As a practicing chiropractor, I support the regulation change to increase the educational requirements for future chiropractors.   Our goal should be to have the best trained chiropractors coming to Virginia.  As the states around us increase their educational requirements, Virginia should do so as well to maintain our traditional high standards.

I support the 4year pre-chiropractic  school requirement.  In my opinion this mandate will be another step to assure that the citizens of the Commonwealth will continue to recieve quality chiropractic care through continued higher academic standards. Type over this text and enter your comments here. You are limited to approximately 3000 words.

I am writing in support of the regulation change that would require a prospective chiropractor to obtain a Bachelor's degree prior to matriculating into Chiropractic College. I am aware that a person can obtain a Medical degree without a Bachelor's degree, but it is very unusual to find a MD who did not first obtain a Bachelor's degree or higher.

Obviously, chiropractors can be trained without a Bachelor's degree. What this regulation change will do is gradually raise the overall critical thinking skills of our profession.

A significant number of our profession wants this change. We realize that Chiropractic Colleges should be the impetus for this change. I am afraid that in this case "the cart must lead the horse". The schools [with the exception of one] will not make the change, so the profession must force them to change. As more and more states require the change, the schools will make the change. The chiropractic college from which I graduated, states on their website that a Bachelor's degree is reccommended.

Jefferson K. Teass, D.C.

Please consider requiring a Bachelor's degree prior to matriculation into Colleges of Chiropractic for students planning to apply for licensure as Doctors of Chiropractic in the Commonwealth of Virginia.

I have worked as a chiropractic assistant in our state since 1977 for several different DCs and feel that it is past time for this requirement to be a part of Virginia's health regulations.

There are states which have had this requirement for many years. I always want my state to have the most top-notch providers of health care for its citizens.

Thank you for considering my request.

Susan Goddard, C.A.

I am in favor of requiring a Bachelor's Degree for licensure to practice chiropractic in Virginia.

Hugh W. Cline, Jr.,D.C.

Oppose.  The Idea sounds wonderful.  The candidate can apply for a license if he has a BA or BS , right?  First of all, the Doctor of Chiropractic spends another 4 years aquiring his or her graduate degree, and like myself, I couldn't tell you what the first $60.000. worth of education was about because that was then, and this is now.   The amnesia process could actually start sooner if you  started having children and watched Barney or the Disney channel with your kids.  Can anyone relate here?  The BA or BS does nothing for the "security" of the profession or the public.  Now, create a mandate that we have to get off our back porches and participate in at least 1 certification course (150-200 hrs) every 2 years in order to retain our license is a way of letting the public know how "Cutting Edge" we are.  Mandate that the licensed doctors of VA takes a Diplomate program and finishes all the requirements within a 3 year period in order to keep his license, is a CHANGE for the profession.  Acquire the Certification or the Diplomate or loose your license - it's a simple concept.  Only the best of the best will still be around after the first 2 or 3 license renewal periods.  Requiring someone to get their BA or BS degree and Doctorate degree before getting a license means that someone wants to limit the competition - nothing more.        

I am in agreement with instituting this requirement.  Although many of the other professional degree programs (e.g., M.D.) do not require their students to have a Bachelor's degree, or even four years of undergraduate school, the vast majority of the students do.  I believe that four years of undergraduate are necessary to give one the essential maturity and critical thinking skills that are required for physician-level health care.  In my opinion, this SHOULD be a requirement in Virginia.

A 4 year degree would raise the standards of the profession in the eye of the public. It is difficult to find any health professional in this day and age that does not have a bachelor or master degree.  

I am in favor of raising the prelicensure requirements in Virginia for chiropractic licensure to include a 4 year bacculaureate degree. This will ensure top quality candidates and improve the chiropractic standing with the public.

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As a second generation chiropractic physician I should note that both my father and I had a BS (pre-medicine) prior to entering chiropractic school. I always felt that the additional prerequisite education gave me an advantage, over other chiropractic peers, in being able to communicate and understand my patients in my early years of practice.  

I would like to register my support for the proposed regulation  requiring a bachelor's degree as a pre-requisite for licensure for Chiropractors in the Commonwealth of Virginia. This change would elevate the standards of our profession and bring us in line with the requirements in all of our neighboring states. The attainment of a bachelor's degree indicates a certain level of critical thinking and exposure to a wider  range of topics and experiences than a 2-year degree, which is often narrow in it's focus. The increased experience,  both acedemically and socially, would better prepare the physician to relate to his patients and therefore better serve the needs of the citizens of Virginia .

