Review

Presented by -- John C. Lowe, D.C.

See pages xxx for information on how to order

One of my failings (one of many) is that I tend to be somewhat verbose. As I write -- so do I speak. Someone asks me a question and my answer becomes a speech. Get me started on the value of chiropractic and the patient is stuck for the next hour. This naturally has a way of driving a patient nuts and seriously curtails the number of patients you have the time to see.

Maybe I just became entranced by my own voice or what I said, but at one time I began to think of my office as a temple of talk. At the same time I couldn't figure out why I could only fit in nine or ten patients a day. My practice was literally being strangled by my own rhetoric. It's for the proceeding reasons that educational videotapes have been produced by and for the chiropractic profession. These days, we must have either a patient education area in our offices or lend tapes for patients to take home and view.

Seldom, however, have we addressed the fact that some patients are in too much discomfort to sit down in the office and view a tape, and it takes an effort to set aside viewing time outside of the office. Knowing how busy the professional is, a plethora of excellent audiotapes has been developed so that the DC can be driving along in his car and learn at the same time. But what about the busy patient? Why shouldn't they too have access to tapes that can conveniently be played almost anywhere?

Dr. John Lowe has developed an audiotape that more -- much more -- than fulfills the need. Armed with not only a chiropractic degree but one in psychology as well, Dr. Lowe pulls out all the motivational plugs, while providing the patient with more information and inspiration than many hours' worth of patient lectures.

The tape begins with the facts about chiropractic and natural health care, and its fight against the medical/pharmaceutical cartel. The information is presented in an effective and forceful manner and will certainly be an eye-opener for the majority of the public. Afterwards, Lowe goes on to instruct the patient on the reasons why compliance is so important in order to achieve long-range health goals.

The tape is informative and entertaining. In fact, I found it hard to stop listening to it. During the instructions, Lowe gives the listener projects which reinforce his message.

Every reason for procrastinating is covered so that the listener is literally rationalized into following the patterns of compliance that are so carefully outlined by the tape.

As with most things that are good for the patient -- the tape is also good for the doctor: it reminds us of the rationales for treatment which may have been misplaced in the cobwebs of our memories.

The fact that the philosophical persuasions within the profession may viably use this tape is another attribute.

Every new patient should receive one of these tapes. Lowe is an articulate spokesman on an important subject, and he speaks in an interesting way for the good of all concerned. You should purchase many tapes, for they are seeds that if planted during the right season, will bare fruits to feed your practice for years to come.

Before the book was published in 1983, Dr. Lowe was kind enough to send me a draft for my perusal and review. It goes without saying that I was impressed with the manuscript and wrote a statement to that effect.

The book is written for the lay person but, as with some other texts that I've read, it also serves to act as a reminder of what we may have forgotten.

It is difficult to imagine that there are some in our profession who do nothing but adjust the spine. They claim that this is "true" chiropratic which is analagous to a surgeon performing a major operation without using anesthesia. In spite of the dogmatists in the healing arts, nothing is a panacea or works alone.

Healing, especially natural healing, takes many things to create an environment within the body to heal itself. Let's face it, if a patient gets adjusted regularly by the world's best chiropractor but eats nothing but candy bars all day long, the adjustments won't keep him from getting sick.

Thus Dr. Lowe addresses the need for more than just the adjustment. He reasons, quite correctly, that skeletal muscle is attached to bone to move it, and that when muscle is hypertonic or in spasm it will cause distortions and fixations of the articulations indigenous to the involved structures.

Chiropractors may obtain longer lasting results if they ameliorate the myofascial problems before performing specific adjustive procedures on the patient.

After a wonderful foreward from our good professional friend, the late Robert S. Mendelsohn, M.D., the book progresses to a unique open letter to members of the healing arts. His candor is refreshing and deftly presented. In fact, in the 18 chapters that follow, not a comma, period, or colon is wasted.

Chapter one covers the chronic spasms, the hypertonic myofascial problems that have been around for awhile, predisposing the body to structural aberrations.

In the chapters that follow, the author covers the complications caused by spasms, which can be extensive. It is this approach that I like the most because it places the chiropractic physician out of the realm of a technician. We are not therapists working on musculoskeletal problems -- instead we are physicians working on the neuromusculoskeletal system and as such may affect, either directly or indirectly, the integrity of organic function.

One of Dr. Lowe's primary interests has been in the field of nutrition. It's only natural then, that he devotes several chapters to the correlation of nutrition to spastic muscle. In other chapters, he eloquently dismisses the misuse of such therapeutic approaches as surgery and prescription medication.

The conservative therapy he proposes centers around stretching exercises, trigger point therapy, nutrition, physical therapy and adjustive techniques.

The chapters are short and well written. They serve the patient and the busy professional equally because of their brevity and valuable information. Well presented and illustrated, the book should be read by all the members of the healing arts who are interested in treating the individual rather than just the baggage of afflictions they bring into the office.

Thank you, Dr. Lowe -- you continue to impress.

RHT