The C.A.M. Report
Complementary and Alternative Medicine: Fair, Balanced, and to the Point
  • About this web log

    This blog ran from 2006 to 2016 and was intended as an objective and dispassionate source of information on the latest CAM research. Since my background is in pharmacy and allopathic medicine, I view all CAM as advancing through the development pipeline to eventually become integrated into mainstream medical practice. Some will succeed while others fail. But all are treated fairly here.

  • About the author

    John Russo, Jr., PharmD, is president of The MedCom Resource, Inc. Previously, he was senior vice president of medical communications at www.Vicus.com, a complementary and alternative medicine website.

  • Common sense considerations

    The material on this weblog is for informational purposes. It is not medical advice or counsel. Be smart, consult your health professional before using CAM.

  • Recent Posts

  • Recent Comments

    Safety of chiropractic

    “There is no robust data concerning the incidence or prevalence of adverse reactions after chiropractic,” according to reviewers from Portugal.

    First, the details.

    • A search of the literature revealed 376 potentially relevant articles.
    • 46 articles were considered worth including in this review.

    And, the results.

    • Most of the side effects reported were benign and transitory.
    • Life threatening complications included arterial dissection, myelopathy (disturbance of the spinal cord), vertebral disc extrusion, and epidural hematoma (swelling or mass of blood between the skull and the brain).
    • The frequency of adverse events varied between 33% and 61%.
    • The frequency of serious adverse events:
      • 5 strokes/100,000 manipulations
      • 1.5 serious side effects/10,000,000 manipulations
      • 2.7 deaths/10,000,000 manipulations

    The bottom line?
    An earlier review by researchers in the UK concluded, “Although minor side effects following cervical spine manipulation were relatively common, the risk of a serious adverse event, immediately or up to 7 days after treatment, was low to very low.”

    5/17/09 17:20 JR

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