Doctor of Chiropractic Degree: Your Opportunity to Preserve and Optimize Health

When you decide on a Doctor of Chiropractic degree, your healthcare journey is about preserving, restoring, and optimizing health. The practice of chiropractic focuses on optimizing the body’s spinal and extremity joint function and emphasizes the body’s ability to achieve health without drugs or surgery by focusing on the proper relationship between the body’s spinal and extremity joint function structures and its nervous system.

Two-thirds of the U.S. population will encounter low-back pain at some point. Earning a Doctor of Chiropractic degree positions you to provide a whole-person approach to health.

Chiropractic care focuses on maintaining proper spinal and extremity joint function, supportive care to include therapeutic and rehabilitative exercises, and posture corrections. Many chiropractors include nutritional and dietary advice, lifestyle counseling, and health promotion.

Chiropractic Career: A Non-drug, Patient-focused Profession

The more you know about chiropractic, the more attractive it becomes. Check these compelling facts about the profession:

• Doctors of Chiropractic are portal-of-entry, primary healthcare providers. Patients can access chiropractic care without a referral, just like dentists and optometrists.
• Chiropractors receive more than 4,200 contact hours of education. The 3.3-year curriculum includes diagnosis, orthopedics, sports performance, nutrition, and basic and clinical sciences. Students participate in a two-year hands-on direct patient care clinical experience.
• According to a recent Gallup poll, 97% of patients who have seen a chiropractor say they would return for care in the case of future neck or back pain.

4 Reasons to Earn a Doctor of Chiropractic Degree

1. Growing evidence of effectiveness
At least four major medical journals have recognized the benefits of turning first to chiropractic and other conservative care options for musculoskeletal pain and conditions: the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA), Spine, Annals of Internal Medicine, and the Journal of Manipulative and Physiological Therapeutics.

2. A commitment to multidisciplinary healthcare
Chiropractors are at the forefront of the multidisciplinary care movement. The profession’s collaborative, whole-person approach naturally fits the desire for the most accurate diagnosis and targeted care options.

3. Medical insurance plans cover chiropractic care
It’s estimated that 90% of U.S. medical insurance plans cover chiropractic care, according to the American Chiropractic Association (ACA).

Workers’ compensation, Medicare, some Medicaid plans, and Blue Cross Blue Shield plans also provide coverage for federal employees. Chiropractic is part of the standard medical benefits package available to military veterans through the Dept. of Veterans Affairs.

4. Chiropractic offers specialty options
Although more than half of chiropractic college graduates choose to provide care in solo or group practices, there are specialty areas:

• Sports
• Pediatric
• Animal chiropractic
• Chiropractic radiology

What to Consider When Choosing a Chiropractic College

Knowing what university and chiropractic college best fits your needs is essential. The journey begins by gathering the correct information.

Here are five categories to consider when exploring your options:

• Reputation
  Financial stability, years established, and commitment to student success are all good indicators of a strong chiropractic education. Questions you can ask to help evaluate Doctor of Chiropractic degree programs include:
  • How large are the class and laboratory sizes?
  • What academic support services are available, such as tutoring, counseling, etc?
  • Are there ongoing and visible improvements and upgrades in equipment, technology, and campus facilities?
  • What scholarships and financial support are available?
  • Will I have the opportunity to participate in chiropractic research?
  • Is there an emphasis on helping students find shadowing and internship experiences?
  • How do students perform on the National Board exams required for licensure?
• Resources
  Find out what facilities your chiropractic college has on campus, from food service to information technology support to practice labs.
• Class Size
  The harder the coursework, the more important it is to be in smaller classes. The pace of learning in a professional degree program like the Doctor of Chiropractic will be faster than you’ve experienced so far in college, and so will the amount of material covered. Student-faculty ratios are usually listed on the school’s website.
• Faculty/Student Interaction
  One way to gauge faculty/staff interaction is by asking about services and programs contributing to student success. Examples include tutoring, on-call counseling services, and special classes that can provide success strategies after graduation. You’ll also want to know that faculty members are accessible and invested in helping you achieve success.
• Concurrent B.S./D.C. Program
  For highly motivated students, a program where they earn an undergraduate degree in fields like human biology and exercise science on the way to earning a chiropractic degree is an excellent option. This is called a concurrent degree program, and it can reduce the total time from high school graduation to a professional degree by up to a year.

What’s It Like to Be a Chiropractor?

Most chiropractic graduates start their practice of chiropractic, others may associate themselves with existing practices with other D.C.s, and some become employed in corporate wellness centers, the Veterans Administration of the US Department of Defense, or work in multi-disciplinary practices with other health professionals. Chiropractic practices are found in cities, small towns, and rural areas.

For those choosing to attend chiropractic school, the data site Salary.com reports the annual income of chiropractors with established practices will range to $100,000 or more. Such salaries typically include bonuses, commissions, and profit sharing.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) sees a 10% growth rate in the need for doctors of chiropractic from 2021 through 2031.

The Chiropractic School at Cleveland University-Kansas City (CUKC)

Cleveland University-Kansas City (CUKC) is a private, nonprofit, chiropractic and health sciences university in Overland Park, Kansas, a prominent suburb of the Kansas City metro. Most CUKC students earn their Doctor of Chiropractic degree (D.C.) in 3.3 years through a year-round, trimester schedule. At CUKC, our goal is to educate and develop leaders in health promotion.

Points of distinction for the CUKC chiropractic degree include:

• In 2022, the CUKC College of Chiropractic celebrated its 100th anniversary as a chiropractic college, graduating more than 11,500 doctors of chiropractic.
• CUKC students begin learning the fundamentals of manual spinal adjustive procedures as early as the first term.
• CUKC has an on-campus Technique Simulation Lab, which increases student confidence in the psychomotor skills fundamental for mastering chiropractic adjustive technique.
• Senior CUKC chiropractic students learn patient care best practices as interns in the on-campus Health Center and can participate in patient care at affiliated community clinics or rotations in Veterans Affairs Hospitals.
• In the latest reporting period, within six months of graduating with their D.C. degree, 95% of CUKC graduates passed all parts (I, II, III, IV) of the National Board of Chiropractic Examiners (NBCE) exams. These exams test competence in scientific, academic, and patient care components of chiropractic education.

There’s much to know about earning a Doctor of Chiropractic degree. You’ll find helpful information about chiropractic college in this blog. Learn more by requesting more information here, and click this link for a free eBook: Your Complete Guide to the Chiropractic Profession.