D.C. student, Master of Sport Health Science student, Sports Chiropractic Club President

“A Rising Tide Raises All Ships”

Native Floridian Paul Boss spent a fair amount of his early years with family and friends outdoors, at the beach and on the water. He lived with his mom, his brother Kyle and sister Lauren, and he also has a long-term girlfriend named Mackenzie currently studying Optometry back in his home state. Reflecting on his past, Boss remarked that it was inspiring for him to see how his mom “worked hard to pour into [them] everything that she had to watch [them] succeed.”

As a teen, Boss could often be found playing a variety of sports, leading nicely into his future interest in Sports Chiropractic. In his search for a chiropractic program, he looked at a number of schools. After talking with a friend who was a Life University (Life U) alumnus and hearing lots of positive feedback after shadowing chiropractors that had studied at Life U, Boss felt that this University would best meet his professional needs. He had worked at a chiropractic office before coming to Life U as well, gaining all kinds of knowledge that propelled his decision.

“One of the biggest things I noticed when I was deciding was that, of all the chiropractors that I had worked with or shadowed, the Life U graduates seemed to be the best leaders, and that was a category that I put myself in and something I was striving to become,” said Boss. “Just seeing how well they were able to lead their practices and serve their communities was inspiring to me so that put Life U at the top of the list.”

Boss’ friend and now fellow D.C. student Tony Gagne encouraged him to attend LIFE Leadership Weekend (LLW), and that experience further solidified Boss’ faith in the chiropractic education offered at Life U, helping him to connect with future friends and colleagues. Prior to attending Life U, Boss had completed his undergraduate studies at Florida Atlantic University, a Bachelor of Science in Education- Exercise Science and Health Promotion. His previous university had been much larger in terms of student enrollment, but Boss appreciates the sense of community he has found at Life U.

“Our quarter is a very close quarter, and you just get the feeling that everybody is rooting for you. No one is trying to tear you down on the way to their own success. Everyone kind of gets the mindset that a rising tide raises all ships,” said Boss.

Besides his D.C. studies, Boss is also concurrently working toward a Master of Sport Health Science, which becomes “a bit of a jigsaw puzzle” at registration. However, with careful planning, he manages to get everything in. It’s an interesting balance as both programs demand different challenges from a student and also often take place in different places on campus – D.C. typically “on the D.C. side of the creek” and the master’s classes on the “master’s side of creek,” as Boss sees it.

When Boss is not juggling his class work, he dedicates a good chunk of time to his duties as President of the Sports Chiropractic Club. The club meets Thursdays in Mod 7A and B from 5:00-7:00 p.m. He describes the club as a “treatment paradigm” founded and based around three key pillars: Mobility, Stability and Motor Control.

“Once you gain mobility and you are able to move the joint, then it has to be able to become more stable to prevent injuries. And once you can control that movement, mobility and stability, then you are able to get motor control,” explained Boss.

Boss also detailed how club members learn to evaluate a patient’s health based on varying levels of focus. First, there is the global focus, which looks at the overall health, functioning and nervous system aspects of a patient. Then it is time to take a regional focus, to look at a specific extremity or specific area of interest. And finally, local, attending to a particular joint.

“At the core of it all, how does a chiropractic adjustment affect or improve athletic performance? And not just in athletes, but in everybody else? […] We like to use those principles and that treatment paradigm that we use to treat athletes on a spectrum because we look at athletes as people that had reached their optimum performance and almost as a roadmap that everyone can follow along their own way,” said Boss.

 

 

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