Episode 13, Talking South Carolina Podcast Interview with Drs. Mike McIntyre and Luke Sparaccio of McIntyre Family Chiropractic in Summerville, SC

Episode transcript:

Angela Barrett – “Hey guys, today I have with me Doctor Luke and Doctor Mike from McIntyre. Family Chiropractic one of make sure I got that right in out of Summerville. So we’re down that we’re down south. Yeah. Sumerville’s kind of become in the new Charleston, right?”

DR. Mike McIntyre – Pretty much.

Angela Barrett – “Yeah, yeah, Charleston. It’s growing. It’s kind of what I say about.”

DR. Mike McIntyre – Bill all.

Angela Barrett – “Over. Yeah. So, how long have, you guys been in business? I guess, the market started with you. I guess.”

DR. Mike McIntyre – “Yeah, I opened in 2019.”

Angela Barrett – “2019, and.”

DR. Mike McIntyre – “And then. Yeah, we’re. I guess we’re almost, what, the five years now in business, I guess just about. Oh, yeah.”

Angela Barrett – “And, how long have you been with them?”

DR. Luke Sparaccio – “Yeah. So I was, I moved, different area. So I’m originally from New York, Long Island, New York.”

Angela Barrett – Long Island.

DR. Luke Sparaccio – “Yeah. I went to the doctor. I went to school with doctor Mike. So we’re very close. We had the same philosophy and how to manage and care for patients. Same mentor. A doctor would shout out to doctor, would you stayed us and everything that we we know about the work that we do. And so just taking care of people.”

DR. Luke Sparaccio – “So so I was in, upstate and then California. So I just moved from California to work with doctor Mike. So a few weeks.”

DR. Mike McIntyre – “I’ve been here a few weeks. Yes, yes.”

Angela Barrett – So what part of California?

DR. Luke Sparaccio – “The Bay area, Pleasanton, Concord area.”

Angela Barrett – “Cool. So my son worked out, in California for a while, and now that I don’t enjoy him being back in South Carolina. But I sure do miss the excuse to get out to Sausalito. Wow. Okay. It’s like, dang. So anyway, so tell me you talked about the same philosophy in the care of your patient. What? What is that philosophy?”

DR. Mike McIntyre – “Well, I mean, I remember one thing is service. Like, we’re always focused on the patient, what they need. You know, we do truly believe that we work with the body’s ability to heal itself, so we don’t, you know, what we do is, making the body function as well as it can, not looking at ways to, like, mask symptoms or anything like that.”

DR. Mike McIntyre – “So it’s definitely a different approach to health care. And we definitely share that that servant mindset philosophy as well. So it’s always focused on, you know, what the patient needs and what we can best do to serve that.”

Angela Barrett – So it was let’s just get the elephant out of the room. Let’s talk about the biggest misconception of chiropractic care. Let’s just go ahead and hit that in the bud. What do you think it is?

DR. Luke Sparaccio – “There’s a lot there. Is so I think the biggest thing is people associate lack of symptoms with functioning optimally. One of, a quote that I heard, they said that, who is it? Was the well-known, philosophy. You know, a lot of these. But one of the you guys, it talks about the, if we use the analogy or the, the quote that those without symptoms are the healthiest, the ones that without symptoms are, are in the grave, right?”

DR. Luke Sparaccio – “Because they have no symptoms. So people associate I think that’s the biggest misconception is that, oh, I don’t have, you know, whether that’s someone that’s two years old or or 99 years old, like, I don’t have any symptoms. That means I’m healthy or functioning well. And as I mentioned before, only one third of our nerves have been receptors.”

DR. Luke Sparaccio – And so lacking a lack of pain doesn’t mean function. So that’s why we the work we do is not just where the pain is. And then we adjust that particular area. There is a diagnostic. There’s an analysis. Or we call a system approach to finding the root cause to the problem. And so we’re very detailed and organized in regards to find a good cause to the problem.

Angela Barrett – “Yeah. Like, I mean, there are some people who, have said, oh, will it hurt? You know, and I’m like, well, we went to the wrong person then, because it’s not supposed to hurt. I have my chiropractor, David Chandler shout out to him and seriously, if I could afford to go every day and I know that’s not good for you, but that’s.”

