Further Questions for the BCA

May 28, 2009 at 4:46 pm (Alternative Medicine, Chiropractic) (BCA, British Chiropractic Association, Chiropractic)

Having received a response from the BCA yesterday, I scribbled down a couple of questions that I thought might be worth putting to them. I’ve now put those scribblings in the form of an email and sent it. My latest email to the BCA follows:

Dear Ms Wakefield,

In response to your email of 27^th May, I would like to ask some further questions of the BCA:

1. You state that: “While spinal manipulation is one of the widely used treatment techniques used by chiropractors it is by no means the only one.” What treatment techniques other than spinal manipulation are used by chiropractors?
2. Have these other techniques been tested? If so, what kind of tests have they been subjected to and what results have been found?
3. You state that: “it is not, and never has been our practice to comment on systematic reviews of chiropractic, particularly when many of these have been demonstrated to be flawed”. What flaws have been demonstrated in systematic reviews of chiropractic?
4. Why don’t the BCA comment on systematic reviews? Is this official policy? (Surely if there are flaws in systematic reviews it would be better to discuss these flaws and look at whether these flaws can be eliminated from future reviews?)
5. Why do you dismiss an important tool in evidence-based medicine, the systematic review, but at the same time assert that outdated guidelines, which have been withdrawn, are “an important publication”? Do you believe that guidelines are more reliable than systematic reviews?

Regards,
James Cole.

Note: I have been awaiting a response from Bassett Chiropractic to my latest email of 22nd May. I have sent a brief (and polite) reminder to my contact there and I will update you as and when they respond.