Part 11

When a vertebra has lost its normal articular relations with its fellows and occupies an abnormal position as a consequence in regard to _all_ surrounding or adjacent tissues it may impinge nerve tissue in two ways, by _tension_ or by _constriction_. By the displacement of one vertebra of a pair the size and shape of the intervertebral foramen may be altered (occlusion) constricting the nerve which passes through the opening. That this change in the size and shape of the foramina does frequently occur is shown by the frequency with which alterations in the shape of vertebrae appear in dry spines, by post-mortems which have demonstrated the altered foramina in the cadaver and by permanent occlusion of the foramina in ankylosed spines so that the occlusion may be preserved. Adding cartilage changes in the intervertebral disks to alterations in bone shape and position, especially the latter, we find full and sufficient reason for all the pathological phenomena which follow the subluxation. Explain it as you will, these morbid results _do_ follow subluxation and can be experimentally produced in animals. Moreover, the disease may be directed to a desired organ or region by selection of the particular vertebra to be displaced.

The suboccipital, sacral, and coccygeal nerves cannot be constricted as they pass through the foramina because they do not emerge through complete rings formed of separate and movable bones. But these nerves may be _pressed upon_ or stretched by displaced bone, as may also the great gangliated cord of the sympathetic, especially the Cervical portion of it. _Tension_ of the Cervical sympathetic cord by subluxation of vertebrae is a very common occurrence.

Whether the impingement be by constriction or by tension the effect is much the same depending upon the degree to which the molecular continuity of the nerve substance is impaired--interference with the function of the organ connected with the nerve and sometimes swelling and pain in the nerve itself followed by degeneration. The effects are chiefly noticeable in peripheral tissues. S. Weir Mitchell says (1872), “A continuous pressure upon a nerve results in the degeneration of the nerve and a disturbance of function of the parts innervated by that nerve.” No clearer statement can be made.

It must not be understood that all nerve impingement is due directly to subluxation of a vertebra. A dislocated shoulder would produce a similar effect of nerve tension. But dislocated shoulders are seldom met with as permanent conditions. Likewise there may be secondary impingement from new growths, themselves due to some primary subluxation. Aneurism of the thoracic aorta often produces hoarseness by impingement of the recurrent laryngeal.

Not all impingement is sufficient to produce noticeable disease. To a certain extent the power of adaptation inherent in the body can overcome its deleterious effects and suppress all signs of its existence until an overtax upon bodily energy lessens this adaptative power. Then disease appears and we say that the overtax caused it.

Excitation or Inhibition

A slight impingement serves as a mechanical irritant to increase the action of the nerve and the functions of the attached peripheral organs. Such stimulation beyond the normal is always followed by a reaction, or fall to subnormal action.

Heavy impingement, especially the impingement due to marked occlusion of foramina, partly or wholly paralyzes the affected nerves. Often the impingement produces only a latent weakness in some organ, a weakness which may be brought to light only through the introduction of some secondary cause which takes advantage of the susceptibility of the organ to produce some definite disease. As an instance of this we may mention typhoid fever. No typhoid case is found without subluxation in the region of the second Lumbar; yet the latent weakness produced by that subluxation may not have been observed until the typhoid germ found a fertile feeding and breeding ground in the weakened tissue and proceeded to multiply there and develop its toxins.

Effect Upon Single Cell

Each nerve cell is trophic to its processes and to the tissue cells to which these processes are distributed. The growth, nutrition and repair of each cell of the body is dependent upon the integrity of the axon which supplies it. The effect of nerve impingement upon the single cell is a weakening of cell structure and a disturbance, slight or great, of the special function possessed by that cell. Dunglisson says of diseases, “All ... are dependent upon modified cell-action.”

Effect Upon Organs

Each organ is but an aggregation of cells of some special type or kind. Nerve Impingement usually involves either a whole nerve trunk or many of its fibres and thus weakens either the entire organ or many of its cells and increases or diminishes its special function. Some organs are innervated by more than one nerve and may be injured only in part by a localized impingement.

