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Belgian Chiropractors’ Union - Newsletter December 2017 Page 1 of 7

ECU General Council On the 3rd-4th of November the ECU General Council meeting took place in Helsinki (for the new members: this is a biannual meeting of the presidents of the national associations together with the executive council of the ECU).

As usual the agenda was very busy with quite a few financial requests to discuss and decisions to make. By far the most important item on the agenda however was the ratification of the new council of the European Academy of Chiropractic of which our VP Tom Michielsen became the chairman! We would like to congratulate Tom with this important and challenging position and are very happy he is maintaining his position as VP of the BCU at the same time.

Tom will explain the vision and focus of the new EAC council during his presentation at our next General Assembly meeting on 25th February 2018.

Dear colleagues, Geppers and students, The first snow has fallen and the festive season is upon us. Before we all sign off work to indulge in the many Christmas delights, we wanted to send you an overview of our past and future activities. It has been a very interesting and active year for the BCU and 2018 promises to be equally exciting. On behalf of the BCU Council I would like to wish you and your loved ones a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year! Bart Vandendries, President BCU

CHIRO NEWS Belgian Chiropractors’ Union Newsletter – December 2017

The ECU General Council meeting took place in Helsinki on 3-4 November 2017.

In This Issue

ECU General Council

Week of the Back

Research Fund Update

GEP News

VAT Update

CPD Topics

Care Response

UCLL Student Project


CPD Points Final Year

What is the deadline for collecting points? You have only 1 more year to go to get to your 150 points (30

points per year). At the end of 2018, the first 5 years come to an

end (2014-2018). From that year on, each year will be the endpoint

of another 5 year cycle (2015-2019). Your CPD form clearly shows

where you are with your points. It is your own responsibility to

update your online folder in the One Drive.

At the end of this period, we will start publishing the seals on the

BCU website next to your name. Those who are not ok will receive

a red mark instead, so it is very important to use this last year to

get your CPD portfolio in order.

What happens to my Care Quality seal? In January, your CPD folder will be consulted. If ok, we will change

the year on your seal from 2017 to 2018. For most of you, this

change will be automatically visible on your own website. We will

test this and send a new seal to those members were the change is

not coming through (this might be related to some plugins installed

on your website). You will need to reinstall the new seal.

What if I don’t have a seal yet? Get your CPD folder up to date and send Chantal a mail letting us

now that it is ready for inspection. When approved for 120 points,

you will receive the seal.

‘Doing what needs to be done may not make you happy, but it will

make you great.’ (George Bernard Shaw)

Week of the Back 16-20 October 2017

In 2017 we decided to focus on cycling. Being

chiropractors we obviously looked at the

subject from a special point of view and our

focus was on posture and bike position in the

prevention of back pain.

We developed a new brochure (FIETSEN –

PREVENTIE VAN RUGKLACHTEN; LE VÉLO

POUR PRÉVENIR LES DOULEURS DE DOS) and

added a new page to our Straighten Up

website with lots of information, warming-

up and cooling-down exercises and video

messages from sports people who were

supporting our incentive. If you haven’t seen

it yet, have a look at

http://www.straightenup.be/nl/fiets-je-fit/ or

http://www.straightenup.be/fr/vite-a-velo/

In addition to this we launched a press

release and presented our new brochure to

some interested journalists and this brought

quite a lot of media response (radio

interviews, articles in newspapers and

magazines). For more info see

http://www.chiropraxie.org/nl/nieuws/week

vanderug/ and

http://www.chiropraxie.org/fr/nouvelles/las

emainedudos/

The video messages were also posted on

facebook - we had 2200 'likes' and some

200.000 persons received them in their

Facebook accounts!

Many thanks to all those who contributed in

one way or another to making this year’s

Week of the Back yet another successful

event!

The Sanoma Magazines event in Mechelen


Go Abroad Fair Expo Ghent – the facts

Date:

- Sunday 26th November

Audience:

- General public and specifically students looking to study abroad

Objective:

- Inform the students (and their parents) - Promote chiropractic

Sponsors for the BCU:

- AECC - IFEC - South Wales University

The BCU has been promoting chiropractic studies at the Go Abroad Fair in Ghent

Go Abroad Fair - 26 November The first edition of this fair attracted 1047 visitors in 1 day and Bert, Michael, Katrien and Anne (who were so kind to represent the BCU) were enthusiastic about the level of interest shown in chiropractic.

Next to getting students thinking about studying chiropractic, this fair definitely also raised chiropractic awareness in Belgium.

Thank you to the 2017 crew and we hope to repeat this in 2018!