Angela Barrett – “But, I just like to be adjusted, and so I’ll just go in there and he said anything wrong today, and I’ll be like, no, just hear me. Well, just. That’s right. And that is a lot of it. I know and many years ago gone for migraines, certainly was in an accident many, many years ago. Not a bad one, but just enough to tweak things.”

Angela Barrett – “Did that. I’m not a big medicine taker, so I seek all other avenues because I can’t. The medicine just doesn’t do well with me. Like some people can take a a tiny RPM. Well, that would make me in a coma for like two days. Not kidding. So I can’t take it. So I, I’ve always sought out other avenues.”

Angela Barrett – “And so I think what you all do, is a great thing, but I know that there are a lot of people who don’t, so clear up some of the things. I mean, I’ve known one, you know, you’ve been in a car accident and, you know, you tweaked your neck, your back, and migraines for sure. It can help name some of the other things that people don’t normally think of.”

Angela Barrett – They just reach for medicine that you can help again to the root cause.

DR. Mike McIntyre – “I think I’ll just say like medicine. But one of the things that I’m focused on now is like pregnancy and pediatric care and, and I, we have another baby on the way in a few weeks.”

Angela Barrett – “Number five. Six. Oh my God. Five. Oh, mercy.”

DR. Mike McIntyre – “But but but, the and I hate to say medical world, but the medical world views something that’s simple and natural. Is pregnancy as like as an issue. Right. It’s not. So educating people about the fact that, you know, you can this is a natural thing that we’ve been doing for, you know, tens of thousands of years. It’s not a medical intervention that’s always needed.”

DR. Mike McIntyre – “Now, obviously there are cases when there are. But like seeing people having like such high rates of like C-section when it might not necessarily have to happen or, you know, taking care of babies. The biggest thing that I focus on is like checking a baby after they’re born. Like, if you if your baby’s born in a hospital, they checked everything, but they don’t have a spine check with what we do, you know, the most important system in their body because their spine holds their nervous system, which controls everything.”

DR. Mike McIntyre – “So I always, at that baby’s first adjustment is the most important one, because we might be, prevent any problem before it even becomes a problem.”

Angela Barrett – “Yeah. And speaking of children, when my son was young, he got, headaches a lot. He was a baseball player. And the headaches were actually coming from things just being out of line. And so we went a couple times a week, you know, you got 2 to 3 times a week, two times a week. And then we got to that monthly as long as he played baseball and we went to get the regular spine adjustments, headaches were not there is you know it’s just people just don’t think about that kind of stuff.”

Angela Barrett – Yeah. Yeah.

DR. Luke Sparaccio – “Our bodies that a body is designed to heal and we need to remove the interference from the brain to body and, another passion of mine is something I really like to study is, blood sugar and adrenal function. And a lot of people don’t associate that with, managing their blood sugar and or digestive. And but I see it.”

DR. Luke Sparaccio – “I mean, when I was in California, I saw pretty much people weekly just for digestive, like, acid reflux. I can’t tell you how many patients are on acid reflux medicine for 15, 20 years. When we get back to the root. Root, how the medicine was developed, it should be only several weeks that really they should be on it.”

DR. Luke Sparaccio – “But just educating, I mean, doctor Mike and I have a heart. Just educating, going above and beyond just to sit down with them and and just give them hope and clarity as to what the problems are and whether we can fix it here and or we need to refer them out. I mean, we’re trying to work with other practitioners to really, build a network of people that, take care of people.”

Angela Barrett – “So and the other thing, this is how it is explained to me many, many, many years ago because I’m much older than you guys. You know, when your spine is aligned and everything is working, everything flows like it should. And I’ll give you an example. Hormones, female hormones. You know, I have it for a fact. I had a friend who was told by a medical doctor, can’t get pregnant, can’t get pregnant, can’t get pregnant.”

Angela Barrett – “I said, go see a chiropractor in six months. Guess what? She was pregnant.”

DR. Mike McIntyre – “I have so many stories. Yeah, just the beautiful thing I know.”

