Altonaer
Chiropraktik
Praxis

Chiropractic education/ training


To independently examine a patient, diagnose a disease and effectively treat an ailment a chiropractor needs qualified training and a lot of practical experience. The Masters Course program for Chiropractic usually takes five years of full time study and applies to the WHO criteria (guidelines for requirements on chiropractic education and safety). 

The General Council on Chiropractic Education (www.gcce-uk.com) monitors the course standards and levels of education at all accredited Universities and Colleges throughout Europe.

The chiropractic students’ curriculum is similar to that of medical students. In some Universities the first years of training chiropractic and medicals students are taught together (Denmark, Switzerland, Wales). The emphasis of the final years lies on orthopaedic and chiropractic subjects. The practical application of the theories taught is the main feature right from the start since acquiring the sensibility skills of fingertips and hands takes several years of practice. The student has to learn to feel anatomical structures underneath the skin and differentiate, for example, normal from abnormal joint movement. After graduation, a junior chiropractor has to absolve a year of assistance training at a senior chiropractor’s clinic.


The situation in Germany

Contrary to most European countries, Chiropractic in Germany is not recognized as an independent health care profession. The term ‘Chiropractor’ is thus not protected to those of adequate training. There is unfortunately no chiropractic training institution teaching at GCCE standard in Germany.The various chiropractic courses that do exist are usually part time courses or subject of physiotherapy- or heilpraktiker training programmes. Ongoing chiropractic students who want an internationally recognized chiropractic education must therefore attend universities or colleges abroad (in Europe: UK, Denmark, France, Spain and soon Switzerland). Chiropractors practicing in Germany have to work at the status of the so called ‘Heilpraktiker’as they are neither medical practitioners nor physiotherapists. 

All members of the German Chiropractors Association (Deutsche ChiropraktorenGesellschaft or DCG) are academically trained chiropractors, whose education conforms to the WHO (World Health Organisation) regulations category 1 (of the “guidelines of requirements for chiropractic education and safety”). They are both part of the European Chiropractors Union (ECU) and the World Federation of Chiropractic (WFC). This means that all DCG-members follow internationally applied practice standards and are obliged to undertake regular further education. It is aimed to offer a high standard modern and effective treatment to a patient. 



Gesine Lunau took her chiropractic education at the Anglo European College of Chiropractic in Bournemouth, England, graduating there in 1998 with the Bachelor of Science (Chiropractic) and in 1999 with the Masters of Science (Chiropractic). The “Graduate Examination Programm-Year”she undertook in the Netherlands. Coming back home to Germany in 2001, she joined the Chiropraktik Lemche-Team in Delingsdorf (Ahrensburg), and, tired of travelling, founded the Altonaer Chiropraktik Praxis in 2004.


Fynn Ehlers took her chiropractic education at the Anglo Eurpean College of Chiropractic in England and graduated in 2013 as a Bachelor of Science (BSc). In 2014 hereceived his Masters Degree in Chiropactic (MSc). He undertook the “Graduate Examination Programm-Year” at the “Chiropraktik Lemche” close to Ahrensburg and the Chiropakti Pörksen in Kiel..


Our chiropractors are part of the German Chiropractors' Association DCG (www.chiropraktik.de).