The Rodeo-Chedeski fires in Arizona took a devastating toll not only to almost 500,000 acres of prime timberland and 425 homes destroyed, but also to thousands of Arizonans. Within a week of starting, more than 25,000 people were evacuated from their homes and were living in shelters across the state.

Soon after the fires started, a group of chiropractors got together and decided something needed to be done for these people. The Chiropractic Support Team consisted of Dr. Thomas Andrews (Gilbert, Az.) Dr. Paul Dickerson (Phoenix), Dr. David Lehenbauer (Sedona), Dr. John Dickerson (Tempe) and Dr. John Pham (Casa Grande).

We spent two days trying to coordinate our Chiropractic Support Team through the government agencies, but became frustrated with the inability of the officials to understand that people desperately needed our help.

By Wednesday evening we decided to go "grassroots" and just take our services to the people. We packed our tents and portable adjusting tables and headed up to Payson. Thursday morning, we made our first stop at a local fire station in Payson, announced our arrival, and told them we were here to help.

The response was immediate and enthusiastic! They asked us to set up in one of the rooms of the fire station and we started adjusting our first group of patients. When we finished there, they told us to "follow the big red truck" and gave us an escort to the evacuee center located at Rim Valley Middle School where over 2,000 evacuees had registered, with 250 living there full time.

This shelter was housing people from Heber-Overgaard and Forest Lakes, those hardest hit by the fire. We were introduced to the EMT crew by the firefighters, and adjusted those folks within 10 minutes of being on site. Their only concern was that once people heard there was chiropractic available they would not be able to handle the crowd, so they moved us to a long-term care facility two blocks away.

While we were there, we adjusted the staff of the facility as well as a few evacuees. However, we knew we had to be in the middle of the action to do the most good, so we asked to be transferred back to the evacuee center. Friday morning we set up a tent on the north lawn and started seeing patients. Once people heard we were there, they came in droves! By Friday afternoon, we set up another tent as a reception room so people didn't have to sit in the sun waiting for their adjustments.

This group of chiropractors, all "on purpose," adjusted for a 12-hour shift with two 10-minute breaks through the day. The response to chiropractic care was fantastic! Referrals were easy, as they should be. We would ask, "Did you like your adjustment?" (Their answer, every time was a resounding "Yes.") "Then tell your friends", we said. And they did. A few minutes later they would come back with their friends, and we would adjust them as well.

The stress level on the evacuees as well as the volunteers was incredible. Many of the evacuees did not know if their home would be standing when they returned. They had been evacuated on short notice, and had been at the shelter for over a week.

Chiropractic care was in demand, and we were there to supply it. We cared for people at a time when their stress level was probably as high as it will ever be in their life, and they responded incredibly well to chiropractic care. We also saw people with long-term problems who we were able to help resolve, as well as new injuries they sustained while packing and loading on such short notice.

Saturday morning we started at 8 a.m., and did another 12 hour shift ending at 8 in the evening. What an amazing sight to see people being adjusted on a portable chiropractic table in a grass field with the smoke plume from the fire over our shoulders.

On Sunday morning, we set up our tent at the shelter for another day. We saw dozens of patients over the next couple of hours, many of them never having seen a chiropractor before.

Through the course of the previous days we had been handing out cards introducing ourselves to anyone we saw, just to let them know we were there to serve them. Somehow my card made it "up the hill" to the fire line, and at 9 a.m., the medical center for the Forest Service called.

They told us they had heard great things about the work we were doing and they wanted to do a trial basis of chiropractic on the front line for the firefighters. "Were we interested?" she asked. "Absolutely," we replied.

Within a few minutes, we had clearance to pass the checkpoint and roadblocks to get to the main fire camp, "Camp Ponderosa." The drive from Payson to Heber-Overgaard/Camp Ponderosa was an amazing sight. Helicopters and slurry bombers were passing overhead, and fire trucks and water 'dip tank' were in the middle of the highway. "Hot Shot" crews were doing back burns on the side of the road as we drove passed. We were about the only ones on the road without red lights on the top of our truck.

By noon we had arrived at "Camp Ponderosa" which was home to 1700 firefighters and support crews. We set up our tables and quickly realized we had to "go through channels" to be able to stay.

While Drs. Lehenbaur and Pham went into Heber to adjust the people at the local fire station, Dr. Andrews had a meeting with four of the top officials of the Forest Service for several minutes regarding the logistics of how we were going to be able to take care of so many people.

In the meantime. Dr. Dickerson had an adjusting table set up and started seeing patients. Within five minutes, a line started formed for our services and camp officials realized we were in high demand. They agreed we should stay. The logistics coordinator of the camp was concerned that the front line crews would have to wait to get their adjustments instead of sleeping during their off time.

The fire crews were on an exhausting schedule of 16 hours on and 8 hours off, so we made an agreement to expedite care for the firefighters on the front line. We would take firefighters as priority patients and camp staff would wait if necessary. With this agreement in place, we started adjusting, but they quickly moved us away from the center of the camp because we were getting "too busy." Every time we set up a table we had a line of 10-15 people within a few minutes.

The officials would not announce to the camp that we were there because "if people find out chiropractors are here the line for you will be longer than the chow line." We found out later that 300 to 400 people normally are in line for food, so we took that as a compliment. However, that meant we had to get the word out ourselves, so while two doctors started adjusting, two others started going through camp letting people know we were there.

They soon moved us into the medical facility, which was about 200 yards from the center of the camp. This concerned us because it meant tired firefighters would have to walk an extra quarter-mile or more to get to us.

Our concerns were soon relieved because within 10 minutes we had a line from the back room of the clinic through the reception room and out the front door! They sent us outside so we would not take all the room for the people they were seeing. The ER doctor and medical crew were seeing lacerations, burns, and foot fungus and the Chiropractic Team was busy seeing people with subluxations and explaining chiropractic.

We were adjusting patients while less than two miles from the raging fire, right under the American and Arizona flags in the great outdoors.

Many times we did consultations and reports in groups of eight to 12, with each D.C. taking shifts on the adjusting tables. My report of findings was simple. "Your brain communicates with the body and tells it what to do, and the body then sends signal back telling the brain that it did what it was supposed to do. That is just like one of you using your radio to tell someone else to do something on the fire line. Then the other person does what was instructed and radios you back that the job was done. However, if there is a problem with anyone's radio then you and your entire team are in serious trouble. The same thing happens with your brain and body. If it can't get the signal out, or if it can't get the signal back, you are in trouble. All we do here is fix your radio. Do you have any questions?"

Between 1:30 and 7:00 PM, we saw 220 firefighters and support crew. We left Sunday night with happy hearts and hands, having introduced more than 500 patients to the wonders of chiropractic care. We estimate somewhere between $40,000 and $65,000 in chiropractic services were donated in a period of four days.

By 9 a.m., Monday, the Forest Service called and asked when we were coming back. Apparently we were a "big hit" and they wanted more. We have agreed to go back up and continue our work, and this time we will have more tables!

This experience has given us all a new understanding of people's appreciation of chiropractic. All we had to say was "we are chiropractors, and we are here to help," and the people came and brought their friends and crew members.

Sunday night a unit commander stopped by to be adjusted and asked how long we were going to be here, as he had 160 more of his crew he wants us to see! Isn't this the way it should be in our offices everyday?!

When we were de-mobilized, they gave us the highest compliment possible -- an invitation to "get back up here as soon as possible. What you're doing is fantastic."