Angela Barrett – “So I mean, people, you know, for women who still have all that, again, pretty old, I mean, it is a very,”

Angela Barrett – “And noninvasive is what I’m trying to say. A noninvasive way to get everything working right down to female hormones, which are not talked about a lot because people are like, oh, let’s we’ll talk about that. But it needs to be brought up because this is a big part, because then, you know, as as you get older than you, you go through all this whole other thing and it just, you know, but all of it helps, what you guys do.”

Angela Barrett – “So speaking of that, we’ll talk about the three teas of chiropractic, care. Tell me about that.”

DR. Mike McIntyre – “You got your go to,”

DR. Luke Sparaccio – “Yeah. It’s, toxins, traumas and thoughts, or another is chemical, physical and emotional stress. And that is the big reason for educating patients. I was just talking with someone earlier today about, better understanding. How can we manage stress? And that’s why people say, oh, chiropractic, we have this broad stroke is because if we can better understand how to want to adapt to our stressors, then those three things chemical, physical and emotion, all stress.”

DR. Luke Sparaccio – “We all have those, right? It’s not going to go away. Right. How do we better manage that. So that’s why we have doctor Mike and I have a lot of things that we talk with, lifestyle, things that we do outside of the office to help them better manage their stress. So that’s a key component because a lot of people, as we mentioned before, a misconception is like, oh, I, I didn’t know that that my mental stress, you know, when people come in, you see them regularly, that you can tell them there’s a lot of mental stress, whether that’s difficult at work or a family death in a family like that is a”

DR. Luke Sparaccio – “big emotional stress. And what that does, it puts a lot of stress to the nervous and does the joints. When the joints are moving well, your body can’t move. And I can talk forever about all those things.”

Angela Barrett – “But just like when people have tension in the neck, I mean, nine times out of ten, not always that stress, but what happens is because, like you’re saying, it’s just that gradual thing and, you know, the next thing you know, sitting with your shoulders up round your ears because you can’t lose, I know, I had several friends who have to go.”

Angela Barrett – “I mean, just because of their jobs or what they do daily just provides a lot of stress. And, they go for muscle management or chiropractic adjustments. However, I think at your office, I think you guys do both like some sort of I think I saw on the website, correct me if I’m wrong. A massage therapy there.”

DR. Mike McIntyre – “Yeah. Have a massage therapist in-house who works with us. We do. I say we don’t do, we don’t do the spa treatment. We do corrective care utilizing her skills. So she works with us. In each case, basically, it’s it’s pretty awesome to have that. Yeah.”

Angela Barrett – “So, clear up an argument. Muscles from I’ve had before massage first and then adjustment or adjustment and then the size.”

DR. Mike McIntyre – “Most of the time for me, I adjust people first and then send them in for a massage.”

Angela Barrett – Yeah.

DR. Mike McIntyre – And everything. Yeah. And.

DR. Luke Sparaccio –

DR. Mike McIntyre – “Yeah, I don’t like having massage first because that muscle feedback gives me a lot of information on where and when to adjust. Yeah. So I like to adjust first rather than like, you know, get rid of that feedback from the muscles and then adjusting.”

Angela Barrett – “Right. Yeah. Well and just from the massage standpoint it’s like it takes me a while to relax if I’ve already had that adjustment. Sort of I could relax when I get to the inside, the whole relaxing and enjoy all of it. You know, I’ve got, so let’s talk about the services you guys do provide there.”

Angela Barrett – At the office.

DR. Mike McIntyre – “Yeah. So we do, we focus on the chiropractic care, right? We do garden center practice care, and then, have the massage therapist that works with us. My front office manager also does, she’s a yoga instructor. So we do yoga classes. She’ll, she’ll show people, like, some home care stuff, like stretching and things like that.”

DR. Mike McIntyre – “And then, we’re starting to delve into some functional medicine stuff with a new partner that we have. We haven’t really announced anything about that yet, but,”

Angela Barrett – You have no. Yeah.

DR. Mike McIntyre – There’s a teaser.

Angela Barrett – On that’s.

