Chiropractic Care and the Brain: New Research Looks at Changes in Brain Communication

A study published on July 31, 2026, in the journal Brain Sciences examined what may happen inside the brain when people with chronic low back pain receive chiropractic care. The researchers used EEG recordings, which measure electrical activity in the brain, to study how different brain regions communicated with one another. Their findings suggest that chiropractic care was associated with measurable changes in several major brain networks involved in pain, attention, emotions, thinking, and the way the brain processes information.

The study involved 76 adults with chronic low back pain, meaning their back pain had lasted for at least three months. Half were assigned to receive chiropractic care along with their usual healthcare, while the other half continued with usual care alone. Those receiving chiropractic care were seen three times a week for four weeks. Brain activity was measured before care began, immediately following the first session, and again after four weeks. This allowed researchers to look at both immediate changes and changes that remained after several weeks of care.

One of the most important findings involved a group of brain areas known as the default mode network. This network helps the brain manage internally focused thoughts, memories, emotions, and our awareness of ourselves. People with chronic pain often show altered communication within this network. After chiropractic care, the researchers found increased communication within the default mode network in the alpha brain-wave range. These changes were seen immediately after care and were still present four weeks later. The researchers described these alpha-band findings as the strongest and most consistent results of the study.

Changes were also found in two other important brain networks. The salience network helps decide which sensations or events deserve our attention, while the central executive network is involved in concentration, decision-making, working memory, and self-control. Chronic pain can cause the brain to give too much attention to pain signals, almost as if the nervous system remains on high alert. The pattern found in this study may represent a shift toward more balanced communication among brain systems responsible for attention, sensory processing, and internal awareness.

These brain findings are especially interesting because the people receiving chiropractic care in the original clinical trial also experienced improvements in areas such as pain, anxiety, depression, fatigue, sleep, and quality of life. However, the researchers were careful to point out that this study did not prove that the brain changes caused those improvements. Instead, the findings raise the possibility that improving the sensory information entering the nervous system from the spine may influence how the brain organizes and processes information. From a chiropractic perspective, correction of areas of spinal dysfunction or subluxation may therefore have effects that extend beyond simply changing how the back feels.