CHIROPRACTIC healing professionals are mostly found in the USA. The name for CHIROLOGY conveys the notion that CHIROPRACTICE has roots in classic MEDICINE in particular SURGICAL manual manipulations. In 1895, Daniel David Palmer opened the Palmer School of "Chiropractic", a term cleverly coined by Rev. Samel Weed to convey the notion "done by hand". Palmer was a grocer in Davenport, Iowa interested in "magnetic healing". His son, B. J. Palmer, in  a series of books, described the special "philosophy" of "Chiropratic". A common view is that the emphasis of Chiropractic is on manipulations of the vertebral spine and its "subluxation". Some believe that Chiropractic can also heal most human ailments. Since its inception in the USA, similarities of Chiropractic with OSTEOPATHY was a source of confusion and conflict. In 1892, Andrew Taylor Still established in Kirkville, Missouri, the "American School of Osteopathy (now A. T. Still University), Some assert that Palmer studied the methods proposed by Still. The legal differentiation between Chiropractic and Osteopathy was defined by Tom Moore, an attorney, as the "supremacy of the nerve" and the "supremacy of the artery" respectively. Since those days, adherents to Chiropratic and Osteopathy have labored to explained to the public the contrasts between their beliefs, a subject beyond the scope of this summary. Here, the focus is on "CHIRO" from CHEIRO or HAND in Greek which points to CHEIRON, the personification of the origin of SURGICAL MEDICINE. To start, the notions inherent in HAND or MANO in Spanish point toward MANUAL as well as to FIST, PUG, PUGnatious, PYGmies as well as tto WOUND, TEAR, VULTURE, VULNERABLE, VULPEX, and WOLF. Please also note that CHEIRO may be confused with CHEILO or lip in  Greek. From CHEIRO in Greek we get via Latin, Ukrainian, French and Spanish,  CHEIROURGOS, CHIRURGOS, CHIRURGH, QUIROFANO, CHIRUGIEN, SURGIEN, CIRUJANO and SURGERY.

CHIROpractors or CHEIROpractors specialize in MANipulation while CHIRURG or SURGEON illuminates CHIROPHANO or QUIROFANO describe rooms dedicated to surgical operations. Other terms related to HAND or CHEIRO include CHIRAGRA for hand pain often due to gout, CHIROGRAPHUM for handwriting, CHIRONOMIA, for talking with hands and CHIROMANCY for palmistry expanded by pretended supernatural ability to read fortunes from the patterns of the lines on the palm.

As a mythic figure, CHEIRON is presented as a most learned, wise and gentle of the Centaurs and a beloved of the Gods. CHEIRON trained AESCULAPIUS in manual skills needed to become a SURGEON. Following the devastation of classic western culture by invading hords of barbarians in combination with Christian mysticism, MANUAL SKILLS decayed and manual LABOR was seen as degrading. The new sense of dignity of Doctors of Medicine relegated manual medical procedures and surgery to be performed by barbers. Only after the Renaissance did SURGERY rejoined MEDICINE.