Many patients have previously asked - and many others
have likely thought about it – “Why isn’t there more research out there about
Upper Cervical Care?”
The answer to that question was, perhaps, best
exemplified in a recent email that updated me about the progress of a study, which
I donated money to about three months ago.
A little bit of background information before I continue:
for the last several years, there has been a lot of research conducted in
tandem between Upper Cervical Practitioners and Medical Doctors in Italy where Upper
Cervical Care was given the wings of several Italian hospitals. This is not unprecedented, as these types of
joint tasks have occurred here in the United States, but suffice to say that a
lot more research has been going on over in Italy where the system is better
built to help patients find the root causes of their respective health problems. Here in the States, there is a lot more bias toward
the term “chiropractic,” creating a barrier between the paradigms which can
often be difficult to overcome. In
Italy, this is less of a problem, in part because the Italian version of the
AMA, as I understand it, does not view Upper Cervical Care and Chiropractic as
the same entity. Though groundbreaking
discoveries are achieved in the USA when the two professions are able to
collaborate -- such as in the University of Chicago Medical Center study that
determined Upper Cervical Care is more effective than two blood pressure
lowering medications! -- it has proven easier for more research to occur, with
less hassle, overseas than in the US.
So, over in Italy about five years ago, the UC DCs and
MDs combined to study whether the brainstem subluxation (misalignment of one of
the top two vertebrae in the spine, to the point that the brainstem which rests
within those bones is compromised) is one of the causes of Multiple Sclerosis,
by using functional MRI to better assess the area. Other forms of imaging have long-since
established the neurological consequences of a foundational shift where the head
and the neck meet, but the scientific community prefers the functional MRI. That being stated, the brainstem subluxation
was found to be a common link amongst M.S. patients in the Italian study. Furthermore, it was found that not only was
there a correlation, but that there a causative relationship; in fact, the
brainstem subluxation was determined to be one of the four primary causes of
M.S. Powerful information, and
game-changing for the scientific community.
For an Upper Cervical Practitioner, this study merely confirmed what we
already knew, but as this information becomes scientifically solidified, it
will begin to reach the public; and when it reaches the public, the manner in
which M.S. and related conditions are handled is going to change… a much needed
change.
The problem is that research – and this goes back to the
question asked in the beginning – requires a lot of money. The M.S. study in Italy ran out of it. I happened upon this unfortunate fact on
Facebook, of all places. One of my
colleagues posted a link asking for help in raising the remaining funds
necessary to complete the study. I made
a donation. Several months and tens of
thousands of dollars later (from mostly UC docs and patient advocates), there still is not enough money to finish it. Medical schools in the United States receive
research grants provided by huge corporations with a vested interest in the
results. At least one pain medication
earned well over a billion dollars in 2013.
As compared to the research described above, there is an endless funnel
of money pouring into the studies on how to “treat” disease and infirmity, but
a study that seeks the cause of such disease and infirmity gets stonewalled by
too few dollars and cents.
Research in the Upper Cervical world does get done, but
because we, the practitioners, essentially have to fund it on our own, it takes
a lot longer. Greater resources would
lead to faster speed of completion, which would mean faster publication of
results, which would make it faster and easier for the public to acquire access
to that knowledge which the research concludes.
I once had a patient who asked me to verify the comments that I had made
about another autoimmune disease. I
said, “I believe that if we can find out why your immune system is attacking
your body, then we can do more than treat your diagnosis – we can put you in
position to truly overcome.” This
patient abruptly quit receiving Upper Cervical care, because we could not
provide him with the double blind, randomly controlled trials to back up such a
statement. No amount of philosophical
discussion about the Law of Life that governs what we do as Upper Cervical Practitioners
could knock down the mental barricade constructed by years of medical theories
validated by research (but then, often, disproved by further research). It took me 5 months to find the research for
him; it now sits on my office’s educational wall. Unfortunately, that patient left one month
prior.
Upper Cervical has grown leaps and bounds in the last
decade. The relationship established
with the Italian MDs has been a great one.
They literally said, “Upper Cervical Care makes all the sense in the
world. It is logical and reasonable. We want to help you prove it
scientifically.” Good things are in the
works, ladies and gentlemen. For now,
though, we, as doctors and patients, as well as the research community, simply
have to be patient. Money grows on trees
if you want to spend hours in a lab trying to “cure” cancer, but it’s hard to
find the location of those trees if your aim is to prove what causes it.
Thinking good things for you,
-Dr. Chad
PS - If, in
reading this article, you find yourself inclined to learn more about
Upper Cervical research and/or how you can contribute to it, visit http://www.ucrf.org/
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