DR. Mike McIntyre – “The that’s the teaser. And then, but we have other, health care providers in the area that I work with, like some nurse practitioners, mental health counselor. That’s a, somebody we work with pretty regularly. And I’m really just having even, even medical doctors. I mean, I work with knowledgeable doctors and Ob-Gyn, OB GYNs, and, having that relationship is wonderful.”

DR. Mike McIntyre – “And I think a lot of chiropractors are afraid to have those relationships because they think that, you know, I mean, there’s there’s the conception, right? Where we’re different. We’re not accepted by the medical world, and.”

Angela Barrett – They’re not doctors in quotation.

DR. Mike McIntyre – “We’re fake doctors faked out. Right? We go through, we go through just as much schooling, and I really do it myself. On being like people I take care of. I view them as like primary care doctor. What? You know, I, I need to be referred somewhere or something else. Like I need to figure out where they need to go.”

DR. Mike McIntyre – “And I mean, we take X-rays on people. We have to do pathology read on those X-rays. And, I mean, I’ve seen I’ve found bone cancer and X-rays, and I need to be able to know where to send them and and identify that stuff. So we’re not just the, you know, snake oil rack and crack and papa bones.”

DR. Mike McIntyre – “I word for holds, whole body health care provider is what we’re we’re looking to do here. So.”

Angela Barrett – “Yeah. So, let’s talk about, like, people with arthritis. Well, we’ll just pick that one. How can you help? Because that’s a that’s a common one. How do you help people with what are the different modalities? I guess that you can help people with other ideas with.”

DR. Mike McIntyre – Go for it.

DR. Luke Sparaccio – “But yeah. So that the term is, is is used a lot arthritis. It’s an inflammatory, it’s inflammatory. Right. And so when we look at the X-rays and that’s why the detail gone said is really based on, a foundational perspective. Right. So if there’s imbalance or structural misalignment, it can irritate put stress to the joints.”

DR. Luke Sparaccio – “So that joint has been, misaligned or not level as we would call it. Then over time, there’s going to be more wear and tear on that joint. And that’s when you’ll have more of that arthritic changes on the disc. And that’s the big thing to see is to know. To not to see is to guess. Someone has told me.”

DR. Luke Sparaccio – “And so why would we ever want to guess with your health? And I talked to patients, like, if you go to a dentist, before they drill your teeth, you don’t hesitate to take an X-rays. But a lot of the time, say, I don’t think it’s necessary, but in order to see those changes and arthritic changes, it’s important to, really figure out what’s the cost of the problem is, so arthritis is it’s case by case.”

DR. Luke Sparaccio – “And we again, You know, we can definitely help those, those things. So it’s hard to say what we do for arthritis as opposed to what’s causing the arthritis or arthritic changes. When we see any x rays. And sometimes it’s an inflammatory that’s causing, you know, digestive issues. So that can be potential. And that’s can typically be more of the the upper or mid-back area.”

DR. Luke Sparaccio – “So every joint your spine as a direct correlation with every organ tissue and gland. That’s why the details are so important. When someone comes I just have lower back pain. Doctor would would say, point to it, show me, show me and and trace where the pain is, because that’s going to give us an indication of potentially what segment or joint it is potentially causing distress.”

Angela Barrett – “Yeah. And you brought up something interesting. And I always seem to forget ugly honestly not in that field whatsoever, but have been, my whole life with, a chiropractor. But you forget that every joint or every,”

Angela Barrett – “Is related to an organ like sewer, like they do with the, What is it called when they. They do the feet, and it’s like, this is liver. This is heart. You know, I.”

DR. Mike McIntyre – Think like psychology.

Angela Barrett – “Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And people would.”

DR. Mike McIntyre – Tums in the body and. Yeah.

Angela Barrett – “Right. And so it really is the same. If you were to look at a similar chart, the same with the spine. Correct?”

DR. Mike McIntyre – “Yeah, absolutely. You’re I mean that’s what we the number one reason why we look at the spine is to make sure that it’s not affecting the nervous system because you’re spot, you know, your spine houses, your spinal cord, your nervous system, direct connection to the brain that controls everything. And so that’s I mean, it’s the only system in your body fully encased by bone or protection.”

