What If....?

By Keith Innes

Last month I received a letter from a chiropractic college student asking for some help with his problem. During his years at chiropractic college, he continually asked his instructors this question:

"What does the adjustment do?"

One instructor told him it puts the bone back in place.

So the student asked the instructor to show him some reference books or studies to verify this claim. It is now two and and one-half years later and the student now knows that this hidden data will never be brought forth for him to see.

Another instructor explained that the adjustment released an unknown force and that this force cured the patients ills.

Not getting discouraged, the student kept on asking and finally he found a doctor of chiropractic who told him what actually happens when a specific motion unit or units lose or change their axis of rotation (IAR). The doctor went on to explain Sherrington's Laws of Reciprocal Innervation and Inhibition, the process of recurrent inhibition and the concept of joint propriception which give accurate input as to where a joint or limb is in time and space. The doctor also told the student that the adjustment would allow the motion unit to reestablish its IAR by stimulating various receptors and allowing them to do what they would normally do if the vertebra was functioning as it should. In other words, what the adjustment does is it permits joint proprioceptive and nechanoreceptors to function normally, thereby allowing a harmonious state within the musculoskeletal system to exist.

Finally, the doctor informed the student that he should master the art of spinal and peripheral joint motion palpation as the human body is not a static structure and therefore must be examined and diagnosed in dynamic motion only. The adjustment would be given into the direction of the loss of ROM and would address all planes of motion.

What the adjustment does, the student now knows! How to find the spinal and peripheral joint fixations and the specific adjustive procedures to restore the IAR, he is learning!!

Here is my question. How many other students and DCs are experiencing the same internal frustration? MPI is a nonprofit organization dedicated to bring to the chiropractic profession the most up-to-date research available with the goal of keeping chiropractic in the forefront of primary health care providers.

Midway through 1994, MPI will begin to introduce coupled joint play methods for the lumbar and cervical regions. The variable IAR of the sacroiliac joint and the consequences of an integrated treatment protocol will be discussed. MPI will continue to strive for clinical chiropractic excellence in the 1990s.

Editor's note: Dr. Innes next seminars will be in Los Angeles, Oct. 2-3, "E1-- Lower Extremities"; Chicago, Oct. 9-10, "E1 -- Lower Extremities"; St. Louis, Oct. 16-17, "Full Spine"; and Raleigh, NC, Oct. 23-24, "S1 -- Lumbars and Pelvis." To register or for more information, call the chiropractic order desk at 1-800-359-2289.