The days right after a car accident are a strange mix of relief and uncertainty. You’re glad you’re alive, but you don’t know yet whether that stiff neck is nothing or the start of something that’ll bother you for months. At our Lakewood office, sorting that out quickly is a big part of what we do.
Auto accident and personal injury care is one of the services we focus on most, at both of our locations. In Lakewood specifically, we also happen to be the location where our regenerative medicine lab lives. That matters if your accident involved a joint injury that doesn’t fully resolve with chiropractic care and PT alone.
What Recovery Actually Looks Like
Recovery timelines vary a lot depending on the severity of the injury, but a few things tend to hold true across most cases:
- The first two weeks are usually about reducing acute pain and inflammation
- Weeks two through six typically focus on restoring range of motion and addressing lingering soft tissue tightness
- Later stages shift toward strengthening, so the injured area doesn’t stay vulnerable to re-injury once you’re back to normal activity
We’ll give you a realistic sense of where your case falls on that timeline once we’ve completed your evaluation, rather than a generic estimate that may not apply to your specific injury.
What Happens at Your First Visit
We don’t start with a rushed intake form. Your first conversation covers what actually happened: how the impact hit, what position you were in, and every symptom, even ones that seem too minor to mention. Pain that feels manageable on day one can turn into something much more limiting by day five, and the details from that first conversation help us catch the pattern early.
From there, we run a full orthopedic exam built around the injuries auto accidents typically cause:
- Neck strain and whiplash
- Lower back pain
- Shoulder tension, including seatbelt-related rotator cuff strain
- Wrist pain
- Disc-related injuries such as herniation, sciatica, or radiculopathy
- Headaches that often trace back to the neck rather than being a separate issue
- Knee pain
- Hip pain
- Ankle pain
- Post-concussion syndrome
If chiropractic care is the right first step, we start there. If physical therapy should lead, your PT is down the hall, not a separate referral you have to chase down on your own. If your case needs a medical evaluation or imaging, Dr. Justin Merkow, MD, our specialist for auto injury patients and a spine specialist and pain management doctor, is part of the team here as well.
Why the Timing of Your Visit Matters
Insurance adjusters pay close attention to the gap between your accident date and your first appointment. Wait too long, and it becomes easier for a claim to argue your injury wasn’t related to the crash. Getting evaluated within the first week protects your body and your paperwork at the same time.
There’s also a pattern we see often enough to mention directly. Patients feel mostly fine for the first few days, then the adrenaline wears off and real pain sets in. An early evaluation catches these delayed injuries before they turn into a longer recovery than necessary.
When an Accident Injury Needs More Than Adjustments
Most soft tissue injuries from car accidents respond well to chiropractic care and physical therapy working together. But some joint injuries don’t. A shoulder that never quite recovers full range of motion. A knee that stays inflamed months after the crash. These benefit from a different kind of treatment.
Because our regenerative medicine lab is based right here in Lakewood, that option doesn’t require a referral out to another practice if your recovery calls for it down the road. Every PRP or BMAC injection here is performed by Dr. Merkow, our spine specialist and pain management doctor, and referred internally only after a full evaluation. We’re not suggesting every accident needs this level of care (most don’t), but it’s worth knowing the option exists close by if your case turns out to be more complicated than the average whiplash recovery.
Book Your Appointment
Fill out our form to request an appointment, and our team will be in touch to confirm your visit.
Therapies and Services: Additional Care We Offer
Manipulation is one part of how we treat you, not the whole toolkit. Conservative care is our starting point for nearly every auto injury, and depending on what your exam shows, your plan might also include:
- Dry needling for muscle tension and trigger points
- Massage therapy, with several massage therapists on staff
- ART (Active Release Technique) and Graston Technique for soft tissue restrictions
- Spinal decompression for disc-related issues
- Shockwave therapy and Class IV laser for tendon and soft tissue healing
- Flexion distraction for lower lumbar mobility
If conservative care isn’t enough to resolve your symptoms, that’s when a medical evaluation with Dr. Merkow, and if appropriate, our regenerative medicine program, come into the conversation, not as a first step, but as the next one.
Common Injuries We See From Lakewood-Area Accidents
Whiplash is the most familiar accident injury, and for good reason. It’s the one that shows up most consistently, even in accidents that felt relatively minor. Beyond that, a few patterns stand out:
- Lower back pain, particularly in rear-end collisions where the seat and spine absorb most of the impact force
- Shoulder tension, tied to bracing against the steering wheel or the strain a seatbelt places on the shoulder at impact
- Jaw discomfort that patients rarely connect to the accident until we ask directly
- Headaches starting at the base of the skull, frequently a neck injury presenting as head pain rather than a separate problem
We also see patients from Wheat Ridge, west Denver, Edgewater, and the surrounding area at this location, since it’s a natural stop for anyone commuting along that corridor. Wherever you’re coming from, the evaluation process is the same.
Why Accelerate Health for Your Auto Injury Care
At most clinics, one provider type directs the whole recovery and the other just executes instructions. Here, your chiropractor and your physical therapist are equal partners in your case, and they compare notes on your progress instead of working in separate lanes, and when a case calls for it, Dr. Merkow’s medical evaluation is part of that same coordinated plan. After an accident, that coordination often makes the difference between a recovery that plateaus and one that actually finishes.
We also won’t push you into a locked-in package before you understand your coverage. Most auto accident cases are billed through MedPay or a personal injury claim, and we’ll walk through exactly how that applies to your situation before anything is decided.
Working With Your Claim or Attorney
If you already have a personal injury attorney, we routinely send records and visit documentation directly to their office, and can bill on a lien basis through their firm, so nothing gets lost in translation. If you’re managing the claim yourself, we bill your MedPay directly and will walk you through what to keep track of as treatment progresses. We don’t arrange liens directly with unrepresented patients, so we’ll make sure your MedPay and coverage options are clear up front instead. Either way, the documentation reflects what actually happened in your body, not a simplified version written to move you out the door faster.
Frequently Asked Questions
Within the first week is ideal, even if you feel mostly okay. Some injuries take days to show up, and an early visit protects both your recovery and your claim.
Not as much as people assume. Low-speed collisions still cause real soft tissue injury that doesn’t always hurt right away. We recommend getting checked regardless of how severe the accident felt.
In most cases, yes: through MedPay on your own policy, the other driver’s insurance, or a personal injury claim. We’ll help you understand your specific situation on your first visit.
No. You can schedule directly, and we’ll bring in physical therapy, a medical evaluation with Dr. Merkow, or, if needed down the road, our regenerative medicine team, without requiring you to start over somewhere else.
That’s exactly the kind of case where a conversation with Dr. Merkow and our Lakewood regenerative medicine lab becomes relevant. We’ll talk through whether that’s a fit once we understand how your recovery is progressing.
Schedule Your Lakewood Auto Injury Consultation
Whatever kind of accident brought you here, the plan starts with an honest look at what’s actually going on, not a generic protocol. Come in, tell us what happened, and we’ll figure out the right path together.