging. D.C.'s can write weekly column's for print media as a public service to educate readers. D.C.'c could even have talk shows or be a frequent guest. We should own newspapers, production companies, sponsor television programs, radio talk shows, write books and invest in our own research. We need to focus on what my Chiropractic History Professor terms the "higher level" of chiropractic and not the "back hurt, me fix" syndrome that the public perceives us as. The other approach we have as far as financial resources are concerned is insurance companies, HMO's, PPO's, etc. When we are able to prove to them that the bottom line is chiropractic care saves them money and in effect makes them money we may be able to solicit their support as well in the realm of education. There are already insurance companies taking the step to test the effectiveness of having D.C.'s as first contact doctor's. I know the word physician is taboo, and I am in know way advocating a change in name or scope of practice to the extent of prescribing drugs, but the phrase "Primary Care Physician" should point to us. How else can we implement our own ideology of "Chiropractic first, Drugs second, and Surgery last?" The schools need a slight adjustment in the level of diagnostic training and they need to try and get our students into clinical rotations in acute environments like hospitals to adjust the sickest people in this country, to start building inter-professional relationships and a greater understanding of what our patients are going through...not to become more medical or to assume the role or treating a disease process with drugs or surgery. All of this can start at the smallest level, and honestly I think we will be more effective if we do it on small, personal and local levels. As much as I hesitate to make the analogy but I must reflect on one of the most successful and debt free companies in the world. They gained their success one person, one business agreement, one partner at a time...AMWAY. I don't represent them but their success story cannot be denied and it does not change the fact that to reeducate the public we are selling them on the idea of living better, healthier, more prosperous and less afflicted from the status quo of today's healthcare. I didn't plan on writing this much. I have a lot of studying to do. I hope this has not been an inconvenience.