Frequently Asked Questions

Do I really need x-rays?

Sometimes the decision to recommend x-rays is a matter of neccessity and sometimes it is more of a matter of curiosity. There can indeed be circumstances where x-rays are over utilized and unwarranted. It is best to weigh this decision with the help of the doctor. His experience and even his intuition often guide him to make the best possible choice for his patients. Dr. Dan will not recommend x-rays unless he feels that they are neccessary.

Are they safe?

Much safer than driving on the highway, or walking around with some undiagnosed condition. All radiation exposure, however, is cumulative throughout your entire lifetime and is therefore more potentially harmful to infants and children than to adults. As with many decisions, the key to making the right choice is in knowing when the beneit outweighs the risk.

How much do they cost?

That is the wrong question. The right question would be "how much are they worth?". X-rays can be of immense value in determining the correct diagnosis and treatment of an individual. Besides that, x-ray machines do not come cheap, and the automatic developing machine requires constant maintenance. Then there is the cost of the film and chemicals. Not to mention the expense of the education required to take and read them.

But to answer the question, we try to keep them surprisingly affordable. Most people are used to Emergency Room prices and have hundreds of dollars in their heads. We charge much less than that, around $30 or so per film.

BRIEF HISTORY

In late 1895, Professor Wilhelm Roentgen, a German physicist, was working in his laboratory with a cathode ray tube, which is similar to our fluorescent light bulbs. He evacuated the tube of all air, filled it with a special gas, and passed a high electric voltage through it. When he did this, the tube would produce a fluorescent glow. Roentgen shielded the tube with heavy black paper, and found that a green colored fluorescent light could be seen coming from a screen setting a few feet away from the tube. He realized that he had produced a previously unknown "invisible light," or ray, that was being emitted from the tube; a ray that was capable of passing through the heavy paper covering the tube. Through additional experiments, he also found that the new ray would pass through most solid substances and cast their shadows onto pieces of film. To underscore the unknown nature of his new discovery, Roentgen decided to call them x-rays.

Roentgen soon found that the X-ray would pass through the tissue of humans leaving the bones and metals visible. One of Roentgen's first experiments late in 1895 was a film of his wife Bertha's hand with a ring on her finger. The news of Roentgen's discovery spread quickly throughout the world. Scientists everywhere could duplicate his experiment because the cathode tube was very well known during this period.

Roentgen's discovery quickly opened up an exciting new field for doctors. Radiology began as a medical sub-specialty in the first decade of the 1900's. It was now possible to use this new form of radiation in the study of the human body. Broken bones, for example, could now be looked at by using the rays to see straight through flesh. The extensive use of x-ray imaging during the second world war, and the advent of the digital computer and new imaging modalities like ultrasound and magnetic resonance imaging have combined to create an explosion of diagnostic imaging techniques in the past 25 years.

CHIROPRACTIC X-RAYS

Chiropractors, like all primary-care doctors, are trained to take and read x-ray films. Radiographs are incorporated into the chiropractic field for several reasons:

We can find broken bones, dislocations, birth defects, arthritis, bone spurs, certain metabolic diseases, calcification, some cancers, tumors, cysts, osteoporosis, scoliosis, and spinal distortions.