Sports chiropractic seminar – 23 September We were pleased having 37 participants for the Sports chiropractic seminar on extremity adjusting with Atle Aare

and Atle Thorstensen on the 23rd of September. The Parker Hotel at Brussels Airport was an ideal location with

parking, excellent facilities and catering as well as being conveniently central in Belgium.

Based on the feedback from the attendees the seminar overall was rated 4.75/5. There were positive remarks

especially on venue, quality of hands-on sessions and the instructors. Unique to this seminar were 2 real patients

that were treated "on stage". I can tell you that they both are improved in function and out of pain now. The

weaknesses of this seminar according to the feedback were too much content for one day and the time lost of

moving everyone from one place to another. Overall the seminar was well-organised, well attended and chiropractic

skills were learned or refreshed. Hopefully all of this for the benefit of the patient and the profession.


VAT Update

The Belgian government voted a new law in January 2016 which

imposes VAT on chiropractic treatments, but up until today,

chiropractors in Belgium are exempted from VAT on the basis of an

administrative exemption which we have since 1992.

We started a procedure at the constitutional court in June 2016

against this new law and just a few months ago this case was

referred to the European court of justice, this procedure will take

another 2,5 years. The administrative exemption is still active.

Our lawyer will be present at our General Assembly on Sunday 25th

February 2018 to give a presentation on our VAT situation and

court case and all your questions will be answered, so make sure

you don’t miss this opportunity.

BCU Research Fund

The BCU research council has approved its first grant. A grant of

€ 15.000 will be given to Francesca Wuytack. Francesca is a Belgian

graduate from AECC currently living in Ireland and doing a post-doc

at Trinity University.

The title of her project is called: ‘Development of a Core Outcome

Set (COS) for Pelvic Girdle Pain; A systematic review, qualitative

interviews and Delphi consensus study.’

The BCU council wishes to thank Luc Ailliet and Karl Devriese for

their time and expert opinion. We would also like to thank all the

members of the BCU for this important step forward in our

profession. Your financial support to research makes things like this

possible and helps our colleagues on their path to get to important

university positions. This moves our profession forward!

Care Response Project In order to improve our services it is

important to get feedback from our

patients.

A Chiropractic Practice Assessment Questionnaire has been developed by the Royal College of Chiropractors as a means to assess standards within chiropractic clinics. Care Response is a free and pragmatic

system to help practices gather and report

clinical outcome and patient satisfaction

information with minimal work from

practice staff. Care Response is a cloud

based service, there is no software to

install.

Patients can choose to complete

questionnaires on-line, on paper forms or

using tablet computers such as an iPad.

Assessments may be given out or sent by

email at any time. For those with email

addresses outcomes are requested

automatically.

The BCU is in the process of translating

everything into Dutch and French and we

are looking to implement this tool by

spring 2018.

A detailed presentation on this project will

be given by Tom Michielsen at our General

Assembly on 25th February 2018.


KCE pathway

The KCE is an independent research centre

that provides scientific advice on topics

related to health care. The topics are

generally asked for by the public

authorities (Minister / Ministry of Public

Health, NIHDI), universities, professional

associations, etc.

In May 2017 they published a clinical

guideline for the treatment of back pain,

based on the latest scientific evidence.

Among the expert panel of this KCE

project, the BCU was represented by Luc

Ailliet.

Now they have taken this another step

further by developing a clinical pathway

for low back pain and radicular pain. This

pathway is like a step-by-step procedure

that needs to be followed and will

ultimately come up with the best possible

treatment for the patient.

In order to make this as user-friendly as

possible, the KCE offers an interactive,

online tool (see http://lagerugpijn.kce.be/

and http://lombalgie.kce.be/).

It is the first time in Belgium that a

pathway of care is developed in

cooperation with the Spine Society of

Belgium and with representatives of GP’s,

physiotherapists, chiropractors,

osteopaths, physical medicine specialists,

orthopaedic and neurosurgeons,

anaesthesiologists and psychologists.

,

GEP/Student Affairs News The gep committee is very pleased to announce that all 3

candidates passed the gep exam in 2017. We will be swearing

in Dean Crombé, Marine Le Forestier and Louis Verfaillie as

permanent members of the BCU at our general assembly in

February. Congratulations to all!

We also want to thank their coaches (Anneke Verbeeck & Carl

Van Landeghem, Véronique Claes-d'Erckenteel and Hans

Desimpele) for all their hard work during the 2016-17 gep

year.

There are 6 GEP candidates for 2016-2017 gep year: Alexis Pommerol, Alizée Maréchal, Doriane Salvet, Kiara Defrancq, Kristina Kippernes and Thomas Vanquickenborne. We wish them a successful GEP year together with their coaches: Bert Ameloot & Marien Vermeulen, Declan Murphy, Véronique Claes-d’Erckenteel, Ruben Cordonni, Heimdal Derde and Karl Devriese. We hope that all of you will support them and help them out when they phone to do observations in your office. Furthermore, we also welcomed 2 candidates with an adapted gep and without a coach: Ben Gordon and Thanh Nguyen. Good luck to all 8!


