Date: Fri, 16 Sep 1994
To: chiro-list@silcom.com
Subject: Bridges
Dr. Dubin: Your response is awaited.
Dr Badanes: OK, let's start with 10.
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Response 1:
SOME GUIDELINES FOR CHOOSING A CHIROPRACTOR
1) Avoid a chiropractor who attributes any of your problems to Vertebral Subluxation and sells the Adjustment as the solution to your complaint.
2) Avoid a chiropractor who practices a 'named' Technique (e.g. Activator, NUCCA, Biomechanics, Gonstead, AK, Thompson, Pierce-Stillwagon, Biophysics, Toggle-recoil, Diversified, Network, etc, etc) or any combination of these or OTHER named Techniques.
3) Avoid a chiropractor who uses x-rays to locate your Subluxation and probably any chiropractor who has an x-ray machine in their office.
4) Avoid a chiropractor who wants to see you a given number of times per week in an effort to get you to the point of being "on a maintenance schedule" and probably any who use the word "maintenance" as a goal of treatment.
5) Avoid a chiropractor who suggests that MDs are simply against chiropraxis and those that in any way imply that chiropractic is somehow better than medicine.
On the other side of the coin, complementing each "avoid" above:
1) Seek a chiropractor who acknowledges differences in tissue and does not neatly conceptualize pathophysiologic complexity into a Spinal Demon.
2) Seek a chiropractor who when asked, "What techniques do you practice?" is bewildered by your question and suggests that their treatment will depend on what's wrong with you.
3) Seek a chiropractor who uses a medical facility for x-rays and orders them to rule out fracture and/or gross pathology as indicated by the case history and medical (not chiropractic)
exam.
4) Seek a chiropractor who may or may not choose to treat and emphasizes patient empowerment by teaching how to take better care of yourself.
5) Seek a chiropractor who is not competing with MDs at your expense in their effort to promote chiropraxis and their practice. It is not a contest between MDs and chiropractors.
I suspect it will be more difficult than you think to find a chiropractor if you strictly adhere to these guidelines... but that is EXACTLY what I suggest you do.
John Badanes, DC, L.Ac.
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Response 2:
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Yep. Where's the "new anus" you promised... or, are you going to "huff and puff and blow their house down?"
JB.
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Response 3:
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What makes chiropractors point to what they view as medicine's "failures" as if to imply their own success? These are incredibly impressive statistics next to chiropractic's <.01% -- or hasn't
this occurred to you amidst your "finger-pointing" and chest-beating?
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Yep. Take a look. Treatment approach will be based on studies, not psychoaesthetic personal proclivity. Perhaps you can name me five things in the entire history of chiropractice that have changed as a result of a study. OK... name one. And what study was that?
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Exactly.
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So? Ever heard the expression, "What's one thing got to do with another?" Ranting against medicine is the most imbecilic argument FOR chiropractic that can be offered. You are better off looking
to your own "house" before casting stones. Not only is it more honest and appropriate, but it is more productive and practical.
JB.
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Response 4:
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Dr Badanes:
Why waste your time with your study if this is your relationship to scientific inquiry?
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Dr Badanes:
Why waste MY time with your study if this is your relationship to scientific inquiry?
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Response 5:
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Dr Badanes:
DD Palmer presumably healed Harvy Lillard of a hearing problem by fiddling with his spine. On this basis, he opened a clinic for the deaf.
Author unkown:
The role of science is not to provide everlasting truth, but rather, to provide a modest obstacle to everlasting error.
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Response 6:
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Dr Badanes:
Oh really? Tell me what you think I've criticized that you agree with and why? Then tell me in what ways you do not participate in this criticism of chiropractors and chiropraxis?
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Response 7:
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Dr Badanes:
HAHAHAHAHAHAHA. Can you really be this lame, Doctor?
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Dr Badanes:
HAHAHAHAHAHAHA. Can you really be this lame, Doctor?
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Response 8:
(Our colleague, Roy Hildebrandt said): "While we are all subject to some degree of capriciousness and while there is nothing basically wrong with entrepreneurialism, when those aspects are
combined to synthesize proprietary "patent-medicine-like" clinical procedures [what you and I call Chiropractic Technique, Menachem] that may directly or indirectly constitute threats to people's
health, welfare and lives ..sometime... somehow... such procedures must be... will be... brought to a court of accountability."
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Dr Badanes:
You can take this up with our colleague, Dr.Hildebrandt. Before you start to blather to him however, you should probably fortify yourself by reading the editorial from which I quoted, "Science,
Medicine and Chiropractic Theory" (JMPT September, 1986). Honestly, I don't believe that you are capable of understanding what's being said here, since to begin with, you apparently can't even
discern who originally made the remark.