Respectfully submitted,

Elliot Eisenberg, DC , Richmond, VA

 

I believe that a 4-year degree reflects the type of maturity and scholarship that should be present for a viable medical, osteopathic or chiropractic school student.   Perhaps, in the past, just taking core classes was enough pre-requisite, but the changing face of college studies needs to be taken into concern here.  To overcome objection to this requirement, a consideration for enough hours in qualifying subjects can also be written into the code.   This does seem redundant, but may help someone who has been forced by circumstances to transfer to different colleges and universities at the undergraduate level, yet has more than enough credits to merit a degree.  The amount of maturity and ability to complete courses is the primary concern.

I support the regulation change to increase the educational requirements for future chiropractors.

I support the proposed additional educational requirements to obtain a license to practice Chiropractic in Virginia. I additionally feel this should apply to all like professions such as Medicine as to not be discriminatory. This increased educational requirement would serve to increase the competency of the providers and therefore the quality of care delivered to the citizens of the Commonwealth of Virginia.

Respectfully submitted,

Michael S. Pankow, D.C.

 

 

  

It is completely discriminatory to require a DC to have a bachelor's degree when MDs and DOs do not.  You do not need a bachelor's degree to get into medical school in Virginia.  Check out UVA School of Medicine, Medical College of Virginia and/or Eastern Virginia Medical School web sites.  Bachelor's degrees are NOT required.  Their prerequisites are virtually identical to that of The Council on Chiropractic Education.

Where is the data that shows chiropractors or medical doctors are more proficient if they have a four year degree than if they have just 90 hours?  Two studies published in 1976 in JAMA and J Med Ed. concluded that there was no difference in the quality of medical providers with or without bachelor's degrees.  Where is the data that refutes this?

The Council on Chiropractic Education and The Federation of Chiropractic Licensing Boards do not require a 4 year degree than why should the Commonwealth of Virginia be any different?

To raise the standard of education. I highly support the four year pre-chirpractic education degrees for Virginia Chiropractic Licensure.

Respectfully,

Jennifer Tinoosh, D.C., M.U.A.C.

e-mail: docjt98@yahoo.com

I support the regulation change that will increase the educational requirements to include a four-year degree for future chiropractors.  We need to maintain sufficiently high standards to insure that students entering chiropractic colleges have the maturity to handle the increasingly complex healthcare system. Ours is a profession in which the scientific and technological knowledge base is increasing exponentially.  I realize that there will be rare and brilliant students able to skip the requirement without losing necessary maturation and information.  It should, then be very easy for them to meet the requirement.  I do not accept arguments that this would be discriminatory against chiropractors.  We should be responsibly leading the way in requiring what is necessary for quality healthcare and our patient's welfare.

I fully support requiring a Bachelor's degree for newly licensed chiropractors in Virginia.

I believe that it will help raise the standards & public perceptions, as well as insure that we have practitioners who are mature, well rounded and well educated.

Kristen M Teagle,DC
Williamsburg, VA

Why is it necessary for Chiropractors that are already in the state to mess with other people’s lives?  Who are we to label these new doctors as undesirable and say they are not qualified or welcome in Virginia?  And why are we wasting the time of the Board of Medicine? 

Our young doctors need 90 semester hours of undergraduate education, a Doctor of Chiropractic from a CCE accredited school and passage of 4 parts of the National Board examinations.  Just over twenty years ago chiropractors needed 2 years undergrad and had only 2 Parts of the National Boards.  If the new DCs are unqualified, then what about these guys?  Are you going to take way their licenses???

Who says these are lesser-qualified DC anyway?  There is no evidence to support this effort other than a knee jerk impression that one more year of undergraduate education MUST be better.  Show me some DATA, PLEASE !!!  Medical studies say the 4-year degree is not necessary, that is why UVA medical school only requires 90 semester hours!!!  Please see the listed studies below.

Here is some DATA that shows we are NOT a dumping ground of DCs.

Virginia is NOT attracting more chiropractors.  There is not a big influx of students coming to Virginia.  The number of new DCs licensed in Virginia is low compared to neighboring states and complaints against chiropractors are primarily over advertising issues.  This solution of a 4-year degree does not seem to have a problem to fix.  The actual number of NEW DCs each year provided directly from the BOM are:
 
 
1990 – 96
1991 – 100
1992 – 95
1993 – 98
1994 – 90
1995 – 97
1996 – 256 * year that state test was dropped in favor of Part 4 of National Boards
1997 – 159
1998 – 173
1999 - 154
2000 - 145
2001 - 131
2002 - 128
2003 - 110
2004 - 82
2005 – 99
2006 – 96

In comparison, the state of North Carolina, which does have a 4-year degree requirement, is licensing 140+ NEW DCs every year.  The number of DCs in North Carolina is increasing. 

There have been studies comparing medical doctors with two, three and four years of pre-professional education. These studies show that there is no significant difference in performance.

