The ABC's of health promotion and disease prevention in chiropractic practice.

OBJECTIVE: To describe the importance of health promotion techniques and use of active disease prevention techniques as part of chiropractic practice through a selective review of literature using a mnemonic device. DISCUSSION: There is evidence that doctors of chiropractic use some health promotion techniques in practice such as instruction on exercise, dietary advice, smoking cessation recommendations and the encouraging of preventive chiropractic visits. Healthy People goals for the nation suggest that providers encourage preventive services, work toward better access to care and stress disease prevention. However, information on how this can be routinely done in chiropractic practice is fragmented. This article suggests ways to implement health promotion into the everyday management of the chiropractic patient.
CONCLUSION: Health promotion and disease prevention can be easily performed in chiropractic practice. The nature of the chiropractic supportive or maintenance visit gives doctors a unique platform on which they can launch full-scale health promotion efforts on their patients.