DR. Mike McIntyre – “Right? Right. When the spine is out of alignment, it really affects that. I mean, one of the small things that it does is cause pain, right? Every single level in the spine. Yeah. The nerves. That’s the electrical function in the body. They the nerves come from somewhere to control stuff. And it starts at your spine.”

Angela Barrett – “Know, so there was a question I had, and I’m sorry, it just left me, I’ll move on and maybe it’ll come back to me. No, no. So tell me what you think makes you guys stand out. I’m just going to say more than other chiropractors, say South Carolina. We’ll go that far. What makes you stand out?”

DR. Mike McIntyre – “So the the system that we use, the constant system, it’s I mean, it’s it’s specific, it’s scientific. It eliminates all guesswork. You know, and I mean, you’d be surprised how many chiropractors don’t even take X-rays. Somebody can literally come crawling into an office, and they won’t take an X-ray before they they work on them. And so that’s just a small part of what we do.”

DR. Mike McIntyre – “So we look at movement, motion in the joints x ray. Obviously like system analysis. What’s been going on. History all that. So putting so many pieces of the puzzle together before we ever even lay our hands on people. One of the things that people have told me a lot is when they come to see me, they don’t feel like they’re just going through an assembly line.”

DR. Mike McIntyre – “And that’s not to talk bad about other doctors. It’s just the, our, our systems different. You know, we don’t put people through the assembly line. I don’t, you know, I talk to people. I reexamine them every single time before I X-ray them. So I don’t just meet them in the room with their face down. Yeah. So it’s just specificity to each person’s unique issue.”

DR. Mike McIntyre – “And, unfortunately, I just don’t see that a lot.”

Angela Barrett – “But that’s what with the other doctors in other professions, I think would be different than some of the chiropractic care that you.”

DR. Mike McIntyre – “See, I love, I say co-managing, right? I love co-managing care with other professionals. And, you know, I yeah, I’m not like hiding in the corner saying, oh, now just, you know, choose me. Take me. You know, I’m like, no, let’s. I’m like, give, give them my number. I’ll call them like, send me the labs, I go over, I go over blood reports with people all the time from blood tests and most of the time they’ll get an, an x ray, like a medical x ray, which is a little different than what we do or blood work or something.”

DR. Mike McIntyre – “And they’ll just say, oh, it’s normal, but they never have it reviewed. So even like normal doesn’t necessarily mean normal if you’re right on the cusp of being abnormal. But if you fall into that normal, it’s just kind of, you know, your normal checkbox and move on. And we don’t we don’t do that.”

Angela Barrett – “Right? Right. So, doctor Mike, I understand you have a farm.”

DR. Mike McIntyre – I do.

Angela Barrett – “Yeah, that’s tell me a little bit about that.”

DR. Mike McIntyre – “So we can I mean, I kind of just joke that I live on a big petting zoo, so.”

Angela Barrett – But.

DR. Mike McIntyre – “So we have, we have a bunch of animals we’ve rescued. So I have, like, horses and donkeys that have been rescues, and I have ducks and chickens and pigs and goats and sheep and on and on. And it’s, it’s really just, it’s a simple living connection with the animals in the, the earth and raise my kids on it.”

DR. Mike McIntyre – “And I joke that I have, free range kids yet, so.”

Angela Barrett – “Yeah, with five, Oh.”

DR. Mike McIntyre – “Yeah. That’s like, it’s my little, you know. Yeah. My little.”

Angela Barrett – “What, do you work for a baseball team here. So I’m.”

DR. Mike McIntyre – Trying. That’s right. Yeah.

Angela Barrett – “Yeah. Well, that’s pretty cool. It is always amazing to me how our northerners who move south end up with, farms or, you know, lots of land.”

DR. Mike McIntyre – “And then my, I have my uncle, who I was very close with was a farmer his whole life, and he was, like, the happiest person I ever met. Just simple guy, always happy, always had a smile on his face. And, I mean, he was on to something. So. Yeah, I’m. I’m trying to embrace that.”

Angela Barrett – “So, yeah, I call my therapy dirt therapy, like, you know, working in the and planning and digging, but but it really is. And my husband was like, do you want me to help you? I’m like, please don’t. Please just go.”

DR. Mike McIntyre – “So, yeah, my donkeys are great listeners.”

