What Kind of Doctor Treats Post-Concussion Syndrome?

Do You Need a Specialist at All?

Most concussions settle on their own. The Ontario living guideline for adults puts the share of people with symptoms lasting beyond 1 month at 15 to 20%, and says that for them referral for specialized assessment or an interdisciplinary concussion clinic may be indicated (Ontario living guideline, section 4). Its recommendation 5.5 goes further and carries the guideline's highest grade: anyone with prolonged symptoms for more than 1 month should be considered for referral to an interdisciplinary concussion clinic (Ontario living guideline, 5.5). For children and teens, the American Academy of Pediatrics says most visual symptoms resolve on their own by 4 weeks, and for the subset who don't, it names referral to a specialist with experience in comprehensive concussion management, listing sports medicine, neurology, neuropsychology, physiatry, ophthalmology and otorhinolaryngology (Master, 2022).

The month matters because of what symptoms do after it. Prolonged physical, cognitive and psychological symptoms can be nonspecific and overlap, and similar symptoms are common in chronic pain, so the guideline asks for a careful differential diagnosis (Ontario living guideline, 4.1). Whoever you see after the first month has to sort what's concussion from what isn't, which is why it matters what each specialty measures. If you're still unwell and wondering why, do concussions heal on their own covers what keeps symptoms going.

2 things don't wait for the month. A severe or worsening headache, repeated vomiting or symptoms that keep getting worse need medical care the same day, and the full list of red flags is on post-concussion syndrome treatment (Lumba-Brown, 2018). Rest also has a short window: the guideline recommends a brief period of rest in the acute phase, then a gradual return to normal activity as tolerated, with a slower, monitored progression if symptoms worsen more than mildly (Ontario living guideline, 5.3). The clinic's rest window and what comes after it are on that treatment page too.

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Who Can Diagnose Post-Concussion Syndrome?

The diagnosis is clinical. The American Congress of Rehabilitation Medicine's 2023 criteria for mild traumatic brain injury, written for use across sport, civilian trauma and military settings and agreed by a 32-member expert panel with 90.7% agreement on the final vote, rest on a plausible mechanism of injury plus either a clinical sign such as loss of consciousness or amnesia, or at least 2 symptoms plus a finding on clinical examination (Silverberg, 2023; Albert, 2026). No scan appears in the criteria. Physicians trained in the history and the exam apply them, which includes neurologists and sports medicine and physiatry physicians. Post-concussion syndrome is the name those symptoms get when they persist.

What the exam should cover is written down too. Ontario recommendation 4.3 says assessment and management should be directed at the specific symptoms found with a standardized tool, and that the most prominent ones should be directly assessed: a physical examination of the head and cervical spine for headache and neck pain, vestibular function and balance, oculomotor function, cognitive symptoms such as memory and attention, mood and sleep (Ontario living guideline, 4.3). That list is the yardstick for comparing the specialties. A specialty that measures 1 or 2 of those items well still leaves the rest to someone.

Which Specialists Treat Post-Concussion Syndrome?

A 2021 review for neurologists lists who meets persistent post-concussive symptoms in practice: sports medicine, pediatrics, neurology, physiatry, emergency medicine and primary care, and it adds that management may require a multidisciplinary approach (Wilber, 2021). The table puts the main specialties side by side: what each usually measures, what it treats, and what, in our team's view, can stay open. Good clinicians work in every row, ours included.

Who treats post-concussion syndrome, and what each one measures. The "measures" column is checked against the Ontario living guideline's assessment list (4.3) and the AAP vision examination (Master, 2022).

