Perhaps no better example of a subject that generates strong emotional disturbance among some members of the chiropractic profession is what we call ourselves. Are we doctors, physicians or chiropractors? Do we term the practice of chiropractic a practice of medicine? For instance, I have a PhD in health psychology and behavioral medicine, but that doesn't mean I practice drug therapy. I am licensed to practice chiropractic and psychotherapy in Colorado. Psychotherapy is behavioral medicine, not drug therapy, and Colorado psychotherapists and psychologists don't become emotionally disturbed over the term medicine when it is used properly. They understand the difference between drug and medicine. More essential, while words are important to psychotherapists, they don't get overly concerned about them and react in self-defeating ways.
Take, for example, the type of emotional disturbance and self-defeating behavior the use of physician generates within the chiropractic profession. This is an old, irrational argument, and, as is often the case, based upon a lack of knowledge. The truth is that DCs are more entitled to physician than MDs. I would suggest reading Richard Leviton's book Physician (Hampton Roads, 2000). Here's what Leviton says about physician:
"... (the) individual has a reservoir of basic life energy called 'physis' in the classical Greek medical tradition from which came the term "physician," meaning the one who manages the physis [is derived]. The physis is the human organism's innate ability to keep itself in dynamic balance (or homeostasis), to heal when it's sick, to restore when it's depleted, and to thrive when it's given the proper nourishment. You might consider the physis to be the human organism's inborn intelligence of health and vitality, its homeostatic regulator. Natural therapeutics support the physis, the human organism's physical ability to heal itself; these approaches do not seek to kill a disease (as does conventional medicine), but to strengthen the body's ability to transmute its ill-health-producing effect and restore it to health... "
Leviton could have also added that conventional medicine is allopathic and rationalist, and natural therapeutics are empirical and holistic. These are two different paradigms.
Mosby's Medical Dictionary states that physician (Greek, physikos = natural) is an MD who practices medicine. There is no doubt that the MDs like to be called physicians, but there is very little about what they do that can be called natural (nor can everything a doctor of chiropractic does be called natural). The point is that many DCs opposed to the use of the physician associate it with chemicals, i.e., drugs. Do such individuals deny that doctors of chiropractic work with the physis? Would they not agree that chiropractors do not attempt to kill a disease? And when some of their colleagues in addition to the adjustment utilize adjuncts to support the physis, are they really MD wanna-bes?
Should a "true" chiropractic doctor be subluxation-based or physis-based (read: innate intelligence-based)? Is it more important what one does or why one does it? The subluxation is only as important as its adverse relationship to disturbing the physis and the adjustment in restoring its balance. For example, consider the question of toxicity in the human body. Two aspects are important here. Obviously the degree of potency of the toxin is important, but so is the degree or level of susceptibility. These are obvious factors. The human body also has a number of organs (skin, lungs, kidneys, liver) that eliminate toxins.
Let's consider the liver: To eliminate toxins, certain nutrients must also be present. Did you know that the emotional state of anger can adversely affect the liver and other organs? Though the nerve supply to the liver is also important, it is not the only consideration. If you can't let go of your anger, you may not be able to let go of your toxins either! Your anger can disturb your physis. Your anger, created by irrational beliefs, now results in self-defeating actions and pbysiological behavior. The subluxation cannot be the sole cause of disturbing the physis, and therefore, the adjustment cannot be the sole means for restoring its balance.
The father of the chiropractic profession, D.D.Palmer, stated that the determining causes of disease were mental, physical and chemical. The mental component reflects our beliefs. Thoughts generate emotions (and also reactivate older beliefs and experiences), which result in social or physiological behaviors. Many doctors of chiropractic have lost sight of this and have focused on the physical cause (trauma) as leading to the subluxation. Subluxation-focused chiropractic has, in turn, led to an emphasis on musculoskeletal problems and conditions. A doctor who focuses only on the subluxation, but ignores the mental and chemical sides of the triangle of health (lifestyle; beliefs; toxins; nourishment; the effects of poison; and lack of adequate nutrition; etc.) is neither doctor nor physician, but a technician that most likely needs to be supervised.
I am not trying to insult members of our profession, but I am trying to make an important point. If you believe that chiropractic practice is a technique, like hair- cutting is a technique, you will object to the idea that haircutters or barbers are any more than that. They don't diagnose scalp and hair disorders, or provide care to improve scalp circulation, and so on. A haircutter is someone who cuts hair. A chiropractor corrects spinal misalignments called subluxations. It's as simple as that (to quote B.J. Palmer). Such beliefs as this, however, would not generally cause emotional disturbance. Barbers are not likely to become so emotionally upset that they would engage in self-defeating behavior, oppose their colleagues in public, call one another names, and form organizations to prevent the various state and federal governments from increasing their legal scope of practice or join forces with their enemies, and so on.
Yet sabotage does happen in our profession, to such an extent that there is a growing cry to split the profession into two legal factions. This would be a sad day for the profession, and certainly a self-defeating one. Despite that fact, it may well come to such a reality. You see, there are only three options people have in a relationship: to accept one another, for one to change, or for the two to separate. In a marriage, we call it divorce; in a job, we call it resignation or termination. The people who stay together are the ones who either have come to accept one another's views, beliefs and behaviors, or they are still trying to change one another. That's called "fighting," and that's what we have engaged in for over 100 years.
Why do chiropractors get so emotionally disturbed? Such disturbance comes from one small segment of the profession: narrow-scope-minded DCs. The obvious reason for this is their belief system, one that is similar to a religious belief system. In fact, some of the so-called Palmer philosophical principles (I speak of D.D., and B.J., not institutions, one of which I graduated from) are really religious beliefs. D.D. Palmer was a spiritualist and theosophist (occultist), and included a number of non-Christian beliefs within his chiropractic philosophy. D.D. and B.J. Palmer believed "universal intelligence" was God and "innate intelligence" God's spirit, or at least a "part" of God's spirit. The Palmer philosophy is a religious worldview that, if carefully examined by doctors of theology would be found incompatible with most of the world's religions. Many of our colleagues who fully embrace this philosophy do so dogmatically, and become emotionally disturbed when it is questioned just as would a Jew, Christian, Hindu, or Muslim if their religious beliefs were called into question. Religious beliefs are sacred to people of faith, and in general, deserve respect - but are chiropractors to be compared to Christian Scientists or other healthcare professionals? Do we want to be philosophically-based or scientifically-based? By that I mean dogmatically based, because philosophy is not inherently dogmatic. Chiropractic has been defined as a philosophy, science, and art. While the science and art have received attention from the profession and have slowly improved, the philosophy has essentially remained the same.
Perhaps the time has come for chiropractic principles to be reexamined and developed in accordance with new research and our modern times. Only dogma remains unchanged. The majority of the profession has already spoken, but what about the minority? Which one of the three choices will we chose?
Next article: The Chiropractor as Doctor.
Edward Sullivan,
DC,PhD,BCIAC,FIAMA
Denver, Colorado