Alteration of the action of one organ often tends to affect the entire body, as in subluxation of the fourth Dorsal interfering with the nerve supply to the liver the secretion of bile becomes altered in character or quantity and the entire system suffers, through deranged digestion, from this alteration in a necessary secretion. Every disease presents symptoms only indirectly referable to the organ which is primarily affected and the problem of the diagnostician is to so discriminate between direct and indirect symptoms as to be able to _locate_ disease.

Simple Subluxation Disease

We have considered a chain of events by which disease is produced without the intervention of any secondary cause. Such a condition may be called, for convenience, a simple subluxation disease. Its existence depends directly upon the subluxation which is the first change manifest in the individual and upon which all the other changes depend.

The two facts that not all subluxations impinge nerves and not all nerve impingements cause demonstrable disease explain why we do not, in practice, find a disease to correspond with each subluxation discovered by palpation. It must be remembered that there may be latent weakness following a subluxation and of importance because it renders the patient susceptible to infection or to the action of other secondary causes.

SECONDARY CAUSES

Among the secondary causes of disease may be mentioned the pathogenic germ, poisons, dietetic errors, abnormal mental states, bodily excesses, exposure to sudden temperature changes, and inhalation of non-poisonous but irritating substances as the most common. Many others might be included but these will suffice for complete illustration of the principle. It will be our endeavor to show how each of these secondary causes operates by virtue of a previous susceptibility, or breaking down of the normal resisting power of the organism caused by subluxation, and how each in turn _may_ bring about increase in subluxation and thus, both directly and indirectly, increase disease.

Bear in mind these two all-important facts. _None of these secondary causes can operate without previous subluxation. A subluxation may produce disease without the aid of any secondary cause._

GERM DISEASES

These comprise a large portion of the febrile affections. Most germ diseases are characterized by fever and the presence of circulating toxins with resulting disturbance of the metabolic processes of the body.

It is generally agreed among pathologists that the greater number of varieties of micro-organisms found at times in man are not pathogenic. Some aid in the decomposition of food in the alimentary canal; others have various beneficial functions to perform. But some, under proper conditions, feed upon and destroy living tissue. These are the so-called pathogenic germs.

The pathogenic germs are many. They enter the body by various routes, in the air we breathe, the food we eat, the water we drink; sometimes they are communicated by direct contact with other persons or with objects infected with them. The term “contagious” is applied to those diseases whose germs may be carried through the air from one to another; “infectious” refers to those communicable only by contact.

In every healthy individual are found multitudes of germs of both the pathogenic and harmless varieties. We are constantly exposed to the influence of the former yet by no means all bodies into which pathogenic germs find entrance contract disease. This fact has caused much study and among pathologists and bacteriologists generally the conclusion has been reached that the development of colonies of micro-organisms sufficiently to produce disease depends upon what is known as “susceptibility” of the organism. There must be a latent weakness of which the micro-organisms take advantage.

This amounts to the admission that the body contains the inherent property of successfully resisting all germ action. Indeed, the fundamental proposition of Serum-Therapy is that under stress of the presence of dilute germ infusions the body _does_ develop special chemicals which neutralize the germ poisons and kill the germs and which remain after the inoculation to guard against any further entrance of germs of the same kind and vulnerable to the same protective chemicals.

This theory is sufficiently correct to have served as an unassailable basis for a most illogical procedure. The truth is that the auto-protective power of the body must be lower than normal and the germs must find a weakened area for development and multiplication before they can develop sufficiently to produce disease. Once they gain a foothold they tend to multiply with great rapidity and to develop alarming symptoms often leading to death.

Only in a few instances does modern science believe that a pathogenic germ can successfully attack a healthy body, but is claimed that there are a few germs, such as the Klebs-Loeffler bacillus (diphtheria producer) and the bacillus of anthrax, which may find lodgment in any organism, healthy or unhealthy, to produce disease.

