Why Palmer is The Trusted Leader in Chiropractic Education
Palmer College of Chiropractic was founded in Davenport, Iowa, by the discoverer of chiropractic, D.D. Palmer, in 1897, and is widely known as The Fountainhead of the chiropractic profession. Consisting of three campuses—the main campus in Davenport, Iowa, and branch campuses in San Jose, Calif., and Port Orange, Fla., Palmer College has approximately 2,200 students attending its three campuses and more than 26,000 alumni practicing worldwide.
Since its founding in 1897, Palmer has shaped the chiropractic profession. That’s not surprising when you consider that nearly a third of all chiropractors are Palmer graduates.
Palmer faculty members are typically engaged in clinical practice, so they routinely share relevant lessons from their patient-care experiences. Additionally, they are accomplished researchers; many have had papers published in prestigious professional journals and have written authoritative textbooks for chiropractic students at Palmer College and around the world. Small classes give Palmer students more access to expert faculty members. Palmer’s student-to-faculty ratio is 15-to-1 or lower.
Palmer College of Chiropractic is known for providing an extensive and carefully crafted program in chiropractic technique as part of its core curriculum. A wide variety of techniques have been developed by chiropractic innovators, many of them Palmer graduates, and over the years Palmer has developed what is known throughout the profession as the “Palmer Package.” This is a group of techniques that, once mastered, provide the Palmer graduate with the technique expertise needed to deal with practically any clinical situation that may emerge in practice.
By the time Palmer students receive their Doctor of Chiropractic degree, they’ve completed more than three years of graduate studies and clinical training that encompass the science, philosophy and art (technique) of chiropractic. In fact, the number of hours Palmer students spend in courses such as anatomy, physiology, diagnosis and neurology are comparable to the hours medical school students spend in similar courses.
Palmer Successes
- In March 2012, Palmer’s Florida Campus in Port Orange, Fla., opened a third building, the Standard Process Student Center. This two-story, 14,000-square-foot facility with a construction budget of $4 million has significantly expanded support services for the campus’s nearly 750 students. The building features a larger bookstore and cafeteria, patio seating overlooking the lake and flexible room formats to accommodate large-group seating for student assemblies, graduations and Homecoming events.
- The Palmer Center for Chiropractic Research (PCCR) is the largest institutional chiropractic research effort in the world, including research efforts on all three Palmer campuses, nearly 50 faculty and professional staff members along with research fellows. The PCCR has the largest budget for research in a chiropractic college, supplemented increasingly by grants from outside sources such as the National Institutes of Health and the U.S. Health Resources and Services Administration, which total more than $35 million since 2000.
In February 2011, the PCCR, the RAND Corporation and the Samueli Institute received a $7.4 million grant from the Department of Defense Congressionally Directed Medical Research Program. The grant is funding a four-year research project to assess chiropractic treatment for military readiness in active-duty personnel. This landmark study is the largest single award for a chiropractic research project in the history of the profession and is being used to conduct the largest clinical trial evaluating chiropractic to date. - In June 2011, clinics on Palmer’s Florida Campus joined those on Palmer’s West and Davenport campuses in receiving Recognition from the Back Pain Recognition Program of the National Committee on Quality Assurance for providing superior care to clinic patients suffering from low back pain. This national recognition provides external validation for patients in all three of Palmer’s campus communities that the Palmer Chiropractic Clinics have processes in place to ensure consistent delivery of high-quality, evidence-based care in an effort to generate the best patient outcomes.
- The American Chiropractic Association named Palmer Vice Chancellor for Research and Health Policy Christine Goertz, D.C., Ph.D., its Chiropractor of the Year for 2012. The ACA also named Palmer Chancellor Dennis Marchiori, D.C., Ph.D. its Academic of the Year for 2012.
- Palmer College and Quad City Bank & Trust are raising $300,000 for student scholarships.
- Palmer’s involvement in health policy continues with Dr. Christine Goertz serving on the national Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute board.