The Secret is Out! The Benefits Of Natural, Drug Free Chiropractic Treatment

Among the most difficult things for people who are taking control of their health care for the first time is separating fact from fiction, pseudoscience from evidence-based treatment and real effects from imagined ones. The flip side to the gradual acceptance of the human brain as a powerful component of healing is the age-old insight that we humans can convince ourselves of many things that are just plain wrong. The chiropractic community, like many other specialty areas in what is loosely called "alternative and complementary medicine," has to fight the food fight endlessly, to get the truth out as well as to rebut falsehoods and refute nonsensical claims.

There is a large, growing contingent of researchers and practitioners studying the methods and results of chiropractic care, and it is a fascinating field even for lay readers. Thankfully, a new era of candor and exploration is beginning to replace the mid-20th century "Dark Ages" when chiropractors were assigned the same "quack medicine" label as alchemists, shamans and witch doctors. When some irresponsible and marginally trained New Age "healers" began using the vocabulary of chiropractic without the methodology or the science, the public became understandably confused.

Back from the brink

Chiropractic has been shown in controlled experimental settings to be effective in treating lower back pain, chronic pain syndrome, headaches/migraines, fibromyalgia and other musculoskeletal conditions. These are precisely the sorts of successful treatments one would expect of a medical specialty founded on a rigorous study of human physiology (structure) and kinesiology (movement). Even old school MD's, educated by members of what is essentially their own union (the AMA, American Medical Association), have had to admit that the clinical findings support the foregoing specific, defined benefits of chiropractic.

Some questionable "health care movements" such as crystal power and so-called "therapeutic touch" have tried to hijack chiropractic, and influence some practitioners. This merely gives critics to dismiss chiropractic because of its association with quack medicine and untested theories. Now, it very well may be that, at some point in the future, empirical evidence will establish the validity of therapeutic touch and other types of what is termed "mind/body work." Such evidence has not yet been forthcoming, although when it is adduced for any new or unconventional treatment, that treatment is no longer considered "alternative and complementary medicine." It becomes, simply, medicine, as solidly established in fact as any other therapy.

History of a new paradigm

The founder of chiropractic, D.D. Palmer, was born in 1845, developing his skills in the healing arts during a turbulent period, a rancorous and undisciplined time when various new and exotic practices struggled for scientific respectability. He died in 1913, but not before he taught his new "art and science of chiropractic" to hundreds, including two Portland, Oregon medical doctors. Together these MD's founded the Portland College of Chiropractic. Although the first generation of chiropractors argued most passionately about "true chiropractic" and the treatments it comprises, they did agree unanimously on a drugless therapy, "underwritten by nature." This approach was to become a core feature of the treatment.

Solon M. Langworthy, a 1901 graduate of the Palmer School, opened an office in Ceder Rapids, Iowa that same year and established an infirmary called the "Health Home." In 1903 he founded the American School of Chiropractic and Nature Cure with the aim of training new chiropractors with the scientific rigor and evidence-based approach expected by "modern, 20th century researchers" and clinicians. The rejection of pain killers and surgery was in keeping with the "natural methods" of adjustment and manipulation on which the practice is based.

Present and future

In 1906, Langworthy and two other Palmer graduates, Minora Paxson and Oakley Smith, published the two-volume "Modernized Chiropractic." This work was the consolidation of various lines of research and sought, successfully it is felt by many, to present chiropractic in a scientific, clinically responsible light. Since that time, chiropractic has continued to refine and perfect treatments centered on spinal manipulation, while incorporating also the many sensible components of a healthy, all-around life - good diet, exercise, natural remedies whenever possible and a healthy, balanced, well-aligned body.

Today, chiropractic is established as a safe, effective therapeutic method not just for back and spine treatment, but the various other specific conditions mentioned above. Responsible practitioners would never claim to offer effective treatment of eye infections, liver disease, bullet wounds, food poisoning or psoriasis, for those are not the conditions that chiropractic was developed to treat. It is natural, drug-free approach for the restoration of optimal balance, spinal integrity, blood flow and the "nerve force", as the founder of chiropractic, D.D. Palmer, called it. Chiropractic does not have to pretend to be anything else, as its contribution to the world is scientifically established. If chiropractic's benefits have been somewhat of a secret up to now, that situation is overdue for a dramatic change. Chiropractor Dr. Friedman, at NUCCA based atlanta chiropractic treatment center AlternaHealth Solutions, invites you to a life of optimal health, based upon the principles of spinal balance and active healing which are the foundation of the NUCCA chiropractic method.