Friends and Neighbors: Ryan Behrend

Born and raised in Harlan, Iowa, Dr. Ryan Behrend always knew he wanted to go into a medical field, but it wasn't until a chance encounter that he decided to become a chiropractor.

"I came out here on wheat harvest and I met my wife, Dr. McConnell's daughter, Tabitha," he said. "When I met my wife, I met Dr. McConnell too, and he was my mentor in that way. I always wanted to do something in the health field but didn't always have a clear direction in what I wanted to do. After meeting him and seeing how passionate he was about it, I became interested."

Behrend married Tabitha and they began a journey to return to her hometown. He attended four years of undergrad work at UNL and completed his doctorate, in 2009, at Palmer College of Chiropractic in Davenport, Iowa.

Following his doctorate work, in 2010, they returned to Kimball, working with Dr. McConnell for several years before taking over the practice upon his retirement.

During that time the young couple also grew their family, Ryker, 8, was born while Behrend finished his doctorate, then they added Lincoln, 6, Maggie, 4, and Selldon, 18 months.

"They keep us busy," he said. "We travel quite a bit. I don't work on Fridays, so we enjoy three day weekends together. We like to spend a lot of time with the kids."

They have also expanded the business, now renamed Highpoint Spine and Joint Center, to Sidney as well and Dr. Behrand splits his time between the two clinics.

The best part about being a chiropractor, Behrend said, is building the relationship with patients and becoming their family chiropractor. He works often on adults and young athletes though Dr. Behrend does prenatal and postpartum work as well as infants.

"A lot of what we treat is musculo-skeletal conditions, problems with joints and muscles, specifically of the spine," he said. "We do a lot of extremities too, shoulders, knees, hips, anything like that – sports injuries, car accidents. A lot of it is evaluating the function of different joints in the spine and in the extremities, and seeing how it all works together and how it relates to the problem, whether that be neck pain, headaches, low back pain, or whatever."