Maintenance care is routinely recommended by most chiropractors.  Maintenance care by its very definition is coming in to be "checked", even if you do not have any symptoms.  In fact, true maintenance care would never have the patient complaining of any aches, pains, stiffness, or other complaints.  The chiropractor would be "checking" to see if you have any misalignments caused by muscle tightness, resulting in restrictions in movement and/or nerve irritation.  The restrictions in motion cause people to be less mobile, more prone to injury, and more likely to develop degenerative arthritis.  Many people take advantage of this care to enjoy a higher quality of life and to save health costs.

So, "where's the beef!"  Here are some of the stats showing the benefits of maintenance care from the research literature:

The RAND corporation found that geriatric patients under continuing chiropractic care were free from the use of a nursing home (95.7% vs. 80.8%), free from hospitalization over the past 23 years (73.9% vs. 52.4%), more likely to report a better health status, more likely to exercise vigorously, and more likely to be mobile in the community (69.6% vs. 46.8%).

Another review found direct costs (hospital care, physicians' services, nursing home) of maintenance care chiropractic patients' costs of $3105 vs. patients receiving no maintenance care at $10,041.  A savings of $6936!

A study implementing an onsite industrial chiropractic program of 2 days per week for 21 months found a decrease in the total number of days of lost time, costs per claim, rate premiums, and surgeries.  Cost savings from the avoided surgeries alone was $900,000!

Another study divided patients into 3 groups, one group got 12 treatments of fake adjustments, one group got 12 real adjustments, and the last group got 12 real adjustments followed by 2 treatments per month the following 10 months.  Guess which group did the best at the end of the 10 months?  Clearly, the group who did the maintenance care did the best!

So, if you were thinking "I don't need it", you may want to re-evaluate!