How to find a Chiropractor

If you are suffering from a condition such as osteoarthritis, sciatica, spine/neck pain or discomfort, repetitive motion conditions or problems with your posture, then you may wish to find a suitable chiropractor to help you. It is probably most useful to locate one in your local area to ensure that you are able to get there for all your appointments and that travel is not too much of a burden for you.

It is very simple to find a chiropractor. Telephone directories and Internet search engines generate numerous results highlighting chiropractors. If you wish to search for a chiropractor whilst ensuring that they are registered with the General Chiropractic Council (GCC – this is a legal requirement therefore this route is recommended), you can do so through their website.


The GCC website has a search engine where you can either look for a specific chiropractor (perhaps if they have been recommended to you by a medical professional or acquaintance who approved of their services) or just any in your area. To find a certain chiropractor you should know their GCC registration number and/or their surname. Alternatively, if you are just looking for any chiropractor in your local area, you can type in your county and/or postcode. This allows the website to generate the appropriate results for you and you can be safe in the knowledge that all advertised chiropractors are registered.

Questions to ask when choosing a chiropractor

There are a variety of key questions that you should consider when selecting your chiropractor. This is important to do as the treatments being administered could affect you for the rest of your life. It is vital that you select the right chiropractor for you and ensure they are properly qualified to limit the possibility of anything going wrong. Therefore, listed here are a few topics you may choose to ponder:

  • Education – You must ensure that your chiropractor has qualified from a registered, legal institution that educates and trains chiropractors to General Chiropractic Council standards. To be sure that the chiropractor has completed their proper training, they should have some documenting evidence that you should ask to see before committing yourself to them.
  • Consultation cost – In general, a good, reliable chiropractor will offer you a free first consultation where they will assess your conditions and determine a diagnosis and recommendations. This is not, however, an official rule to judge the professionalism of a chiropractor.
  • Examination methods – It has been claimed that the best chiropractors use x-rays, digital imaging tools and ultrasound machines. These are used to determine if there are any skeletal issues and can monitor treatment progress if so. This however is subject to some controversy as x-rays (when overused) can be harmful to the body. Despite this, these tools do offer a visual diagnostic aid that may allow a more accurate diagnosis to be made.
  • Number of treatments required – After your initial consultation, your chiropractor should be able to tell you a good estimate of how many treatments you will need.
  • References – Feel free to ask the chiropractor if they have any references you may contact. After all, it is the health of your body that is being determined and is ultimately in the hands of the chiropractor. If they cannot offer references, you may wish to search on the internet to see if anyone has written a review about the chiropractor in question. This can help you evaluate customer experiences to conclude if they sound like the right chiropractor for you.
  • Cost – Would you consider the cost of each treatment reasonable? You should search for a chiropractor that offers good, effective treatments that will benefit you but are within your price range. Do not just attend a chiropractic clinic because it offers cheap treatments, you should weigh up the quality of care with the cost.
  • Legalisation – You should check (either by seeing the chiropractor’s documents or by searching on the General Chiropractic Council website) whether or not the chiropractor is registered. To legally practice chiropractic treatment and therefore be known as a chiropractor, it is necessary for them to be registered with the General Chiropractic Council. If they are not registered with the GCC, then do not seek treatment from them.
  • Experience – You may want to find out how many years the chiropractor has been in the chiropractic business for. They longer they have been working, the more experience they have. Just because a chiropractor is educated, trained and registered through all the right bodies, it does no mean that they hold much experience, which may be off-putting to some.
  • Specialisation – If you are attending a chiropractic clinic for a specific problem, such as an injury that resulted from sports, you may wish to search for a chiropractor that specialises in this area. This specialisation may be a result of additional training or just experience. However, if they are specialised it is more likely that they have seen similar condition and can therefore treat them more effectively.

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