We have the ability to change the way the world is dealing with their health care. experts. The process to develop a globally accepted identity for chiropractic gave Stewart a glimpse of the amount of collaboration and open dialogue – be-tween opposing views and differing principles – required to achieve global consensus and unify the profession. “It gave me a first-hand look at chiropractic around the world,” he says. Working with the WFC has also opened his eyes to various issues and challenges chiropractors around the world are facing, many of them things that practitioners in this part of the world have almost taken for granted – like practising chiropractic. “Chiropractors in Taiwan have been basically told in order for them to practice, they are going to have to call themselves physiotherapists. And they are having to fight a battle that we can’t even envision here (in Canada),” Stewart points out. In South Korea, chiropractic is viewed as an illegal practice of medi-cine, prompting many chiropractors there to leave the country and practise somewhere else. “We have these contradictions within countries, and the issues we are dealing with in North America seem trivial compared to the battles that are going on (in other parts) of the world.” Then there are those on the other side of the spectrum, where chiroprac-tic has continued to flourish and be-come more integrated in health care. “We have situations like in Denmark and Switzerland, where the curricu-lum for chiropractic and medicine is the same for the first three years, with chiropractic and medical students in the same classes until they branch off to their different streams in later years,” Stewart notes. He says this early exposure to one another – between the medical and chiropractic fields – is enabling the development of a new generation of health-care practitioners that is much www.canadianchiropractor.ca more inclined to collaboration. Stewart believes increasing chiro-practic’s exposure to other disciplines at the education level paves the way for greater recognition and credibility within the wider health-care realm. “We have to leave our little comfort-able areas and actually go into areas that are challenging, and sometimes are confrontational, in order to get ahead,” he says Common gRoUnd Stewart believes WFC can play a role in finding more common grounds for chiropractors to move forward. A good place to start is in develop-ing and implementing consistent ap-proach to assessing and addressing health issues, such as back pain. Chiropractors need to achieve some “commonalities” in their assessment and diagnosis, and be able to articu-late reasonable – yet not necessarily identical – treatment plans, he says. Having a consistent approach can open new doors for increased multi-disciplinary health-care collaboration – so does using language that is com-prehensible across health disciplines. “(Chiropractors) are encumbered by a unique Lexicon,” he points out. “Unique language is wonderful – it reflects our history, it’s respectful of our forefathers, it’s meaningful to us – but perhaps language and our Lex-icon may be a hindrance to collabora-tion. And if it is, then we have to be strategic and perhaps use language in different situations appropriately.” Whether the uniquely chiropractic vocabulary is or isn’t a hindrance to collaboration is something that will be discussed at the WFC Congress, to be held in Athens in May 2015. Stewart expects those discussions would be another opportunity for chiropractors to come together and find more common ground. It is no secret the chiropractic pro-fession not only has had to deflect critics and questions about credibility from outside entities; for the longest time, it has also been beleaguered with internal conflicts, mostly brought on by differences in principles and views about the practice of chiropractic. Stewart acknowledges there are still ongoing issues that may have to be ironed out within the profession, but cautions against letting these inner disagreements get in the way of pro-gress for the profession. “There are excellent chiropractors in all levels of the philosophical spec-trum. I can have as much in common with the leadership of the ICA (Inter-national Chiropractic Association) as I do with the ACA (American Chiro-practic Association), when their goals and agendas are in order,” he says. There are, however, principles that will likely remain unpopular among many practitioners, such as making drug prescription part of the chiro-practic scope of practice. Expressing his views on this matter, Stewart wonders, “Is this about chi-ropractors trying to elevate their own self worth or is it something that is really needed by the profession over-all? I think it’s based upon individuals trying to have an increase in their market, rather than actually address-ing any sort of health need of the community.” As far as WFC is concerned, chiro-practic is to remain drugless. “The world is not short of drug intervention,” Stewart says. He points out, however, that maintaining a drugless approach does not mean being anti-drug. “I am not anti-drug. My daughter is in medicine right now. But I don’t see the need for prescrip-tion rights in my practice on a day-to-day basis, considering I have excellent relationships with medical doctors in my community that when I see there is a need for medication, I direct them accordingly.” Despite the challenges – external and internal – Stewart is confident the profession can effect big changes in health care, nationally and globally. “I cannot overstate the opportuni-ties that are there internationally. It’s whether we can grab the brass ring on this. It’s my personal goal to really move away from chiropractic just trying to survive, into a world where we flourish.” December 2014 Canadian Chiropractor 23
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