Question
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Followup To
Question -
Does the paraspinal digital infrared imaging report really helps for diagnosis of a subluxation?
Answer -
Dear Maricel Dent,

Thank you for your question.  It is not just a simple "yes or no" question, though, as you will see.  

In order to answer you properly, it would be helpful to have a bit more detail to help put things in better context.  It is essential that we discuss more than the name of the device or the report in order to understand what data it is revealing.  A tool, whether it be an imaging device or something else, can be used for radically different goals and, therefore, yield different results.  The validity of any tool is determined by its ability to measure the desired parameter.

In this case, for instance, it would be helpful to know more about the objective of the practitioner in using such an imaging device.  What are they looking for and why would they choose such imaging to reveal it?  In other words, it is necessary to know how the data from this imaging is being used to know if it is valid as an indicator of vertebral subluxation.  

Please feel free to send me a follow-up with more detail so I can provide you with a more complete answer.

Sincerely,
James W. Healey, DC

Dear Dr. Healey,
This is hard to explain but I will try and maybe you get the idea. ok?
The machine is passed or rolled on your back(column) and a diagram is made up on the  computer of both sides of your column and it will show a straight line, a line with some curves at different locations,or any kind of line depending on your back, which represent what part of your back is not normal. This curve indicates that nerves are not working or working
more than normal by the temperature that reflects on the machine. After the machine shows this the doctor works on your back with his hands, puts you to rest 15 min. lying down, and then he will use the machine again to see how your back shows now.

I started treatment for some rigidity on my neck 10 days ago and my back is showing better in the computer, but the treatment is 90 days long and I just wanted to make sure I am not wasting my money on something that does not work.Since we are in Costa Rica, no other doctors have that machine and we don't know about it. Thank you so much for you time.

Maricel Dent


Answer
Dear Maricel Dent,

Thank you for your follow-up and the information it contained on the context of the use of the imaging and the type of chiropractor you are visiting.

Before I go into detail about the imaging procedure, it is important to discuss that there are two branches or schools of thought in chiropractic.  Briefly, they are differentiated by whether they deal with the limited therapeutic approach for aches and pains (commonly termed "mixed" chiropractic because it represents a mixture of a chiropractor with a non-chiropractic matter) or a non-therapeutic approach to optimum body performance (termed "straight" chiropractic because there is no mixing of chiropractic with anything else).  My expertise is in non-therapeutic straight chiropractic.

Therapeutic "mixed" chiropractic is the older approach based on a split from the founding principles of chiropractic about a century ago.

Non-therapeutic "straight" chiropractic is the more modern of the two.  It deals with a particular, common situation called a vertebral subluxation. It is hard to know if this is the same as the findings mentioned in you questions to me since there is also some conflicting information in how the terms are being used.  The spine is made of many bone segments which house and protect the spinal cord and the smaller spinal nerve branches that come off the spinal cord and exit between the bones.  These nerve pathways carry information or messages between the brain and the cells of the body.  These messages are essential for the life of the cells.  Without brain messages, the cells immediately begin the process of dying; i.e., they can no longer function the way they should to maintain life.

Because the bones are moveable, they can misalign in such a way as to interfere with the messages and, ultimately, the ability of the person to function at their best or express their optimum potential, whatever that may be.  People with vertebral subluxations are not able to get all they can out of life.

Vertebral subluxations can be caused by a wide variety of factors, what we'll generally call stresses.  These stresses can be physical (such as sports, exercise routines, sleeping posture and mattress condition, the birth process, sneezing, falling down, etc.), mental / emotional (in its many forms, probably the most familiar use of the word stress), or chemical (such as pollution, food additives, perhaps even drugs, etc.), which are, unfortunately, for the most part, uncontrollable and regular parts of daily living for all age groups.  In short, a vertebral subluxation can occur for a multitude of reasons.

