Forward-Thinking Chiropractors Are Adding Aesthetics and Anti-Aging Services

Aesthetic and anti-aging services is one area that is often way outside the comfort zone for chiropractors. Many chiropractors have a picture of their practice and themselves that is narrowly focused on what they were trained to do, which is provide chiropractic services, and nothing else.


Others, however, take a broader view and see themselves as natural health-care providers. Thus anything that is non-surgical and does not involve medications is a possible option for their practice.


We work with a number of these chiropractors who have opened up their minds to other opportunities. Depending on the practice, we help them bring in a variety of services at different price points and offer treatments that will help patients get better or look and feel better, by their patients' own definition.


Some doctors simply want to add a few extra services within their existing clinic. Others may want to build a stand-alone aesthetic and anti-aging clinic. Today, we usually recommend that you offer aesthetic and anti-aging services in a separate section of the same clinic, in a way that makes sense to the practice and your patients.


Part of the reason is better utilization of overhead, of course. Plus better utilization of your current patient base. Even if patients do not want to cross over to aesthetic services, they obviously know other people who might be interested in these services. Sometimes your staff will be able to cross over and work in aesthetic services, as well. And hopefully by now you have some great marketing people and marketing programs in place that can be re-purposed to attract new kinds of clients.

Alternative Services you Can Offer at Your Chiropractic Office

You need to find alternative services that you can add to your practice, and that are within the scope of your ability to practice in your state. They need to be low cost and easy to do. A service that you can add and start marketing through the Internet and locally in your community, so you can start building up alternative cash patients coming into the clinic.

So whether it's breast thermography or weight loss or fibromyalgia treatments, you can increase the part of your practice that is cash-based and get to a balanced practice that is 50% insurance, 50% cash. Some of the more popular services to consider include:

• Cold Laser Therapy: pain management, wound healing, detox, increasing range of motion, decreasing inflammation;
• ASERT Technique: allergy elimination, increasing energy levels, ion-cleansing foot baths;
• Heavy Metal Detox: increase energy levels and boost the immune system;
• Auriculotherapy Treatments: eliminate addictive behaviors such as smoking, alcohol abuse, drugs, gambling and over-eating;
• Nutritional Testing: help patients find the exact nutrition needed for the body;
• Women's Hormone Testing: which aids in helping women level out hormonal issues using salvia based testing;
• Advanced Chiropractic Services: Decreasing pain and degenerative disc issues that increase range of motion while boosting the immune system;
• CVR: creative visualization and relaxation programs; 20-minute programs over 13 weeks using your eyes, brain, and ears. This can now be done from home or traveling. There are 18 different programs from weight loss to Bobby Lopez's Golf that takes 4- 7 strokes off your score;
• Education & Information: helping your practices provide valuable education and information to all patients;
• Computerized Regulatory Thermography: it's how they detect many cancers in Germany; F.D.A. approved for breast, liver, colon screens;
• Ozone therapy, for detoxification;
• And many others.

Many of these services can be added to your practice for a very reasonable investment, often for less than $5,000

Every practice is different, of course. There are services that all chiropractors can do in legally in most states, and other services that require special licensing or medical supervision.

It's important to determine which services will pay off for your geographic area and type of patient. The best way to do that is to work with an experienced chiropractic consultant who has already implemented these services for hundreds of other successful practices.

Mind Set is Everything

If you are stuck in the same mind set you are going to be left behind. In today's tough times you have to be willing to change your thinking. If you are stubborn and keep saying I have done things this way for the last ten years, I am not about to change now, don't be surprised when your business goes under.

You have to be willing to rethink how you do what you do. If your business is still only focusing on basic chiropractic techniques, clients are going to find a new place to go. The clients want more for their money and they will go where that is being offered. If you can change your mind set you will be able to keep current customers and draw in new ones.

Instead of focusing on just chiropractic spread your business to include health and wellness. People are all about getting healthy. They are into preventative care. They don't want to be middle aged and sick. They want to do what they can right now to keep them healthy long into their golden years.

If you can offer them these services your business will be booming. Don't let your mind frame keep you from being successful. Be willing to make changes to keep up with the times and needs of the client.

How a Coach Can Help You Get Funding for Your Practice

It's hard to justify the need for a coach in a chiropractic practice, since all you're going to be doing is catering to your patients' chiropractic needs-right? Wrong. Yes, you want to take care of patients, but in order to have patients to take care of you have to first let them know who you are, where you are and what you can do. For that, you can benefit from a coach's expertise.

Many lenders want to know you have a coach in your corner before they give you the funding for your practice. For them, it's something of a guarantee. Since coaches know how to build a chiropractic practice there's a very good chance you'll be able to lure in patients and actually make enough money to pay them back for their investment. And when you get right down to it, that's all a lender really wants-to know they're going to get back that little bit more than they put in.

Does Your Insurance Cover Chiropractic Care?

There are many things about being a chiropractor that I find aggravating at times, but nothing sets my teeth on edge like spending an hour arguing with a patient's health insurance company over whether or not they have the right (or the need) to receive chiropractic care. Sometimes I go home at the end of the day feeling like just because I don't hand out prescriptions for pain killers to every patient that walks through my doors, somehow in the eyes of the insurance industry I'm not a real health care provider.

You know and I know that sometimes chiropractic care is not only necessary, but the best course of treatment for one condition or another. If you could choose between spending the rest of your life as a slave to pain pills or receiving chiropractic care to reduce your pain, which would you choose? That's a choice many patients have to make.

The problem is, these patients aren't the ones making that choice. Their doctors aren't doing it either. Somehow along the way the system has managed to double back on itself, allowing insurance companies to dictate what treatments and procedures patients can and can't receive because many of these patients can't afford chiropractic care out of pocket and their insurance companies won't pay for what they consider to be "radical and unconventional" treatment for many conditions.

Does your insurance cover chiropractic care? If the answer is yes, you're lucky. If the answer is no, and you think you might need or want chiropractic services in the future, it might be a good idea to start hunting for another insurance provider. Otherwise, goodness only knows what treatment they might dream up next.