OBJECTIVE: To determine the prevalence of the postsurgical back cases in established chiropractic offices.

DESIGN: A random sample was obtained from each practice for the 30-d duration of the study. Consecutive patients were identified as being postspinal surgical or not. Those individuals who were postsurgical had other demographic information elicited from their cases.

SETTING: Each chiropractic office was a primary care facility open to the general community.

PATIENTS: Nonsolicited, routine daily flow patients. Each consecutive patient was counted as a participant. A total of 1,939 patients were involved in this study.

MAIN OUTCOME AND RESULTS: Sixty-eight patients (3.75%, P = < 0.10) had undergone at least one spinal surgery. Thirty-two were male and 36 were female. Ten patients had previously experienced cervical surgery, while four had thoracic surgery; 55 individuals had previous lumbar surgery. Four patients reported two prior lumbar surgeries, one had three lumbar surgeries, and one had two lumbar and one cervical surgery. The average age of the postspinal surgery patient was 52 yr old (range 26-86 yr). Average time since surgery was 14.5 yr (range 0.5-41 yr). Thirteen individuals stated their condition had been made worse as a result of the surgery.

CONCLUSION: The study demonstrated that the chiropractic profession is involved in treating a significant number of postsurgical back patients. The prevalence of these types of surgeries in the primary care chiropractic practice was found to be above the anticipated level in the general public.

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