Country Support Groups - by Michel Tetrault, DC

Bi-cultural DCs can play a large part in the International expansion of chiropractic.

There are now chiropractors in 100 countries in the world where 2/3rds have less than 10 practicing DCs: only four countries have over 500 chiropractors; eighteen have between 51 and 500 DCs; fifteen have between 11 and 50 DCs; and 63 have less than 10 DCs in private practice. Knowing that there is strength in numbers, how can the profession support these chiropractic pioneers in their efforts to establish their legitimacy? One way is to encourage the development of "country support groups" like we have seen developed for El Salvador, Ethiopia, Iran, Panama and Poland.

In chiropractic there are over a thousand DCs who have either immigrated to the USA or Canada or they are the first foreign-born children of immigrants and while living in North America they were attracted to chiropractic. This large number of bi-lingual and bi-cultural DCs can play a significant part in the International expansion of chiropractic if they will learn how to organize and engage in meaningful activities that can in fact increase the prospects of establishing chiropractic in their country of origin or of their parents' origin.

Economists and Political strategists are getting people to pay attention to the increased value emigrants play in a developing county's future growth. Largely due to technology, Internet, cheaper travel, cheaper telecommunications, and dual-citizenships, ex-patriots can and do stay in closer contact with their country of origin and contribute more income as well to the wealth of their country of heritage.

The sad reality today is that it is too attractive to choose to practice in a Western country than it would be to become the first wave of DC pioneers in a developing country. Instead of feeling hopeless or simply avoiding the issue entirely, those elements that allow today's immigrants to maintain closer ties Internationally, can also make it easier for our bi-cultural DCs to support, with good planning and wisely funded activities, the planting and nurturing of chiropractic in India, China, the Philippines, Pakistan, Hungary, Mexico, Chile... just to name a few. The Chiropractic Diplomatic Corps invites the leadership of the small but growing number of "culturally-based" associations to begin a dialogue that can let others benefit from common lessons learned and create data for the foundation of some basic structures and organizational instruments that can be easily adopted and implemented by even a small number of chiropractors.

1. Getting first-hand information about the current status of chiropractic in their country of designation.
2. Starting a regular cyclical humanitarian mission in conjunction with the local practicing DCs.
3. Raising funds or acquiring donated equipment and shipping it to their targeted country.
4. Participating DCs are more likely to visit their country, which naturally increases affinity and motivation.
5. Using all known contacts, local and abroad, to actively recruit for students and DCs who will join the pioneer effort.
6. Giving practical, logistical and other support for student DCs who are sent abroad for chiropractic education.
7. Encouraging their pioneer DCs by emails and drop-in visits when possible.
8. Help in public relation efforts that help increase chiropractic utilization in their targeted country.

Once the number of country support groups increases, that the awareness of these groups becomes better known and that the level of productive activities increases and becomes standard as all groups learn from one another, we will be seeing the dawn of a new "grass-roots" effort in the International expansion of chiropractic; one that requires people to interact at close contact within the profession and within groups with closely held values and with strong national origin affinities.

The Chiropractic Corps can act as a central information exchange and a common contact point to help bring people together of respective national origins and interest. There are also Western-born DCs who have traveled and developed genuine interests in another country who would add to the numbers of these loosely structured support organizations of DCs. There are National and International common interest groups that have become formal associations such as the Black American Chiropractic Association, the Christian Chiropractic Association, The Association of Catholic Chiropractors; but there are also other groups representing country affiliations such as Egypt, El Salvador, Ethiopia, Honduras, Iran, Jordan, Lebanon, Poland, Qatar, Slovakia and Russia. In addition, there are humanitarian missions that somewhat serve as groups that support an increased chiropractic presence in countries like Bolivia, Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Nicaragua, Panama and Peru. These are the groups and associations that we know about today and there are certainly possibilities for support groups to be formed for virtually every country with little or no chiropractic presence that can greatly impact the potential for chiropractic abroad.

A final word since human nature being what it is... a reminder to exercise caution in keeping a policy of openness for humanitarian-minded individuals of non-native origin and of accepting that, within the nationals, there will be differences of opinions. To quote Steven Covey: "Keep the big things big - and the little things little..." or was that BJ Palmer?