New Animal Hospital Offers Chiropractic Care for Pets

The headline above is from a story that appeared in the Effingham Daily News on August 27, 2015. The story highlights the increased roll chiropractic is playing in the health of animals while reporting on a specific new facility for animal chiropractic care.

The article begins by noting that a new facility, St. Francis Animal Hospital of Effingham County, Georgia, has made chiropractic care an important part of the offering for their animal patients suffering from movement or stiffness issues. Dr. Earl Annable, a veterinarian and co-founder of the new animal hospital, treated his four legged patients with traditional veterinary medicine for years before studying and including chiropractic into his care.

The article explains chiropractic care for animals by stating, "Chiropractic care involves the restoration of the spine to normal, using quick thrusts to a mal-aligned vertebrae. Even normal everyday movement and wear and tear, and especially trauma, can create a vertebrae movement out of line."

Dr. Annable responded, "It's like wheels on your car. When your wheels are out of alignment, the car won't steer right. It's the same thing with your body." He continued, "Almost everybody can potentially benefit from this (chiropractic area of care). I've worked at so many different places and at that time, it really wasn't on my radar. But it wasn't long after learning about animal chiropractic care that I jumped on it and took the courses to become certified."

Annable noted in the article that he has not abandoned traditional veterinary medicine but has integrated that care with chiropractic. "This isn't a one or another method of care only," said Annable. "I can now use both traditional medicine and animal chiropractic in a complementary way. It isn't here to just replace one or the other. I want people to know that the two can work together and complement one another."

In explaining how chiropractic benefits animals, Annable stated, "Nerves control everything that happens in your animals." Anything adversely affecting the nervous system will have detrimental effects that will resonate throughout the entire body." He continued, "I love the idea of being able to help an animal feel better by using just my hands. It's real. If we can just promote the body's God-given ability to heal and regulate itself, it can do wonders to restore normal abilities and health."

Dr. Annable continued his explanation by pointing out, "If the vertebrae are off or twisted just a little, those nerves going to the kidney or to a muscle for examples, won't function as normally and healthily as they would otherwise. There's going to be a little nerve impairment if those spaces are infringed upon." He concluded, "Just as benefits of human chiropractic care have become more accepted over time, so too is the hope for animal chiropractic care."