In the 1970s, because of a perceived physician shortage, several medical schools offered six year combined liberal arts-medicine programs. Lazoni and Kayne reported the results of such a program. The authors described their findings: "Graduates of a six-year combined Liberal-Arts-Medicine Program and their medical school classmates (traditional 'eight year' students) are compared as to their medical school performance and their professional postgraduate activities. On standardized examinations (Medical College Admission Test and examinations of the National Board of Medical Examiners) the six-year group was somewhat better than the eight-year group.

"In other aspects, such as class ranking, honors at graduation, and medicine clerkship grades, the six- and eight-year groups were similar. The two groups were remarkably similar in their postgraduate professional career choices and in achieving board certification.

"The data for the first three classes indicate that qualified high school students can succeed academically in an accelerated collegiate-degree program, do well in medical practice, and begin the practice of medicine at a younger age." (1)

These findings are corroborated by a JAMA article which stated, "These data, together with additional information concerning postgraduate professional activities, indicate that the combined accelerated program has been successful." (2)

More recently, a group of Canadian investigators reached similar conclusions: "There were no significant differences between the three groups in the results of any of the subjective and objective outcome measures. Students who have completed 2 years of undergraduate study before admission to medical school were able to achieve a satisfactory level of competency and maturity by the end of medical school. The 2-year option for entrance into medical school should be reconsidered." (3)

Doxey and Phillips, in comparing entrance requirements for health care professions, wisely observed, "The value of pre-professional requirements relating to success in practice is yet to be determined." (4)

References

1. Lanzoni V, Kayne HL: "A report on graduates of the Boston University six-year combined liberal-arts-medicine program." J Med Educ 1976;51(4):283.

2. Blaustein EH, Kayne HL: "The accelerated medical program and the liberal arts at Boston University. JAMA 1976;235(24):2618.

3. Crockford PM, Gupta DM, Grace MG: "Requirements for admission to medical school: how many years of university study are necessary-" Can Med Assoc J 1995;153(11):1595.

4. Doxey THE, Phillips RB: "Comparison of entrance requirements for health care professions." JMPT 1997;20(2):86.

I would encourage the Board members to look at the data and not pass this unsupported, unnecessary and discriminatory proposed regulatory action.

Sincerely,

Joe Foley, D.C.
 

The national trend- not just in neighboring states is to increase the requirements to a 4 yr degree, and to accept Part I.V. clinical exams. I personally see no problem with this pre-requisite.  Infact, I think it should have been implemented long ago. When I decided to go to chiropractic school there was no 4 year pre-requisite in most states, however I decided that my education would be more complete and while unnecessary I completed a 4 year degree when I could have just taken a couple weekend classes at the chiro schools and acquired a license 2-3 years ago. 

I understand that there is concern over the implementation of this ruling however, and I would not support this measure if it were to be made retro-active.  I.E.- it would be ridiculous for someone who has been practicing for thirty years to be forced to go back and get a 4 year degree.  There is not a major influx of "young" chiropractors that I have seen in virginia, I am 28 years old (with a B.S. in biology from a state university) and I just do not see this state as a dumping ground for fresh grads.  I do believe that the issue of professionalism in public image should be addressed, but in the proper forum.  It should be under the scope of practice.

I am a 1991 Palmer graduate, and VCA member, who did happen to have a four-year degree prior to entering Chiropractic college.  I would like to state that this action is not representative of the Chiropractic profession in Virginia, or even of VCA members, the organization which is submitting this proposal.  I oppose the institution of this licensure requirement.  I realize that there is a national movement in this direction, and I do not disagree with this as a whole for the profession…as a direction, and over time.  I don’t believe that the Virginia Medical Board (being without a Chiropractic Board as in other states), should have differing requirements for the health professions that it regulates and licenses.  I do not believe that Chiropractors should have a requirement that does not stand for MD’s or DO’s.  If the concern is primarily about the quality of Chiropractors entering and practicing in this state, a better (and more fair) way to establish this would be to make licensure exams more rigorous, or perhaps increasing continuing education requirements.  Many states do this, including South Carolina (that had a very regorous entrance exam in 1991 when I took it), the state where I established my first practice.  States do earn a reputation for being the ‘fall-back’ states, where one can go and practice if you can’t pass the exams/requirements anywhere else.  Let’s not let Virginia be one of them, but let’s do it in a fair way.  Thank you for your time.

I am in favor of the proposed regulation change which would require a candidate to acquire a four year degree as a requirement for licensure in the State of Virginia. I believe that this regulation change is neccessary in order to bring Virginia in line with the licensing requirements of other states and to ensure that the citizens of Virginia receive the highest standards of care.