In this issue of Dynamic Chiropractic, Dr. Barge asks the question, "After 'Philosophical Constructs' What Do We Have Left?" The answer to this question is: "A true health care profession.
As a practicing Christian, I can and do lay claim to the belief that God is intimately involved in the health and welfare of all beings. My faith, based upon what I have been taught as a child and what I have learned an an adult, helps me to maintain that belief. As a result of my faith, I often pray for God's intervention in the lives of those who are mentally, emotionally or physically sick.
As a chiropractic physician, and more particularly as a chiropractic educator, I believe that it is my responsibility to society to make every effort to help in the development of a conservative health care profession that can be accepted by the members of society as a profession that is worthy of the public trust.
It is difficult to trust a group of people who, however vociferously proclaim their worthiness, fail to demonstrate in any objective way their validity and/or their reliability. No evangelistic proclamation by members of the group as to the purported beliefs can masquerade as objectivity regardless of its origin or its quantity.
Dr. Barge quoted from a letter which was written to another individual and then quoted from the National College Outreach publication. I agree with Dr. Barge. I did say that the static anatomical vertebral displacement model of subluxation with replacement by chiropractic adjusting is not a viable model. Nothing that the profession has done in the way of well structure research has supported this concept, nor does our knowledge of the physiology of paraspinal soft tissues. I said it, and I say it again.
That does not mean that I would not change my position if, through legitimate research, the profession proved me wrong. If I am guilty of anything, it is that I want the public, which I serve as a chiropractor and as an educator, to be able to trust our profession as a group of people who serve the public's needs through chiropractic health care.
If our profession has reached the point where its rational members cannot contemplate any change, then perhaps we truly do need a reconstruction of our thinking. For those who are not rational, there is probably little hope, for one does not easily change the mind of the zealot. Meanwhile, I for one shall continue to pursue a pathway of rational thinking supported by those objective measures that the people whom I serve expect of the learned professions.
James Winterstein, D.C.
Lombard, Illinois
Many relevant diagnostic signs are not performed deliberately by the examiner or by the patient at the examiner’s direction. They are observed as the patient reacts to their condition. Fortin’s finger sign, Minor’s sign, and Vanzetti’s sign are three examples of this principle.
Spearheaded by burgeoning scientific and clinical research literature, psychedelics have reached a level of media coverage and popular interest that has not been seen for over half a century. By “psychedelics,” we are referring to the unique class of substances that includes psilocybin (the active compound found in so-called “magic mushrooms”), LSD, dimethyltryptamine (DMT), ayahuasca, 5-MeO-DMT, and mescaline – each of which occurs in the natural world (except for LSD, which is a semi-synthetic compound).
While working at the Lovelace Medical Center in Albuquerque, N.M., one of the primary care physicians stated that imaging every patient prior to receiving chiropractic was not medically necessary. It was at that point I reconsidered the need for the imaging of every patient to avoid malpractice.
