(WTNH, Oct. 25, 2005 1:45 PM) _ If you’ve ever been in an auto accident, even a minor fender bender, there’s a good chance you suffered whiplash.

Of the 13 million motor vehicle accidents that occur in the united states annually, about 1 million result in whiplash injuries. Management of these injuries, including diagnosis, treatment, litigation costs, and insurance payments, is estimated to cost $29 billion annually.

“I was a passenger in the vehicle that was hit in the rear.” Four months ago Veronica Nicholas suffered whiplash. “I had went forward and I heard a pop,” she recalls.

The term "whiplash" refers to cervical spine injuries caused by sudden hyperextension followed by hyperflexion of the neck. It’s the most common type of traffic injury, affecting 83 percent of people in collisions.

The common cause: a rear-ending, typically at very low speeds, even 5 miles per hour.

Classically, the extension recoil--or backward motion--after a rear-end collision is thought to result in a hyperextension cervical injury.

Symptoms such as neck pain and stiffness, headaches, dizziness, burning or prickling, shoulder or back pain may be present immediately after the injury or may be delayed for several days.

Now, a new study in the latest archives of internal medicine found whiplash patients who went to the General Practioner for just one or two visits had the quickest recovery--around six months time.

Typical treatments involve rest and anti-inflammatory, like Naproxen.

“Most people will find that with that kind of care and some rest that the symptoms will go away in a few days,” says Dr. Jeffrey Goldstein, an orthopedist at NYU-Hospital for Joint Diseases.

In the study, those who went to the chiropractor for six or fewer visits took about a month longer than that. But, those who had more than six visits to the chiropractor or to the chiropractor and a General Practioner as well, took around a year on average to get better.

“The study is suggesting that if you feed into these patients’ symptoms by giving them a lot of chiropractic care, a lot of physical therapy a lot of medical visits that its all this sort of passive care that is going to take them a lot longer to get ready,” Dr. Goldstein states.

Dr. Jason Brattner, a chiropractor, has helped Veronica get better…and he argues for intensive treatment to help the healing process. “As far as the study, I don’t agree with the conclusion or the outcome of it, in my experience in practice the more intervention that a patient gets closer to the time of injury is better,” he says.

Those going to the GP for one or two visits had the mildest symptoms at the start. So the smaller number of visits may simply be a sign of less severe disease.

But the authors also believe that going to the doctor a lot may be prompting the patient to deal get used to being disabled and reinforcing some patients’ belief that whiplash is a serious disorder with a long disabling course, which it isn’t.

They argue patients and doctors should limit the number of treatments for whiplash.

So, perhaps, when it comes to treatment, maybe less is more.

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