An occasional trip won't hurt, and the full back and neck xrays they do are a good way to get an idea what kind of shape your back is in. Treatments from a good chiro also feel lovely, except that if you're in bad shape sometimes you'll feel a bit sore (like muscular sore) for a while afterwards - but it's a "good" soreness. (If it hurts when you are treated, don't go back!)

As a kid, I has scoliosis, and the regular doc wanted to operate and put a metal rod up my spine. Yikes! And year and a half of chiropractic care later, I had a straight and healthy spine. Periodically I continued to have checkups and adjustments.

When I came out to the west coast, I discovered a whole different school of chiroppractic thinking, which seems to believe that you need adjustments 3 times a week to be healthy. I don't buy it, but some people swear by it, especially those which chronic pain problems. If I go too often, my back just goes out of alignment more easily.

As medical treatments go, it's one of the safest things you can do -- probably THE safeest, right after doing nothing at all. Every now and then you'll hear a scare story from a treatment gone wrong, but the statistics are about 1 chiropractic death per year vs. 1.2 million deaths per year from correctly prescribed and dosed drugs. Hmmm.