Award Rules & Criteria
1. What is recognized
Each year, one doctor is selected nationally. That honor is The Golden Spine.
2. When the selection is announced
The announcement date for each award year is posted before that year's selection begins, and every member in good standing is notified by email at least thirty days beforehand.
An honor is announced once. No shortlist is published in advance, and no interim result is given out.
3. Who is eligible
Members in good standing, whose license is current, are eligible. Nobody outside that group is considered, and nobody inside it is required to do anything to be considered.
There is no entry, no submission, and no fee. A doctor cannot apply for an honor and cannot be put forward for one by paying.
4. What the criteria are
The criteria are the seven in the standing registry, five of which are the award path. Each one, and what establishes it, is set out on The Standard.
The criteria are the basis of the selection and are open to read before, during, and after it.
5. How the selection is made
Editorial judgment against those criteria. A doctor is chosen by people reading the record, not by a score a system computes and not by a vote anyone can join.
6. Nothing here is for sale
No purchase reaches an honor. Not membership, not the Leadership tier, not sponsorship, not advertising, and not a relationship with anyone at Chiro+.
The Leadership tier says this on its own price card: no award advantage.
This is the position the whole platform is built to keep, and it is why the two things are described in different words everywhere on this site.
7. Where an honor appears
On the doctor's profile, on the page their badge links to, and on the awards page for their year.
An honor is permanent. It stays on the record after the membership behind it ends.