Introduction

Chiropractic ASMR, the sounds of the cracking, and a way to easily go viral has caused  chiropractic adjustment videos to become increasingly popular on TikTok. A specific video of a chiropractor adjusting an infant went viral after facing a lot of backlash. The child’s pain was extremely visible which caused so many people to be upset by the video. The video showed the chiropractor adjusting the neck and squeezing the head attempting to fix a condition called hydrocephalus. A neurosurgeon, Dr. Zayed Almadidy, or Dr. Z on tik tok, reacted to the video explaining that hydrocephalus is a buildup of cerebral spinal fluid in the head. He also explained how hydrocephalus can deform the skull. The chiropractor attempted to fix the deformed skull by squeezing the head. Dr. Almadidy states that if the child was still young enough, the skull could be slightly manipulated but the chiropractor would be compressing the skull which causes brain damage. If the infant’s skull was past the point of being adjustable, then the chiropractor is squeezing the baby’s head for no reason. Dr. Almadidy goes on to explain that kids should not go to chiropractors because it can be extremely dangerous and suggests people do their research before going to a chiropractor. Since the original video was posted, the account of the chiropractor has now been banned on TikTok and his chiropractic license has been permanently taken away. Adjusting children is not an uncommon thing despite what most doctors recommend. Dr. McCord of Kent East Chiropractic in Washington has a series of videos on the Kent East Chiropractic Youtube channel describing chiropractic adjustments and what they do. He has one video talking specifically about children and the things he claims chiropractic treatment can help. He states that chiropractic can help children immensely. Looking at evidence from a diverse group of doctors working in different medical fields, Dr. McCord’s claims, as well as most other chiropractors, are misleading and if believed could cause serious issues.

D.D. Palmer

Where did chiropractic even start? Daniel David (D.D.) Palmer was born in Ontario, Canada in 1845. He grew up there, but moved to Iowa when he was 20 years old where he would go on to learn about magnetic healing. Sharon Kirkey and Brice Hall wrote an article in the Washington post discussing Palmer’s life and some of the various careers he had before inventing chiropractic: “He also worked as a schoolteacher, raised bees and opened a grocery store.” In 1895, Palmer introduced chiropractic. He said the idea came to him from the ghost of a doctor named Jim Atkinson. Palmer said that Atkinson had tried to learn what is now popularized as chiropractic but was unsuccessful. D.D. Palmer learned more specific techniques from Andrew Taylor Still who invented osteopathy, a kind of medical practice that focuses on treatment of bones, joints, and muscles. Palmer adjusted a deaf person and allegedly cured their deafness, about a year later, he opened the first chiropractic school. According to Edzard Ernst of Science Direct, a doctor working as a professor at The Complementary Medicine, Peninsula Medical School, Universities of Exeter & Plymouth, Exeter, United Kingdom, “[c]hiropractic is rooted in mystical concepts” and Palmer and his son even considered making chiropractic a religion. They thought of it as inherent power where God is what causes things to heal and the adjustments are just a push in that direction. Practiced doctors were not fans of chiropractors at the time of D.D. Palmer and still are not the most fond of them today. On the other side of things, chiropractors are also not the biggest fans of doctors themselves. An old, popular argument was that doctors only say the things they say to make more money and take money away from chiropractors. Ironically, chiropractors today typically make more money. Chiropractors were also very against and not open to testing the science behind it in any way. According to Ernst “India, China, former Russia, parts of Europe, and most of South Africa, chiropractic is not legally recognized” as a medical practice.

