Chiropractor in Five Dock or Exercise Physiologist?
Searching for a chiropractor in Five Dock usually starts with a symptom rather than a profession. A back that has been stiff for three months, a neck that locks up at the desk, a hip that aches on the stairs. Chiropractic and exercise physiology are separate registered professions with different training and different tools, and plenty of people in the Inner West end up seeing both. This is what each one does, so you can make a more informed first call.
What a chiropractor does
Chiropractors are registered with AHPRA under the Chiropractic Board of Australia and complete a five-year university qualification. Their practice centres on assessment and hands-on management of the spine and joints, including manual adjustment and mobilisation, soft tissue work and advice. Appointments tend to be shorter and more frequent in the early phase, with the practitioner doing the hands-on work while you are on the table.
People commonly go to a chiropractor for acute neck and back pain, headaches with a neck component, and joint stiffness.
What an exercise physiologist does
Accredited Exercise Physiologists complete a four-year university degree and are accredited through Exercise and Sports Science Australia. The work is exercise prescription and long-term management of chronic conditions, injuries and persistent pain. There is no manual therapy involved. The session is you moving, being tested, and being coached through a program that you then keep doing between appointments.
Exercise physiology is the pathway most often used for type 2 diabetes, cardiovascular disease, osteoarthritis, osteoporosis, persistent pain lasting beyond three months, deconditioning after hospital or surgery, and balance decline in older adults.
The practical difference is who does the work. In a chiropractic session, the practitioner treats you. In an exercise physiology session, you train and the exercise physiologist adjusts the load, technique and progression.
How the assessment differs
An exercise physiology assessment at our Five Dock clinic runs 45 to 60 minutes. It starts with history, including your medications, other conditions and what activity you were doing before the problem started. Then screening questions for anything that needs a GP or specialist rather than exercise, such as unexplained weight loss, night pain that wakes you, fever, progressive weakness or changes to bladder and bowel function.
After that, objective testing. Depending on your situation this can include sit-to-stand repetitions in 30 seconds, gait and walking speed, single-leg balance time, grip strength, hip and shoulder range of motion, and blood pressure before and after light effort. Those numbers become the baseline. Retest at six or eight weeks and you can see whether the program is doing anything, rather than relying on how you felt on the day.
You leave with a written program, usually three or four exercises to start, built around what you actually have at home or at your gym.
When each may suit
If your pain came on suddenly, you feel locked up, and you want hands-on assessment and treatment, a chiropractor or physiotherapist is a sensible first stop.
If the problem has been running for months, if it sits alongside a diagnosed condition like arthritis or diabetes, if you have lost strength or confidence in your walking, or if you have had passive treatment for a while and want to build capacity so the symptoms stop recurring, exercise physiology is designed for that. Persistent pain responds to graded loading and gradual return to activity, and building that takes weeks of consistent work, not a single appointment.
The two are not in competition. A common sequence is hands-on care to settle an irritable episode, then structured exercise to load the tissue and hold the change. We regularly work alongside chiropractors, physiotherapists and GPs across Five Dock, Drummoyne and Concord.
Funding differences worth knowing
Both professions can be accessed through a Medicare Chronic Condition Management plan from your GP, which allows up to five allied health services per calendar year shared across all providers. Both are commonly claimable on private health extras, subject to your policy.
NDIS plans routinely fund exercise physiology under Capacity Building, Improved Daily Living supports, which makes it the usual pathway for participants working on strength, mobility and independence goals. DVA clients can be referred for exercise physiology by their GP on a D904 referral.
Home visits in the Inner West
For older adults who are not driving, or who are unsteady enough that leaving the house feels like a risk, exercise physiology can be delivered at home. Working in the actual environment has a practical advantage: the exercise physiologist sees the step at the back door, the height of the lounge you struggle to get out of, the rug in the hallway. The program then uses those things instead of gym equipment.
What to bring to a first appointment
A list of your current medications, any imaging reports or specialist letters from the past year or two, your GP referral if you have one, and comfortable clothes and shoes you can move in. If a particular movement is the problem, be ready to show it.
If you are unsure whether exercise physiology fits what you are dealing with, call and describe the problem, or book an assessment at the Five Dock clinic.