Who	What they usually measure	What they treat	What can stay open
Neurologist	A neurological exam, with imaging and EEG when something other than a concussion has to be ruled out	The diagnosis, medication for headache and sleep, and whatever else the workup finds	In our team's view, eye-movement, vestibular and autonomic testing are often referred elsewhere. Ask who does that part.
Sports medicine or primary care concussion clinic	Symptom scales and a graded treadmill test of exercise tolerance (Leddy, 2019)	Return to school, work and sport on a graded plan, with aerobic exercise kept under the symptom threshold	In our team's view, the test shows how much you can do and not what's limiting you. Ask who does the rehab after the test.
Physiatrist (PM&R)	Function and symptoms, then the referrals: in 1 262-patient clinic, 46% were sent on, most often for cognitive strategies, balance and vestibular work and neck pain (Vargo, 2016)	Coordinates physical, speech and occupational therapy and neuropsychology	In our team's view, the coordinator often isn't the one measuring. Ask who reads the results and changes the plan.
Neuro-optometrist or vision specialist	Acuity, eye alignment, pursuits, saccades, the vestibulo-ocular reflex, near point of convergence and accommodation (Master, 2022)	Vision therapy for convergence, accommodation and tracking problems	In our team's view, a vision finding can sit downstream of a vestibular or cerebellar problem. Ask what's driving the eye finding.
Vestibular physical therapist	Vestibular, balance and cervical exams	Vestibular and cervical rehab; in a 31-person trial, 73% were medically cleared at 8 weeks against 7% of controls (Schneider, 2014)	In our team's view, autonomic and brain blood flow measures sit outside the PT exam. Ask what happens if your heart rate or dizziness changes on standing.
Neuropsychologist	Cognitive testing of memory, attention and processing speed, as 1 part of a multifaceted assessment (Kontos, 2016)	Cognitive strategies, school and work accommodations, mood	In our team's view, the scores describe the cognitive output, and something else has to find the cause. Ask what the result points to.
Our team (chiropractic neurologists)	Transcranial Doppler, capnography, exertional threshold testing, visual and oculomotor assessment, autonomic stress testing and a bedside neurological exam	Brain-based rehab built on what those tests show, remeasured as it goes	We're doctors of chiropractic (DC). We don't prescribe or operate, so anything that needs a prescription, a hospital scan or a surgeon is referred out, and fewer independent trials stand behind the approach.

The vision row carries more weight than most people expect. In a concussion program that tested 100 adolescents, 69% had at least 1 vision diagnosis: accommodative disorders in 51%, convergence insufficiency in 49% and saccadic dysfunction in 29%, with 46% carrying more than 1 (Master, 2016). A second group of 113 adolescents examined 4 to 12 weeks after injury put the figure at 70%, led by vergence and accommodative disorders (Scheiman, 2021). Both studies were in adolescents, and in our team's view the question that follows a vision finding is what upstream system is producing it.

The vestibular row has the strongest trial behind it. In the 31-person trial, people aged 12 to 30 with dizziness, neck pain or headache that had persisted after a sport concussion were randomized to cervicovestibular rehab or to the usual advice, and 73% of the treated group were medically cleared within 8 weeks against 7% of controls (Schneider, 2014). A 2026 network meta-analysis of 20 trials in 1,320 people found that multidisciplinary programs produced the largest improvement, followed by vestibular rehab combined with aerobic exercise, then vestibular rehab alone (Li, 2026). In that analysis teams beat single tools, which fits what the Ontario guideline asks for.

Neuropsychological testing is described by its own field as 1 component of a comprehensive and multifaceted assessment, and its interpretation is affected by pain, anxiety, age and pre-existing learning differences, which is why the review calls for an experienced neuropsychologist to read the results (Kontos, 2016). The test tells you how the thinking is performing. Finding out why belongs to the rest of the exam.

Our row is the 6 measurements on post-concussion syndrome at the clinic, and the part that sets it apart is the autonomic and brain blood flow side. In 1 concussion clinic's 268 patients aged 8 to 25, 7% had orthostatic tachycardia, a heart rate that jumps on standing (Pearson, 2022), and can a concussion cause POTS covers what that means. The approach has fewer independent controlled trials behind it than the vestibular row, and what is functional neurology lays that out without softening it.

What Can a Neurologist Do for Post-Concussion Syndrome?

A neurologist can make the diagnosis, since the criteria are clinical (Silverberg, 2023), and can rule out the things a concussion gets mistaken for. CT, MRI and EEG are the tools for finding a bleed, a seizure focus or a growth. Medication is the other half. For post-traumatic headache and for sleep it helps, and it has a ceiling: a tablet can ease a headache, and it can't retrain an eye-movement or balance system that tests abnormal.

Should you see a neurologist after a concussion? You should for any red flag, and for any symptom that could be something other than a concussion, because prolonged symptoms overlap with other conditions (Lumba-Brown, 2018; Ontario living guideline, 4.1). After a normal workup, the Ontario 4.3 list says what still needs measuring: the neck, vestibular and balance function, eye movements, cognition, mood and sleep (Ontario living guideline, 4.3).

In our team's experience, general neurology clinics carry stroke, seizure and tumor caseloads, and an hour-long persistent-symptom exam is hard to fit into that day. Some neurologists are excellent with concussion, and a normal neurology visit still often ends with a referral, so the useful question is where the referral goes.