Angela Barrett – “You know that look, right? Right. So, darling, when are you going to, do your farm?”

DR. Luke Sparaccio – Yeah. I mean.

Angela Barrett – “Coming from New York, when I.”

DR. Luke Sparaccio – “First when I first came and visited, and doctor Mike, he, I helped him set up, what was it? Sheep.”

DR. Mike McIntyre – “Shells. And we built this up of a reef, repurposed now sheep shelter.”

Angela Barrett – “It’s,”

DR. Luke Sparaccio – “I do not know. I do love when I was in school, and I really enjoyed the the scenery. And I just love it. I do love it here. So good. It’s, slowly, showing me the ropes in regards to how to build and. And what do you say you start with chicken training? Yeah. Let’s take.”

DR. Mike McIntyre – The gate.

Angela Barrett – “You in the club? Yeah. That is the big thing. I, I, I do real estate in real life, and, I must get asked daily. Well, can we have chickens? But. Yeah, well, not in a subdivision.”

DR. Mike McIntyre – “Yeah, but,”

Angela Barrett – “You’re going to have to go outside of that. That’s. Yeah. So tell everybody how they get in touch with you and what. Oh, you know what? Before we do that. So for people, because comfort and care sometimes a lot of towns is not covered or either fully covered with insurance. How do you guys help people with that side of things?”

Angela Barrett – Because it can get expensive if you don’t have insurance in it.

DR. Mike McIntyre – “That’s actually one of the reasons why I when I opened my office, I chose not to participate with insurance companies because they literally make it so that I have to charge more. Yeah, right. As they don’t reimburse. I mean, you know, I that’s a whole nother we could do an hour that so I just like I set my prices to be affordable.”

DR. Mike McIntyre – “I offer, you know, I offer discounts when I can. I offer monthly payment stuff. I mean, I try to make that as easy as possible, and we do cash pay. We literally just like, eliminate the middleman of the insurance company trying to tell you what you need and what you don’t need, because in my humble opinion, that’s them practicing chiropractic without a license.”

DR. Mike McIntyre – “Again, that’s a whole nother conversation for a different Eddie. But.”

Angela Barrett – Right. Yeah.

DR. Mike McIntyre – “We really I try to make the financial side of stuff like the easiest, least thing to worry about because and, like, we just focus on getting people. Well. So.”

Angela Barrett – “Yeah, I, cash pay, if people should really, we’re again, we’ll talk about that at another time, but people should really start asking about that. Here are their tell everybody how they get in touch with you. We’re all, I know you’re on Facebook and I know you have a website. But tell everybody how they get in touch with you.”

DR. Mike McIntyre – “Yeah, that’s the easiest way. Websites got all our information on there. We can, like, if somebody is interested in even just sitting down with us, I always do free consultations with people. If they just want to sit and see if chiropractic is something that might help. So I always offer that, and then. Yeah, I mean, if you have like the website to McIntyre chiro Qcom, follow us on there.”

DR. Mike McIntyre – “My social media stuff’s on there, my our telephone number, online info booking, all that stuff.”

Angela Barrett – And do you guys sometimes do speaking engagements at places? I thought I saw that maybe I was wrong.

DR. Mike McIntyre – “No, we do. Yeah. We offer, we offer classes in in the office.”

Angela Barrett – “Oh, okay.”

DR. Mike McIntyre – “We will travel to do some. We like, like to do, like lunch and learns and stuff things like that are great because you can just go some meet people where they’re at and and talk about things. I’m, I love teaching seminars. I like to do, like, like business seminars or chiropractic. So that’s a little side thing that I do to help young docs, you know, not fail in business because unfortunately, you know, being in business for yourself is hard.”

DR. Mike McIntyre – “Yes. So yeah. And and you have a hard to help people, but you also get to keep the lights on in your office to do that. Right.”

Angela Barrett – “That’s right. Well thank you guys so much for, being with me today and, giving us a little bit of insight about how you guys, help people in the Somerville area and surrounding. But thanks so much.”

DR. Luke Sparaccio – “Oh, want to thank you.”

DR. Mike McIntyre – Want to thank you for that.