Looking into schools. Just trying to get some advice on chiropractic schools and your experience?
Much appreciated.
The best DC I have ever been to is a Gonstead style trained at the Palmer school. I plan to go see him during RAGBRAI.
This topic is as controversial amongst chiropractors as the use of chiropractic is amongst the general public. I too learned Gonstead technique at Palmer in the early 90’s and its been a major cornerstone of my practice. The school was good then but there is a high veriability rate in how schools teach the art of chiropractic. Some schools are far more medical in their approach and less holistic. National in Chicago is very medically oriented. From what I hear though, Palmer is still a good choice. My advice would be to look carefully at Life before you apply there as they recently had a huge debacle with not being accredited. Good luck
Jeff
www.yorkchiropractic.com
my dad went to Life Chiro. College in Marietta, Georgia. I’ve visited and it’s a great school
Thanks everyone
I was looking into Palmer, Bridgeport, ( I would need quite a few prereq’s and they offer a progrm specifically fo that) and Life I became nervous with Life since I have heard the horror storys lately!
Im a year out from graduating at Palmer Florida. I’ve enjoyed it so far and the teachers have been great. Training year round in shorts isn’t bad either. PM me and I’d be glad to share more.
I’m half way through SCUHS (5th term). So far, I’m very happy with my decision (despite having round 1 of national boards in 8 days!!!) While I’ve known some really good adjusters that have come out of Palmer, I wanted an evidance-based approach (National, Western, SCU).
My feeling was if school didn’t make me a great adjuster, then all of those additional seminars would.
When I was making my decision, it was either here or the DPT program at USC. I didn’t make my mind until 2 weeks before classes started at USC (kind-of bummed I don’t get to wear the cardinal and gold…especially now living in Newport:) . Probably it doesn’t matter too much which school you choose—it’s more about the student than the school.
Good luck with your choice.
Sorry if this is a silly question, but what do you mean evidence based approach?
U of B sounds very interesting as it’s the only American chiro college that is affiliated with a university. All the rest are stand alone private institutions.
Here’s a link to all the chiro colleges in the world.
I’m half way through SCUHS (5th term). So far, I’m very happy with my decision (despite having round 1 of national boards in 8 days!!!) While I’ve known some really good adjusters that have come out of Palmer, I wanted an evidance-based approach (National, Western, SCU).
My feeling was if school didn’t make me a great adjuster, then all of those additional seminars would.
When I was making my decision, it was either here or the DPT program at USC. I didn’t make my mind until 2 weeks before classes started at USC (kind-of bummed I don’t get to wear the cardinal and gold…especially now living in Newport:) . Probably it doesn’t matter too much which school you choose—it’s more about the student than the school.
Good luck with your choice.
Hey Budlight, you ready for Boards??? They are going to be a pain in the butt. Where are you taking them? We lucked out and have them at Palmer Florida this year so thats nice. I’ll be glad when they are over next weekend. Goodluck with the last minute studying this weekend and next week.
I’ll guess that he means these colleges are more scientific in their approach. Same with CMCC where I graduated from. Some of the colleges tend to be more “philosophical”.
evidence based means they focus on techniques “proven” in current peer reviewed journals and less time on old techniques that have not been scientifically proven to work.
ok got it. Thanks!
Which school is CCMC?
Thanks
Kelly–
if you come down to Marietta to take a tour of Life, let me know. I am an alumnus and took my sweet time getting through. I was here when they lost their accreditation, which by law it looks as if they never lost it. It was taken away for 6 months–no stress or anything. It was mostly political in nature, but all I knew is that I just spent all this time and then the fear of not getting a degree when I was done loomed. The school is WAY better because of it. I am shoked at what a stronger school it became, and in part because of the new President Guy Riekeman (sp?). He was the former President of Palmer. The program truly challenges the students on a better level, and the clinic is continually evolving, but they have a tremendous faculty in there now and they really have patience while you are learning! I felt VERY prepared leaving the school. As for the pre-reqs they have an accelerated program for you down here to take the classes in probably half the time—but be prepared to work!