How Do You Judge Any Concussion Clinic?

The standard our team holds itself to came from a mentor in chiropractic neurology, and the video explains it. Early in practice the instinct is to grow the toolkit and give a patient everything that might help, which, as the video puts it, is a heart in the right place and clinically maybe not. The alternative has 4 steps. Narrow the diagnosis to the smallest target you can name, a group of neurons rather than a side of the brain. Pick the 1 input that reaches that target and set the rest of the toolkit aside. Give it at a dose that's enough to make a difference and not so much that it injures a neuron. Then measure the change, and if the needle moved, measure again, until the physiology changes, then the symptoms, then the person's life.

That standard gives you 3 questions for any clinic, ours included. What did you measure, and what did it show? What will you do about that 1 finding, and why that? How will we know it moved? A clinic that answers all 3 in plain terms is measuring what it treats, whatever the title on the door. A clinic that can't is offering you a toolkit.

Can a Chiropractor Help With Post-Concussion Syndrome?

Start with what a chiropractor is allowed to do, because the law is plainer than the marketing. Michigan's Public Health Code defines chiropractic as the discipline that deals with the human nervous system and the musculoskeletal system and their interrelationship with other body systems. In scope are evaluation by physical examination and the performance or ordering of tests; care with physical measures, analytical instruments, nutritional advice and rehabilitative exercise; and advising you to seek treatment from other health professionals. Out of scope are any procedure that cuts or punctures the skin and the dispensing or prescribing of drugs (MCL 333.16401). A chiropractor is a doctor of chiropractic, DC, and everyone on this team practices under that license.

Chiropractic neurology adds a board. The American Chiropractic Neurology Board describes itself as the sole specialty board in neurology in the chiropractic profession, recognized by the American Chiropractic Association through its Council on Neurology, and it administers an annual written examination and an annual practical examination (ACNB). The training hours, the comparison with a neurology residency and the evidence limits are on what is functional neurology.

The trial evidence for chiropractic care in persistent post-concussion symptoms is 1 randomized trial, and it cuts both ways. 40 young adults with long-term symptoms after a mild traumatic brain injury were randomized to a chiropractic intervention or an active control, with computerized eye tracking as the outcome. The chiropractic group scored better on the Stroop test, held steadier gaze during the vestibulo-ocular reflex and during fixation, and had a lower vertical error in egocentric localization; it also did worse on pursuits, with a higher tracking error (Cade, 2024). It was single-blind, it was published in a chiropractic journal, and it had 40 participants. Case reports exist (Olson, 2016), and a case report shows that something happened to 1 person and proves nothing about the next.

Can a chiropractor diagnose post-concussion syndrome? Michigan's scope covers examining and testing the nervous system and the musculoskeletal system and advising you to seek treatment from other health professionals (MCL 333.16401). Our team examines and measures how the nervous system is working after a concussion within that scope, and a medical diagnosis, imaging or a prescription goes to a physician.

Asked on the channel whether neck adjustments were a good idea for someone with symptoms on standing, the clinic's answer was about sequence. Get the picture first: cerebral perfusion, resting pressure, the posture of the neck vertebrae and the ranges of motion. Then know what the adjustment is going to do and the problem it's meant to solve before using it. An adjustment chosen that way can be useful, and one chosen because chiropractors seemed worth a try is a guess.

What If the Right Clinic Isn't Near You?

"Post-concussion syndrome specialist near me" is the most common form of this search, and the honest answer has 2 parts. Past 1 month, any local clinic that takes the Ontario 4.3 list seriously is worth a visit, and those 3 questions tell you within 1 consultation whether it measures what it treats. The full set of measurements, brain blood flow and breathing included, exists in a small number of places, and people travel for it. Our team sees patients from out of state and from abroad, and the travel page covers how a first week in Michigan works.

What Should You Bring to a First Visit?

• The date and mechanism of injury, including whether you lost consciousness or lost memory around it, because the diagnostic criteria turn on those (Silverberg, 2023).
• Your symptoms in order of how much they bother you. The Ontario guideline asks clinicians to assess the most prominent ones directly (Ontario living guideline, 4.3).
• Reports from any imaging already done, and the names of everyone you've seen so far.
• A medication and supplement list, including anything started since the injury.
• What makes symptoms worse: screens, exertion, standing, busy rooms, reading, driving.
• The 3 questions: what did you measure, what will you do about that finding, and how will we know it moved.

Post-Concussion Syndrome Doctors: FAQ