The editorial is in response to Dr.Fred Barge's ignorant pestering of the chiropractic authors of a paper on AIS. Of course his objection was 1) that since HE knew what caused scoliosis (his "teeter-totter" disc principle and "disc-block Subluxation), it was NOT idiopathic, and 2) that his Techniques, which were
largely Logan and Toggle used in his book Scoliosis Vol.3 (The Nightmare Continues) COULD effectively treat the disorder.
While there were many responses from people with more than two working neurons who criticized our past president of the ICA and author of numerous books including, "Are you the Doctor, Doctor?"...
Dr. Hildebrandt's are more applicable to what you have characterized as "my worst yet."
Hildebrandt:
However, I found the letter by Dr. Barge to be extremely perplexing in that it accused the authors of "parroting" only the medical by-line in regards to scoliosis and then proceeded to completely
disregard present-day scientifically established knowledge on the subject of AIS, offering in its place a dogmatic "chiropractic" supposition on the cause and cure of AIS that cannot, by any stretch of the imagination, be taken seriously as a viable theory" [Badanes comment: I am critical of JMPT for even giving "a Barge" a forum to present theories which are about as valid as "the function of the skin is to give the body form and support."]
....further in the article:
"While Dr.Barge's ideas on the cause and cure of AIS cannot be taken seriously as a viable theory on the basis of present-day scientific knowledge [We haven't discovered the REAL function of
the skin yet], it nevertheless is serious to the extent that it represents a combination of chiropractic 'old-school' capricious ideology and patent-medicine-like entrepreneurialism with frightening implications. There is no question in my mind that, unless checked, some gullible or iniquitous [I'd add non-critical and stupid] chiropractors will almost certainly be drawn to its clinical use and that some unsuspecting parents will subject their children to it in desperate attempts to provide them with
relief for a horribly disfiguring and life-threatening condition."
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Response 9:
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Sure, that's easy: "A chiropractic office is like a box of chocolates, YOU NEVER KNOW WHAT YOU'RE GOING TO GET!" Why just to name a few possibilities when picking a chiropractor out of the phone book to get that darn 'back pain' treated, you might get:
Activator Technique
Logan Basic Technique
Gonstead Technique
Directional Non-Force Technique (DNFT)
Thompson Technique
Pettibon Spinal Biomechanics
NETWORK (The nightmare continues...)
Mears Technique
Spinal Stressology (Lowell Ward, hehehehe)
Toftness Technique
Chiropractic Biophysics Technique
Atlas Specific/HIO (Toggle Recoil)
Pierce-Stillwagon Technique
NUCCA Technique
Barge (Tortipelvis/Torticollis) Technique
BioEnergetic Synchronization Technique (BEST)
Sacral Occiptal Technique (SOT)
Applied Kinesiology
Diversified Technique
Neuro Organizational Technique (NOT)
Perianal Postural Reflex Technique
Meric Technique
Receptor Tonus Technqiue (NIMMO)
Distraction Technique (Cox, Markey, Leander)
Lemond Brain Stem Technique
Grostic Technique
Neuro Emotional Technique
Holographic Diagnosis and Treatment
....plus around 50 more could be named.
The point here, if it's not clear, is that for any complaint such as neck or low back pain, the consumer can't be sure what they're buying and the MD can't feel confident in referring a patient into this Technique Jungle.
Further, not a single one of these Techniques has been shown to be more or less effective than any other for any condition; indeed none has even demonstrated _individually_ to be effective for any particular condition... including a sprain or a strain.
These are all Chiropractic Techniques and should NOT be confused with "spinal manipulative therapy" (SMT). Many of those listed do not even resemble what you would imagine to be spinal
manipulations. Nonetheless, focusing on this aspect alone, it is a useful exercise in beginning to to separate The Chiropractic from physical medicine by asking the question, "What is the difference between a grade 5 mobilization done by a physical therapist and The Chiropractic Adjustment?"
John Badanes DC, L.Ac.
[JB.]
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Response 10:
From: mck@maestro.geo.utexas.edu (Tom McKenna)
Subject: network chiropracter
Date: Fri Sep 16 07:25:38 PDT 1994
Organization: The University of Texas at Austin
Is there anyone out there who knows about a "Network Chiropracter"?
My sister was recommended to see one by someone she gets Huna
Kane Bodywork treatments from. She cannot locate any in her area
(Philadelphia, PA, USA). Are there any out there elsewhere in
the US?
thanx,
tom
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"Hit 'em high and hit'em low ... hit all 24 and collect the dough" ... BJ or JB ... you decide.
Finally, I would ask you, Dr.Dubin, "What would be the difference between a spinal manipulation done by an an orthopractic chiropractor and a Chiropractic Adjustment done by you?"
Dr Badanes