by Brittany Paris

On Jan. 31, 2004, Geri Carlson's life came to a screeching halt. She hadn't slept in five days, could barely eat, drink or talk and she'd lost 15 pounds in two weeks. The retired nurse's body was shutting down and her doctors couldn't figure out why.

"My medical doctors knew it was something severe, but they couldn't come up with a diagnosis," Carlson says. "They only offered the strongest medication on the market to help with the symptoms. But I didn't want a bandage, I wanted a cure."

She decided to try an alternative to traditional medicine and visit her chiropractor for relief. The same chiropractor had eased her severe asthma years ago, weaning her off seven of her eight prescribed medications, and she prayed he could once again save her. With one neck adjustment, Carlson says her symptoms immediately disappeared.

"Chiropractic delivered me from torment," says Carlson, who resides in Indiana and has since become a chiropractic care advocate and authored two books about her experience: "I Stand Amazed" and "Andrew Goes to the Chiropractor."

Carlson continues to see her chiropractor regularly to maintain her health. A few years prior to her 2004 health crisis, Carlson was diagnosed with a "shopping list of disorders" including Crohn's disease and Lupus. She says at one point she was seeing various medical specialists nearly every month. Since devoting herself to chiropractic care, she hasn't needed a medical doctor for four years.

Chiropractic care still often considered alternative

According to the American Chiropractic Association, 22 million people — approximately 8 percent of the population — see a chiropractor, mostly for neck and back pain, making it the fastest-growing health care profession in the United States.

Chiropractors are primary care providers: Patients do not need a referral from a medical doctor to see a chiropractor and chiropractors often run the same diagnostic tests such as X-rays. Yet chiropractic care is still considered an alternative medicine, although nearly 32 percent of Angie's List members polled say they visit a chiropractor. Of those patients, 74 percent rated their chiropractic experience as excellent.

"In many ways the two approaches can complement each other well," says Michael Kane, president of the Connecticut Chiropractic Association. Kane, a doctor of chiropractic, is a staff member at a large orthopedic surgical practice and collaborates with medical doctors on cases. One-third of his patients are direct referrals from MDs.

"Health care delivered by a multidisciplinary team has tremendous potential to remedy this country's health care crisis," says Angela Kargus, ACA director of public relations. "And chiropractic is widely recognized as one of the safest drug-free and noninvasive therapies available."

Chiropractic care dangers?

But some argue that chiropractic treatments, particularly neck (cervical) adjustments, can cause irreparable damage. The Chiropractic Stroke Awareness Group launched an ongoing public awareness campaign in Connecticut in 2005 and expanded its campaign to Massachusetts this year. Its commercials and billboards tout the message: "Warning: Chiropractic Adjustments Can Kill or Permanently Disable You."

It's a warning that some stroke victims say they never received prior to treatment. Elizabeth Dono of Tampa, Fla., sued her chiropractor in 1989 after she suffered a major stroke following a chiropractic adjustment. According to MRIs performed at the hospital, the abrupt neck twisting tore the vertebral artery that runs through the neck and blocked blood flow to parts of Dono's brain.

"When he adjusted my lower neck, I felt this rush go through my head," Dono says. "I screamed, everything started spinning and then I couldn't stop vomiting."

Dono, who was 38 at the time, received a $475,000 settlement, but she says the money doesn't compensate for the suffering she's endured. Once an active aerobics instructor, she couldn't hardly walk or talk for nearly a year after the stroke. She still struggles with short-term memory loss and balance impairment.

Study suggests risks of chiropractic complications low

The link between chiropractic neck adjustments and stroke has been hotly debated for years. The ACA cites scientific studies that put the risk of a major complication after a lower-back adjustment at 1 in 100 million manipulations. For injuries caused by neck adjustments, it is 1 in 5.85 million.

"The odds of suffering a serious adverse reaction from a chiropractic neck treatment are the same odds a person faces of dying in a commercial airline crash," Kargus says. She also points out that over-the-counter anti-inflammatory drugs like ibuprofen — the most common treatment for neck and back pain recommended by medical doctors — carry significantly higher risks such as toxicity or internal bleeding, and that spine surgery also poses far greater risks than chiropractic care.

A new study published in the February issue of Spine, a peer-reviewed medical journal, corroborates the ACA's position. It concluded that patients are no more likely to suffer a stroke following chiropractic treatment than they would after visiting their family physician for the same condition. That's because the stroke may have started before the doctor visit.

Patients with a previously undiagnosed tear or weakness in the artery often complain of headaches and neck pain, so they seek treatment. Unbeknownst to them, a stroke could already be in progress. Everyday activities such as turning your head when driving or craning to look at the sky have been shown to cause artery dissection.

"It means chiropractors are not injuring otherwise healthy patients," Kane says of the study. "A chiropractor's malpractice premium is typically between $2,000 and $3,000 per year — a fraction of what other providers pay. Chiropractic is truly one of the safest options people have."

Dono takes little comfort in that statement. "I had never heard of a chiropractor causing a stroke," Dono says. "If they had told me there was the slightest chance I might have one, I wouldn't have ever gone to a chiropractor."