The American Medical Association did not approve of many chiropractors practicing, claiming they did not have adequate knowledge or experience in the medical field to be doing what they are doing. Many chiropractors who practiced without a license were arrested because of this, including D.D. Palmer himself. The belief that the nervous system is the most vital part of a person’s health and that subluxation, misaligned vertebrae in the spine, can cause stress on nerves and block their pathways to organs. In a different video on the Kent East Chiropractic YouTube, Dr. McCord explains subluxations and misaligned vertebrae (Fig. 1). Chiropractors claim that these misaligned vertebrae being corrected can cure a multitude of sicknesses. Kirkey explains that Palmer thought “95 percent of all disease is due to ‘subluxations.’” Ernst goes on to explain how today, there are two kinds of chiropractors practicing: “[T]hose religiously adhering to the gospel of its founding fathers and those open to change.” Kirkey and Hall discuss how doctors claim those who see the chiropractors that believe the same things Palmer does, they could be influenced into believing other medical falses: “They worry that, in rare cases, people could be harmed, and that people who go to chiropractors who push the subluxation concept and claim they can help with nearly any medical problem, could also be exposed to anti-science beliefs, like the debunked notion that vaccines cause autism.” Mixers are the chiropractors that go against the incoherent ideas of D.D. Palmer and tended to see the side of conventional medicine better.

Colic is not cured by chiropractic treatment.

Dr. McCord talks about different things chiropractic care can help with and claims he has “great studies that have shown that colicky babies are tremendously supported and helped by being under regular chiropractic care.” Colic infants are babies that excessively cry but otherwise are typically healthy babies. Colic infants can be very stressful for parents and it is not uncommon for them to try anything to help their child. Dr. McCord describes colic as “where babies cry and cry and cry because their tummy hurts” however, no one knows exactly why colic infants cry but people speculate it could be behavioral disturbances. Chiropractic is very common for this, especially in Scandinavian countries. There are many chiropractic websites that write articles using anecdotal evidence claiming that chiropractic treatment is significantly helpful for colicky babies. Nurture Family Chiropractic claims, there is a lot of evidence supporting a tie between chiropractic treatment and improving colic symptoms. Arise Family Chiropractic states that “[c]hiropractic care is an effective approach for colic treatment” and there is evidence that shows adjustments seriously improve symptoms of colic. To add on, they claim that chiropractic may even work better than some medications. 

These claims have been proven wrong by multiple studies testing chiropractic care on colic infants. A study done by the American Dietetic Association in Bergen, Norway tested the validity of the claim chiropractors make about colic babies.  According to Lise Holm from the research Unit of General Practice, Department of Public Health, University of Southern Denmark explains how colic is diagnosed using the rule of three which is “where the infant was crying at least 3 h[ours] a day, for at least 3 days a week in the previous 3 weeks.” There was a treatment group and a control group. All infants that participated had to fit certain criteria such as, the rule of three, no previous chiropractic treatment, average weight length, and head circumference, and written consent from parents. The study blinded parents so they did not know if their child had been treated or not. Each baby that was treated was adjusted 3 times within 8 days in intervals of 2-5 days. After 8 days of treatment, there was a 2-week observation period. When the observation period ended, parents were interviewed. The results of the experiment showed no difference in the improvement between the control group and the treated group. The National Library of Medicine conducted a similar study. The parents were also blinded however, there was a crying log to keep track of any improvement in the baby. The results of this study showed slightly more improvement in the treated group but statistically there was not a significant difference. There were more important differences individually than as a group showing that there needs to be more subgroup studies done to better test this. The Washington Post wrote an article about colic babies and chiropractic after videos of chiropractors adjusting babies went viral on Tik Tok. Amenabar explains how “clinicians on TikTok claim chiropractic care can offer relief to fussy babies suffering from a variety of ailments, including colic, constipation, reflux, musculoskeletal problems and even, some say, trauma babies experience in childbirth.” Physicians however, say that this can cause joints to become looser and make the babies more prone to overstretching. Sean Tabie, an orthopedic surgeon from the Children’s National Hospital in D.C. states that “there is no way you’re going to get an improvement in a newborn from a manipulation. The only thing that you might possibly do is cause harm.”

Chiropractic care does not help improve vision problems, in some cases it even makes them worse.

