A Chirodontic Visit

 
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A Chirodontic consult should be a brief appointment, 15 to 30 minutes, depending on the doctor.  Here you have a chance to meet the doctor and staff, and they have time to get acquainted with your chief concerns.  A general consultation usually consists of filling out the necessary paperwork with a patient health history and brief description of your problem. The doctor should begin by asking about the type or level of care you wish to receive.  If you are not aware of these different levels of care, please read the section on the website titled About Chirodontics.

THE CONSULT:

If you are seeking Chirodontic care, then you are asking for a complete Healthcare plan.

The doctor should begin by performing a basic visual postural evaluation.  All Chirodontic clinicians should perform this postural evaluation before doing any examinations or treatment. This helps them determine how much of the problem is ascending from your body and what is descending from your occlusion or bite.  This also helps to determine which areas of your body require a more extensive examination.  “Ideally”, your postural planes should all be level.  If they are not, this indicates a problem in the system in that area.  The planes that are not level may not be one of your “Chief complaints”, but because of the body’s ability to compensate, they are usually the cause of the problem and need to be corrected first.  The doctor should show you this postural evaluation and explain the areas that need further attention, and how this relates to your complaints.  After this, the doctor will need to schedule you for a more extensive examination.

If you are traveling a distance, and know you want Chirodontic care, inform the staff and they can pre-schedule this examination for the same day.  Please realize, however, that these doctors are usually very busy, and generally see patients wanting all different levels of care.  They will not usually want to schedule the full exam time until they are sure of the level of care you desire.

If they find problems coming from other areas, they might recommend that you also see another practitioner in their “Chirodontic Team”.  They can still do their examination and treatment of the areas that are within their scope of practice, but they cannot be expected to provide the highest level of care possible without this team approach.  But again, that is your choice!  If you do not want to see another practitioner, or the one recommended, that is OK, but then you must lower your expectations of the care you will receive and of the level of health you desire!.

THE EXAMINATION:

A Chirodontic examination will consist of 3 parts.  There will be a manual examination of the areas of concern, including those areas that were not level on the postural exam, and that may not seemingly be of any complaint or concern.  Then they should take radiographs, or X-Rays, of those areas to make sure the problem is not from a more serious pathology or cancer.   If you already have these radiographs, please inform the doctor so that you are not subjected to unnecessary X-Rays. But please realize, these radiographs are essential for the doctor to see in order to provide the quality healthcare you desire. If you are seeing a Chirodontic dentist, they will also be taking some impressions of your teeth to make models of them for further analysis.  They will also be taking what is called a “Cranial Facebow” recording and a “Functional Theater” recording.  If they do not, please inquire further, because this step is essential to Chirodontic care, and any qualified practitioner will need this information! Then, if available, the doctor will perform some further “objective” diagnostic studies, like EMG, Blood tests or Urinalysis etc…

After this exam, they will then take all the records and put together a treatment plan for their part of the case.  If you see another team member, they will also go through these same steps.

Because of the extensive case preparation, this may take several days, especially if they are really working as a team, and consulting with other people before making their final recommendations.

This next appointment is called a “Report of Findings”

THE REPORT OF FINDINGS:

Here the doctor will need to sit down with you and go over all the exam results and discuss the treatment options for your case.  They may also discuss the findings of other team members and how this relates to the overall treatment strategy.  If you have not seen the other team members, or if they have not had time to consult with them, then they may only present their findings on this visit.  They can schedule another time to discuss the total treatment plan or what we call “The Chirodontic Syntax of Care”.  The doctor should always present any options available and answer any questions or concerns you might have.  They will also usually ask you to read and sign an “Informed Consent” form.  This is, unfortunately, a standard procedure in today’s litigious healthcare system.  After this report, you should feel comfortable about the examination findings and the proposed treatment plan.  If you are not, please express this and ask more questions!

All doctors have their own personal way of treating patients.  So if you have seen many different Chirodontic doctors, and they all have a different treatment plan, and that is OK.  But they all should go through these basic steps and then go over the standard Chirodontic Syntax  (if you do not have AcrobatReader, please click here to download a free copy)

If they do not, then they are not providing Chirodontic care!  Please inform us of any doctor that does not follow this Chirodontic protocol or that you have any problems with during treatment.

If you already have some clinicians that you are comfortable with, but they do not provide Chirodontic Care, then have them contact us for more information on courses or other doctors near them, that may be able to help in the parts of your case they are unfamiliar with.

Unless all the team members are qualified Chirodontic practitioners, you cannot expect optimum results.  But a team approach of any kind is always better than one doctor working alone.

Now you are on your road to HEALTH.  Congratulations