ECU App

During the GC meeting in Helsinki, secretary-

general Ian Beesley launched an exciting new

communications initiative which will offer

substantial opportunities for national associations

and accredited schools, as well as for the ECU per

se.

With daily news items regarding chiropractic in

Europe, research links, key dates, ECU convention

material and much more, this ECU app offers

relevant information in one place. This free ECU

app will be introduced during our General

Assembly on February 25th 2018.

If you can’t wait that long, then hurry to the

Apple/Android app store and look for ‘European

Chiropractors’ Union’ and download it for free.

Switch on the facility for ‘pushed’ messages – they

will tell you when an update is available. Enjoy!

Reimbursement Forms

We tried to collect the reimbursement forms from the

different "mutualiteiten/mutualités" on one page. If you

click on the logo, a pdf will appear which you can print for

your patients. Maybe it's useful to save this link to your

'favourites' menu on your PC?

If you have other forms which can be included, you can

send a scanned copy to Chantal.

http://www.chiropraxie.org/nl/members/mut/

Insurance Update

As most of you have noticed we are modernising our insurance contracts with AMMA in order to meet the demands

of the diversity of clinic set-ups in Belgium. This modernising will happen on two different levels.

First of all the way a clinic runs: chiropractors and chiropractic clinics have evolved in the way they set up

partnerships. All of our members are insured for mishaps in their own clinic, but things change if a chiropractor is

treating a patient in someone else's clinic. Here there might be some gaps in our current contract.

Secondly it seems that a lot of our colleagues work part-time abroad. In the past a combination of their foreign

insurance and ours was sufficient. Since we cannot guarantee full coverage of foreign insurances anymore it is

critical that we retrieve all details in order to properly insure our members.

This is why we have already sent out two questionnaires to our members in order to personalise everybody’s

contract. Since we still haven’t received answers from everybody, we will send out this questionnaire once more

during the holidays. If you haven’t answered yet please do so before 12th January 2018. After that your answer will

not be processed.

In the future all changes in clinic set-up (i.e. hiring of new colleagues, working abroad) should be communicated to

us so our insurance covers everything.

Lastly we need to keep track of all GEP coaches, they will need an extra insurance which will be paid out of the

association’s accounts.


DID YOU KNOW?

-The University of Wales

welcomed the two first

Belgian students this year:

William Peirelinck and

Maarten Vis.

- As a result of the successful

Week of the Back 2017 the

BCU Facebook page now has

more than 1000 followers!

- Since the Go Abroad Fair in

November we have already

had 5 enquiries from

students who are interested

in studying chiropractic.

- The BCU now has 122

members and growing…

- 8 gep candidates in one

year is a new record!

BCU Secretariat:

Staatsbaan 330

B-3210 Lubbeek

T: 09 221 76 58

E: [email protected]

W: www.chiropraxie.org

Opening hours secretariat: Tuesday

& Thursday from 14.30-18.30 hrs.

Upcoming Events

Mechanics @ Work Symposium 9-10 February 2018 A symposium targeted at chiropractors and podiatrists, featuring

first class speakers David Leaf (chiropractor) and David Dunning

(podiatrist), this event is one not to be missed.

As well as exploring the common ground for chiropractors and

podiatrists, the symposium will also focus on the modern sporting

context touching on the causes of injury, injury prevention and the

role of the medical team as a whole.

The location is the Parker Hotel Brussels Airport and if you need any

extra information just send a mail to [email protected]. Early

Bird rates are valid until 1/1/2018 so register now!

General Assembly Sunday 25 February 2018 The 2018 General Assembly will take place on Sunday 25th February

2018 at the Thon Hotel Brussels City Centre (same location as last

year).

More information and the agenda will follow later but save this

date! We hope to see all of you there as we have quite a few

interesting and new topics to present.

ECU Convention in Budapest 25-27 May 2018

The ECU Convention in 2018 promises to be a lively event in the

amazing city of Budapest. Interesting lectures, workshops and

socials. The perfect opportunity to create conversations and join in

conversations about the future of the profession.

Chiropractic integration in Sports is one of the many topics on the

agenda and speakers include Greg Kawchuk, Carlo Ammendolia,

Richard Brown and Bianca Zietsman. The theme is ‘Chiropractic and

the 7 ages of man’.

For the first time, the ECU will introduce ‘ECU talks’ in analogy with

TED talks: a sequence of lively short presentations of good speakers

with a clear message. Not to be missed!

Details about the Convention and the registration procedure can be

found on the ECU website: http://ecu2018.com//

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