When it came time for me to decide which school to go to, I chose Life right away (Palmer in Florida was not offered). 15/16 Drs I asked went to Life — of course this was in Florida which has a huge draw for students at Life. All those Drs always did an awesome job at adjusting me, so I felt comfortable. Palmer would have been my first choice if I didn’t have so many other Drs swearing by Life. When they lost their accreditation, the school was very unique. We lost many students (enrollment dropped from 3500 to just under 1000 literally overnight - think all time low was around 500 that was some rough quarters) and during the interim many went to other schools across the board. SO MANY returned after the 6 months was up, and even some waited a year or two, Their enrollment is going up each quarter, just no where near their high of 4k like a few years ago. The coolest thing during the return was hearing about how different all the schools were…some that I wouldn’t mind attending for some of the material, and other horror stories about having to do the Proctology exam ON the instructor as the final…uh, not happening --to one of the schools doing minor surgery (stitches on the head). Huge variety between the schools. Also, the way some of them ‘list’ the problems in the spine. I thought I was having trouble with visualizing how bones move, once I had study partners that went to various schools it got REALLy interesting. So I guess in a way I was lucky that I took forever because I got tidbits from many brillant students that brought unique concepts back to the playing field from just about every school I ever thought about attending.
Whatever you do, go VISIT the school. ASK questions, and decide if that is an area you can live for 4 yrs. That was one of my main objectives, I knew I needed a place I could make a living while going to school and still train. ATL was the obvious answer.
As for Chiropractic in general…you are going to be whatever Dr. you are meant to be when you finish, just promise yourself that whatever program you go into you focus strongly on learning your craft AND what is going on in the real World (drugs and treatments). Small little things you learn in school might seem insignificant, but your patient (family/friend/loved one) are relying on you remembering something you learned the first day you were in class. There is no such thing as being completely prepared and knowing it all (those that do I would stay clear of–often they are strongly insecure), but with repetition a great deal of it becomes second nature.
as for the Boards to those that listed on here—best wishes 
Do yourself a favor and pack a lunch, the intensity of the exams back to back is wild. I’ll be taking part 3 in September, chose not to take them this go around, just couldn’t open another book if you paid me!
"Which school is CCMC? "
CMCC - Canadian Memorial Chiropractic College
Dang Canook’s ( hey did I spell that right?) I was going to go to palmer, but man Davenport was getting to be a rough town. I had my car broken into, one of my budies(canadian thus the canook joke) got his car broken into, another friend had his truck stolen from palmers parking lot, and another friend (again a canadian) had his girlfriend get raped. that was all in nine months time. I went to visit a girl in St. Louis and visited Logan, man I fell in love with place, great campus and it is getting even better with the addition of the sports complex and some other new building. St. Louis is also a great town. I felt like I got a good education and you can study almost any technique there.
PS for those of you getting ready for boards, I hate to say this but I never once studied for a board exam, I was to busy training and just did not study. I always figured that if I failed I could retake the test later. I passed all of the exams very easily. But I did study pretty good for classes and did not miss many classes, that was also 10 yrs plus ago. Man I miss Chiro school, the good old days, no responsibility other than a part time job and school. I trained my butt off. Enjoy it while you can, once you start in practice it is much harder to find the time to train.
Thanks Eileen,
I was really looking into Life, but then I heard so much negative comments so i started looking elsewhere for fear of this all happening again! Thanks
kelly
National provided me w/a great education - you cant go wrong there. If you’re looking into schools, you should definitely check it out. Plus, its suburban Chicago…plenty to do outside of school, which can be both good and bad.
Life-ers…do they still do the “money” chant down there?
I am Canadian, so when I decided to go to Chiropractic College in the US, one of the things I looked at was which schools had the best pass rate for the Canadian Board Exam (they are more difficult than the US ones). Southern California University of Health Sciences, National, Western States and I believe New York Chiropractic College were at the top of this list. My now ex-wife was in finance so we needed to be near a large city if she were to find a job while I was in school, so we narrowed it down to National (Chicago) and SCUHS (Los Angeles). And if we were coming from Canada to the US we might as well go somewhere warm for a few years right? So I went to SCUHS.
The plan was to do the schooling there and then come home once I reached the internship portion of the program. Well 5 years later and I still live in So. Cal 
I think that SCUHS provided me with a good education in terms of academics. What all professional schools lack though is preparing students for being a small business owner. Unfortunately, many good docs have a difficult time surviving the first few years because they have no knowledge on how to run a business.