My introduction to sports chiropractic
was as an athlete, like many other chiropractors
who specialize in this area. I had
a back injury while competing in track
and field in college, and, having grown up
in Davenport, I thought I’d try chiropractic.
I came to the Palmer Clinic, and within
a month my back was fine and I was
back to competing.
I’ve always been interested in health care
and have had a fascination with the
human body—I still do; it’s amazing. I
wanted a healthcare career that would
allow me to help people, so chiropractic
was a good fit. So was taking care of
athletes. I’m an athlete and I’m familiar
with how they think and with their
environment and ergonomics. I’ve had
numerous soft tissue and other injuries,
which gives me an advantage when
treating others with injuries. It’s an interesting
phenomenon, but I’ve noticed
over the years that people with athletic
skills tend to work their way into manual
medicine avenues like chiropractic.
Being a chiropractor is a labor-intensive
job. Your body has to be relatively
robust and fit to last in our profession.
Some of you may be familiar with my
Olympic experiences. I competed for the
U.S. bobsled team, but didn’t make an
Olympic bobsled team. From there I
began treating Olympic bobsled athletes.
Working with an Olympic athlete is really
no different from working with anyone
we’d see here in the Chiropractic Rehabilitation
and Sports Injury Department. But
with Olympic athletes, there’s more of a
sense of urgency because they can’t afford
any down time. They need to be fully
engaged and ready to compete.
Another difference between “elite” and
“regular” athletes is that elite athletes have
better acuity in understanding and reading
their body, so they can sense minor
changes faster. And these minor changes
can mean the difference between a bronze
medal and a gold medal, so they’re
important to athletes at this level. This
puts more demand on the chiropractor
because your sensitivity to these minor
changes has to increase. Sometimes you
have to look harder to make sure you
address even minor issues quickly for
these athletes.
Also, elite athletes push themselves
harder. Often, the person who wins,
especially in endurance competitions, is
the one who can endure the most pain.
Chiropractors need to be sensitive to this
tendency, too, and make sure their bodies
are fine-tuned enough to endure this
maximum effort with minimal damage
in terms of injury.
My Olympic experiences even included
work on the administrative side of the
organization. I was privileged to be one of
about a dozen team leaders for the 1998
and 2002 U.S. Winter Olympic teams.
Our mission was to help the teams bring
home as many medals as possible. The
job came with a lot of prestige but also a
lot of responsibility and stress. My wife
tells me my skill was that I could play
multiple chess games at once. I was dealing
with athletes, coaches, International
Olympic Committee officials, attorneys
and marketing people. It was certainly an
interesting experience.
Over the past 15 years I’ve seen quite a
few changes in how chiropractic rehabilitation
is taught at Palmer. The biggest
change, however, is that students today
are so much more knowledgeable to
begin with, but also savvy about seeking
knowledge. All of us in my department
are flattered by the caliber of the students
who want to work here as interns.
We teach them, of course, but we also
learn from them. The entire curriculum
at Palmer has improved, and the educational
approach we take is better. Our
resources are better, too, especially the
library at Palmer. Our students’ ability
to access information is far superior
now. I often say that the clay we get is
so much better, but it’s also moldable.
The students are bright and come to us
better educated, but they are very open
to new ideas and approaches.
The future for sports chiropractic is
certainly bright. I’m constantly amazed
at the high caliber of our students going
out into the field to specialize in this
area. In addition, there are many more
athletes coming into our profession
because of the positive experiences
they’ve had with chiropractic. Athletes
like chiropractors because they help
them perform at their best, which is the
epitome of wellness.