I had an experience with Dr. Stern from February 2019 to April 2019 that is still to this day very disturbing to me.
First, he had been treating me for an avulsion fracture in my foot. Needless to say his methods of treatment are not ones that are realistically sustainable for anyone who ultimately wants to be healed in a proper way for longevity reasons. He insisted that by me seeing him twice a week and continuing normal activities I would heal, but I can also sense that this was more of a business tactic than a real doctor's logic. Long story short, the pain I had initially at the start only began to worsen in time. In the end, I had to reinvest in a new doctor that was able to give me realistic guidelines on how to treat and manipulate the injury. Being a professional athlete and dancer it actually set me back several months being that I had to re-start my rehabilitation process from scratch. Had I known that Dr. Stern's advice was not trustworthy enough I would not have invested the time and money I spent for such appointments to begin with. All in all, I do understand that by going to a chiropractor or whatever type of healer in any situation, he or she cannot promise a cure, however, this is not my primary complaint.
Second, but most importantly, from a young woman's perspective Dr. Stern made me very uncomfortable. Though I appreciated him opening up his office on his days off for me to come in (so I wouldn't have to wait in line during his office hours) the arrangement began to become very strange. It started when he began using wording while giving me deep tissue such as, "You just let me give you all you can take," alluring to the fact that I have a high threshold for pain, but that wasn't how it was coming off. Finally, one day as I was leaving my appointment he suggested, "You can stay and hang out a little if you want." I don't know what this man seemed to think that I wanted to spend extra time with him alone in his basement office with no one else present, but I could not have felt any more violated. That evening when I went home I canceled my follow up appointment via text and did not return to his office again. He proceeded to reach out to me on Instagram wishing me that my foot was feeling better. Again, I don't see the necessity in trying to make additional contact with me via social media when I did not reach out to him, but that goes to show his level of professionalism. (Bare in mind this is also coming from a married man.)
I know he has clients that have been seeing him for years that rely on his treatments, but realistically one should never have to rely on anyone that much to take care of their own physicality of their body. I also understand clients seem to love him because he is only $50 a session, but like the saying goes, you get what you pay for and I have learned from this experience that my body and who I am are both worth so much more than that. read more