Another falsification McCord discusses is a variety of things that could be improved by adjustments including eyesight: “Some of the conditions and things that some kids deal with that can be related back to their spines and getting their spine properly corrected could be vision problems.” Many chiropractors agree with Dr. McCord. Similarly to other claims, their reasoning is because of subluxations in the spine. They say the subluxations can interrupt the nerves’ job by not allowing them to fully reach all the organs in the body. If this happens with the nerves to the eye, then the person’s vision could become worse. Vitality Precision Chiropractic makes a similar claim by saying that “spinal misalignments disrupt nerve function, but they can also interrupt proper blood flow.” They go on to explain how if there is not proper blood flow to the optic nerve it can cause blurry vision or depth perception problems. Vitality Precision Chiropractic also claims, “Chiropractic care can also help restore blood flow to reduce high blood pressure that sometimes leads to vision problems.” If there is high pressure in the eye it can lead to permanent damage. Donna Kostiew of The Joint chiropractic states that chiropractic adjustments have been proven safe and effective to help with vision problems. Claims such as these are not uncommon in the chiropractic world.

Ophthalmologists do not believe what chiropractors try to convince people is true. Dr. Yannis Paulus, a retina specialist at the University of Michigan Kellogg Eye Center in Ann Arbor claims, “[P]articularly forceful movements performed in high-velocity manipulation can damage the blood vessels in the retina.” Chiropractic can also cause serious issues in the cardiovascular system such as cervical artery dissection, which is when “artery walls […] tear, leading to some bleeding. If a blood clot forms at the site and it later happens to become dislodged, it may end up blocking a blood vessel in the brain and causing a stroke.” According to the National Library of Medicine, the dissection of cervical arteries is the most common cause of strokes in people ages 45 and younger. They found that 25% of all dissections were related to chiropractic adjustment. Live Science interviewed Dr. Raj Maturi, a clinical spokesperson for the American Academy of Ophthalmology about the connection between vision problems and chiropractic care. Maturi explained that “[n]eck manipulation during a chiropractic session can also break up and release arterial plaque — solid buildups in the arteries caused by cholesterol deposits — which can also contribute to eye damage.” After this plaque builds up enough, too much flood flow can go to the eyes and can cause microscopic tears.

Babies feel pain, just like any other human.

Dr. McCord talks about force used on babies during chiropractic adjustments and briefly mentions what it was like for the baby in the womb, being soaked in water and not having to handle as much physical stress. He discusses babies getting adjusted immediately after birth and why it is not harmful to them: “Yes babies are more flexible, they have a lot more cartilage, they have fewer bones, […] and they can handle more traumatic stress.” He goes on to say that for 9 months, during the pregnancy, the baby is floating and is not affected by gravity while in the womb so their muscle system to protect the spine is not yet developed. He claims that because babies are more flexible and have more cartilage, they can withstand more force and respond better to chiropractic care. For a really long time doctors everywhere have not considered pain towards infants as a significant factor when deciding treatment or care. The short and long term effects of stress on babies were not fairly comprehensible. 

Different studies show how babies are affected by pain compared to adults. A study conducted by the University of Oxford showed that babies experience the same pain as adults but have a lower pain tolerance. To find this information MRI scans of the brain were taken as either a baby or an adult were poked with a pencil. The scans showed the same reaction but with the infant it was much more prominent. There has been research done that rats and humans have enough similarities to be tested on to find similar results to each other. This is why the National Library of Medicine conducted a study to test the pain level of infants and what the long term impacts could be. In this experiment a rat was pricked with a needle. The more infantile rats were affected more hershey than the older rats. Repeated experiments such as this one showed that stress and pain in infants can have consequences such as delayed wound healing and increased risks for infections. If the repeated pain infliction does not end quick enough there can be increased pain sensitivity, decreased immune system functioning, increased avoidance behavior, and social hypervigilance. Infant pain should be avoided as much as possible to prevent these things from happening.

Chiropractic care is harmful to anyone, no one is exempt, including children.

