Hi everyone, I thought that I would take this week to talk about what drove me to become a Doctor of Chiropractic. When exiting high school and entering college I will admit that I was a little unsure of exactly what I wanted to do. The only thing I really knew was that I wanted to help people. Well wanting to help people isn’t very specific as there are so many ways to go about doing this.

I started my education at UNI very indecisive. Feeling ambitious I signed up for all science classes along with my general education classes. I have always loved science…chemistry, biology, anatomy.. you name it… those were my favorite classes to take in high school so I gave it a go. Shortly after signing up for these classes I became terrified of taking on such a heavy load my freshman year of college, with 3 of my classes having labs as well. I ended up in tears accompanying my anxiety about what I was getting myself into. At this point my parents set up a meeting with an adviser so I could go over my schedule and make it less scary. I ended up changing everything! I went from science to business classes because I figured that was “safer” and easier than what I was getting myself into before.

Upon starting my new schedule I did well in the business classes and enjoyed them for a while but became bored quickly. At this point I wanted something more fun, so I signed up for fashion classes my sophomore year. As much as I loved these classes and enjoyed them they just weren’t for me. My second semester sophomore year I decided to give those science classes another go, after all I had survived my freshman year and felt much more confident in my abilities as a college student. After beginning these classes I began to excel quickly being at the top of my classes in biology, chemistry, anatomy and physiology…etc. For the first time since my college career began I felt like I was finally in the right place. I loved was I was learning and I was good at it! Soon my friends starting making comments… you’re so smart you should be a doctor or something! Hearing this comment was the very first time that I had even thought of trying to achieve something that seemed so out of reach. That seed that was planted by my dear friends at UNI began to grow and my thoughts changed rapidly from negative and fear based to positive and motivational! I thought to myself,  how cool would it be if I could actually become a doctor.. I could help so many people! At this time my goal became to become a pediatric medical doctor because I wanted to work with kids and grew up in a medically based family.

In pursuing this goal I decided to work at a nursing home full time over the summer as a CNA. I loved working in a nursing home, every day I got to help people do the things they could no longer do on their own. These included things like helping them eat, helping them get dressed, and helping them bathe…to me this was the ultimate way of serving people.

That fall I got into a car accident that totaled my car. As you can imagine I had pretty bad whiplash and didn’t feel well at all. After going to urgent care I was given a pain prescription and told to rest. A few days later as I was eating a sandwich I was unable to swallow without difficulty, this scared me as I had no idea what was going on. I called up the doctor from the urgent care clinic that I went to after my accident and went in for another evaluation. The doctor wanted to test me for strep. Now I have had strep before and knew this was no what was going on but I complied knowing that the test would be negative and hoping for a better diagnosis after. Of course the test was negative, and instead of further evaluating me (he didn’t even examine me at all) he told me to eat ice cream and cough drops as it was nothing. This seriously happened! I was distraught and smart enough to know that there was something going on, probably related to the accident that he didn’t bother to look into.

At this point I was advised to go see a chiropractor by a friend so I did. And guess what, I was given a wonderful explanation as to why my throat was in spasm and why I couldn’t swallow food easily… AND it WAS related to my whiplash injury. This is how it was explained to me at the time so that I could understand…..turns out, the nerves to your throat and mouth come out of your neck, and because I had a significant injury to all the structures in my neck causing hyper-excitability and muscle spasms in my neck my throat was unable to function properly.

I was blown away, not only by the attentiveness of the doctor to my concerns but also through his thorough evaluation. Through that he was able to arrive at an explanation for what was going on instead of trying to chase the symptoms and treat those with.. ice cream  and cough drops lol. Once I started treatment not only were adjustments helping the neck pain and upper back pain that I was experiencing from the accident but the headaches and migraines I had suffered from for years were decreasing in severity and frequency. Chiropractic adjustments had helped me in more ways than medicine ever did and that is when I knew that I wanted to become a Doctor of Chiropractic. Two months into treatment I transferred to Logan College of Chiropractic in St. Louis and finished my bachelor’s degree in life sciences there while working on my doctorates in chiropractic.

There is a time and place for medicine and people’s lives are saved every day because of it. But when facing situations like the one I was in I think that medicine and drugs should be the last resort… not the first. And I am so blessed to have found my passion and a way to serve people in the very best way possible.

Dr. Nicole Davis graduated from Logan University with not only her Doctorate in Chiropractic but her Bachelors in Life Sciences. After working with hundreds of clients a week in a busy Ohio Chiropractic clinic, she decided to head home to Des Moines to be closer to her family.  She currently specializes in family wellness care with advanced training in pediatric and pregnancy care, working alongside 2 other doctors in the only Wellness Center in Iowa to offer Chiropractic, Acupuncture, Specialized Pediatric and Pregnancy Care as well as Functional Medicine.  She loves spending time with family, friends and her dog, Maci. She is here to serve her community with love, support and enthusiasm.