Tragically, vertebral subluxations are rarely obvious to the individual they affect.  They usually have no symptoms.  The reason is that most of what goes on inside you happens without your awareness.  As an example, try to "feel" your liver.  What's it doing right now?  You can't know, so you can't know if it's functioning at its best or something less.  To complicate things, nerve pathways that carry messages of control (termed "motor" nerves) have no way of transmitting ache or pain messages, so your body function may be far from perfect and you'd not have any alerting signal whatsoever.  The branching of the nerve pathways is complex and extensive, making it exceedingly difficult to predict or determine exactly how the person will be affected.  Vertebral subluxation is, in and of
itself, detrimental to your life.

In order to know if someone has a vertebral subluxation, it is necessary to have that person's spine checked by a non-therapeutic straight chiropractor using a method of "analysis."  When a vertebral subluxation is detected this way, it is obviously important to correct it as soon as possible.  The term for this procedure is 揳djustment.?br>
Since vertebral subluxations are caused by so many different things, people choose to go to a non-therapeutic straight chiropractor on a regular basis to enjoy the most time free of the life-robbing effects of vertebral subluxation. There's a saying that straight chiropractic is not about your back, it's not about pain, it's about your life.  Each person has a unique potential in life.  With vertebral subluxation, it's impossible to realize that potential.

A key question to ask for your purposes, then, would be, Is someone with neck rigidity better off with vertebral subluxation / nerve interference or free of subluxation / with the nerve channels open?  It is easy to see that having all the available nerve messages getting through is better than only some of them getting through, regardless of the person's situation otherwise.  It's not that you should visit a non-therapeutic straight chiropractor FOR your neck problems, but that you would benefit from being free of vertebral subluxation even WITH such complaints.  Non-therapeutic straight chiropractic is not about treating this or any other medical condition.  

As I mentioned earlier, not all chiropractors adhere to this and it is important that you be able to distinguish which ones do if you're going to seek this type of service.  You need to understand very clearly that the practice objectives of therapeutic mixed chiropractic and non-therapeutic straight chiropractic are quite different, as described above.  What I can
tell you must not be interpreted from the mixed viewpoint.

I have very limited information on the chiropractor you are visiting.  What we do have, however, indicates that he may be of the therapeutic mixed chiropractic viewpoint.  I say this, in large part, because he is addressing your neck rigidity and has prescribed a treatment plan for it.  Realize that the goal in a non-therapeutic straight chiropractic model is not for the purpose of addressing complaints of neck rigidity, for all the reasons we spoke of above.  This is not the type of objective that would be used in the proper delivery of non-therapeutic straight chiropractic.  This doesn't mean it is bad, it just means it is entirely different than what I would advise you on.  I will not comment, then, on this therapeutic goal.  

As far as whether the imaging device you've experienced is measuring the presence or character of vertebral subluxations as we've discussed here, it still seems that the entire goal is about treating neck rigidity.  

Additionally, it was revealing that the proposed treatment will take 90 days.  Realize that the correction of a vertebral subluxation is something that occurs upon adjustment, not over prolonged time periods and in steps.  An adjustment is delivered each time a vertebral subluxation is found, and only when it is found.  Because of the many variables that are inherent in the causes of vertebral subluxations, it is impossible for anyone to know when the next one will happen.  Further, it is impossible for someone to say that after 90 days you will no longer experience the potential causes of new vertebral subluxations.  As we talked about earlier, being checked for vertebral subluxations on a regular basis makes sense throughout a lifetime and when a vertebral subluxation is found an adjustment should be performed.  In and of itself, though, prescribing a 90-day sequence of adjustments is not soundly justified.  

Certainly, I have never met the chiropractor you are visiting and am using limited information.  It may be that you do not have a non-therapeutic straight chiropractor available to you.  Ultimately, you will have to decide if the chiropractor is right for you.  

Maricel, I wish you the best in understanding what non-therapeutic straight chiropractic has to offer.  It has been my pleasure to provide you with some information.

Sincerely,
James W. Healey, D.C.