Chiropractors Learn To Diagnose Spinal Ligament Injury- The No. 1 Underlying Cause Of Pain & Disability In The US Today

The American Academy of Motor Vehicle Injuries sponsored a seminar on “Spinal Ligament Injuries Following Motor Vehicle Collisions” In Phoenix Arizona this past weekend of January 29th 2017

Dr. John Quackenbush stated this seminar was attended by chiropractors, medical doctors, nurse practitioners and personal injury attorneys from Phoenix, California, Washington, and Michigan seeking to understand what spinal ligament injuries are, how they occur and most importantly how spinal ligament damage is documented properly.

This seminar was taught by Dr. Jeffery Allan Cronk DC JD, a nationally recognized expert on spinal ligament injuries. In his opening statement, Dr. Cronk said that there was some confusion about a press release that implied that he was educating doctors on “How to increase your patient’s insurance settlements.”

Dr. Cronk stated, “Everything he and any company or service that he is involved with are about, improving patient results and reducing long term patient costs and benefit needs, not increasing them.” Cronk was quoted as saying, “Today’s patient care is incredibly expensive and doctors need to be focusing on getting much better short and long term results. We know that early accurate objective diagnosis can seriously improve patient outcomes. With improved outcomes, the costs of benefits decrease and everyone wins; as costs go down not up. I have never stated that diagnosing and documenting spinal ligament injury would equate to a patient’s legal settlement doubling or tripling. In my opinion that must have been someone’s idea of a hasty marketing attempt to get attention through controversy as increased settlements have nothing to do with this program.”

Dr. Cronk wanted to make it clear from the get-go that “Our job as doctors is three-fold; accurate diagnosis, excellent treatment results and documentation that allows the patient access to any benefits that they may be entitled to. All my educational programs are about creating much better doctors.”

The attendees learned how to fully appreciate the way to diagnose, document, and manage a patient with spinal ligament injuries, which will also improve their patient results. They also learned that the diagnosis of spinal ligament instability is a major driver in the insurance industries cost containment software, called Colossus or Colossus-like software.

This 15 hour post graduate education seminar also provided a roadmap of how to easily document these injuries in accordance with both national provider best practices and in accordance with the AMA guides to the Evaluation of Permanent Impairment, 6th Edition. A lengthy discussion was held as to why MRI alone is not the best imaging tool for spinal ligament injuries, how to lead by absolute clinical excellence and why spinal adjustments are proven to be one of the most valuable treatment procedures in the management of the spinal ligament injury patient. Further discussion was held concerning how to apply a diagnostic imaging algorithm that does not allow serious spinal ligament injuries to go undiagnosed.

In conclusion Dr. Cronk communicated how to clinically diagnose, treat, document, and produce a win-win for everyone involved, patient, attorney, and insurer, why and how to take command of this crucially vital information as healthcare professionals and legal representatives. Dr. Cronk called on the attendees to become spinal ligament injury experts and to present this information to ER Doctors, General Practitioners, Medical Specialists, Insurance Adjusters, Case Managers, Care Coordinators, the general public as well as their local personal injury attorneys.

Dr. Bill Gallagher of the American Academy of Motor Vehicle Injuries announced that the certification classes will not only be conducted in Phoenix Arizona but will be offered in Tucson Arizona as well as Texas Chiropractic College leading to 150 hour certificate in Motor Vehicle Injuries. Gallagher further stated that The Diplomate in Motor Vehicle Injuries program will be initiated this year also.