In the beginning of the video, Dr. McCord suggests that every child should get checked by a chiropractor. Chiropractors such as Dr. Mcord claim that “[i]t’s not harmful for children to get their spines checked” and use this as a way to convince parents to bring their children to the chiropractor (Fig. 2). Chiropractors claim there are many things that can be improved or even cured by adjusting the spine. Dr. McCord explains that some of the issues that can be tied back to subluxations in the spine are vision problems, skin conditions, sinus problems, poor concentration, asthma, loss of hearing, poor coordination, nervousness, colic, and recurring sore throats. Chiropractors such as Dr. McCord and others justify their reasoning for adjusting kids by saying kids respond faster, better, and heal faster than adults. Although that claim is true, doctors do not believe that is enough of a reason to say adjusting children is safe to do. Chiropractors claim even things like food allergies can be tied back to the nerve system being damaged by subluxations because the immune system is no longer able to do its job properly. The Cuyahoga Falls Chiropractic Clinic makes the same claim by saying “there is no evidence that it harms young patients” and “a small percentage of kids experience some discomfort during chiropractic adjustments but otherwise there were no adverse reactions reported.” Inside Out Chiropractic says that chiropractic not being safe for kids is a myth. They say there are no serious side effects of getting adjusted. Accident Care Chiropractic explains, “Many children can benefit from seeing a chiropractor, especially if they have suffered birth trauma or had any accidents or injuries.” Some of the things Dr. Faherty lists chiropractic can help with are growing pains, ear infections, difficulty sleeping, injury, colic, headaches, digestive problems, and even autism. All of these claims come directly from chiropractic websites showing bias.

Fig. 2 Dr. McCord explaining how kids respond better to chiropractic care and how it is not harmful (Kent East Chiropractic)

Chiropractic care in children is inconsistently judged and there is no clear answer on medical guidelines. Chiropractors and doctors do not agree on many claims made by either side. The National Library of Medicine conducted a study and “the researchers did not find any improvement in the symptoms of asthma, pulmonary function tests or quality of life between the two groups.” Chiropractors argue that studies such as these are not a good representation of care. Chiropractors often use anecdotal evidence to prove the effectiveness of their treatment rather than a majority of people. The capability to diagnose, evaluate, and treat several pediatric illnesses is difficult even for physicians and is even more problematic for chiropractors who have far less experience and training in the medical field. Doctors claim chiropractors use scare tactics to convince people their children need to be adjusted. These claims include things like getting adjusted can scare off symptoms of autism and the birthing process can cause nerve interference and a misaligned cervical spine. There has been no scientific evidence to support that a majority of babies have trauma from birth like many chiropractors claim they do. The American Academy of Pediatrics explains that even though it is rare, children could be at risk for very serious health complications from being adjusted: “A 2007 study led by University of Alberta researchers who reviewed 13 published studies found 14 injuries to children who received chiropractic treatments. Nine of them were serious, and two were fatal. One child died from a brain hemorrhage, the other after a suspected neck fracture. Ten of the injuries were attributed to chiropractic care.” Chiropractors commonly say there is no need for children to see a doctor before going to get adjusted but in a different study, 2 children died of meningitis after ignoring the doctor and only receiving chiropractic treatment. Doctors worry about a missed diagnosis or a wrong diagnosis when people bring their children to the chiropractor. Doctor Justin Smith, medical advisor for digital health, believes chiropractors are not trained well enough to be primary care providers for children. Chiropractic schooling spends about 60 hours out of 4500 (1.33%) learning about adjustments for children and general children’s health. Smith explains how pediatricians spend significantly more time studying children’s health: “Even at a very underestimated six hours of lecture per week, that totals more than 900 hours of lectures training in the three-year period.” This makes delayed diagnosis, incorrect treatment, and worse complications very common by chiropractors.

Conclusion

Chiropractic care is extremely popular with 60,000 chiropractors practicing in North America alone. With chiropractic being so widespread, it is important to know the risks of getting adjusted. Most people do not even think about what could happen because what is commonly assumed about chiropractors, is what chiropractors tell people to think. Most people do not look past that because chiropractors call themselves doctors and on the outside seem to know what they are talking about. If even a little bit of research is done or properly shared to the world, so many complications caused by chiropractic treatment could be avoided. If the mother of the infant in the viral TikTok video had known even a little bit of the risks of adjustments or if she could have seen the reaction her child was about to have beforehand, it is very unlikely she would have taken her kid in the first place. 

Featured image is a screenshot from the video being reviewed. In it, Dr. McCord explains subluxations and how it can supposedly disrupt the nervous system.