Now, the susceptibility of the body to germ invasion requires explanation. Merely to say that one is susceptible and another is not leaves too wide a field of possibility for error. It is easy to reason from the fact that all persons are at some time exposed to contagious or infectious diseases while comparatively few contract them that some persons are vulnerable to certain diseases while others are not. It is plain that while a person may be susceptible to typhoid fever because he has a weakness in the intestines, he may be quite immune from pneumonia or tuberculosis or any other infectious or contagious disease. But why this difference? Let us look at the problem from another angle.

Chiropractors find with every contagious or infectious disease certain subluxations whose location with relation to the disease is constant and demonstrable. Thus all cases of pulmonary tuberculosis show a third Dorsal subluxation with only enough exceptions to prove the rule; tonsilitis is invariably accompanied by subluxation of the second, third or fourth Cervical. Correction of the subluxation is, in all except the most fully and virulently developed cases, followed by a radical cure. Indeed, in many of the germ diseases it is possible to abort the fever with improvement of all symptoms in from five minutes to twelve hours. We are so accustomed to checking germ diseases at once that failure to do so leads us to immediate investigation of our palpation and adjustment to discover some technical error in the application of the principles of Chiropractic to the case in question.

It is manifestly impossible by vertebral adjustment to raise the body beyond _normal power_. Nothing is added to the body; no energy is utilized other than the energy of the body itself which is provided by Nature and released through restoration of the normal carrying capacity of nerves. The highest goal attainable is normality, and it is observed that no matter whether the impingement be in the nature of an excitation or an inhibition of nerve action the effect of a correct adjustment is always in that direction--toward normality. It may be as well to digress here long enough to remark that abnormal change is never the result of _adjustment_ but always of _maladjustment_, and those who claim to be able to produce stimulation by moving a given vertebra one way and inhibition by moving it another are entirely wrong.

It is evident from the results of adjustment in germ disease that the normal body is entirely capable of throwing off the poisons and exterminating the germs, which conclusion quite agrees with science. The fact, not known by other branches of science, and asserted by Chiropractic is simply that _the subluxation is the factor which determines susceptibility_.

Upon ascertaining that a certain vertebra is in normal alignment we may say with absolute certainty that the organs innervated by the nerves passing through its foramina are not and cannot be the site of any pernicious germ activities. To go further, it has been demonstrated in a number of cases that the subluxation existed before the contagion or infection developed. A man has been known to have a second Lumbar subluxation for many years without effects other than a tendency to constipation and on the appearance of a typhoid epidemic to contract the disease. Correction of the subluxation afforded a cure. Such instances might be cited in great numbers. No person without the necessary subluxation ever contracts a germ disease and the necessary subluxation can be exactly located for the vast majority of such diseases. Unfortunately it is impossible to find a person who has not _some_ subluxations and is not, therefore, subject to _some_ form of contagion or infection.

So far Chiropractic agrees with general knowledge of germ disease and its etiology, simply adding the explanation of susceptibility which all other modes of investigation have failed to afford. In one particular we find apparent disagreement.

We have said that several bacilli are supposed to have power to cause disease in healthy bodies. Diphtheria is a disease caused by one of these. Yet Chiropractic adjustments have rapidly aborted diphtheria, apparently proving that the body has power to react strongly enough to conquer even this germ, providing the nerve channels be opened to allow of exertion of its full activity. It is probable that all diseases fall under the same law and that _no_ germ can find lodgment in healthy tissue. Chiropractic affirms this as a truth and as yet no experience has tended to disprove it; the belief is strengthened by the years.

The experiments which are said to have proven that certain micro-organisms can attack healthy tissue are based upon the supposition that careful examination demonstrated the absence of disease in the animals experimented upon by inoculation. Since these experiments and these examinations were made without any knowledge of vertebral subluxations, and consequently without discovering whether or not there existed latent weaknesses of various organs, we doubt the validity of the experiments. Our own examination of human and animal spines has thus far failed to discover any perfectly normal specimens.

Our clinical experience with diphtheria at least absolutely disproves the conclusions of Pasteur and others in regard to its origin.

Increase of Subluxations

It has been observed that in many instances the subluxation which existed previous to infection or contagion is greater and more noticeable during the febrile and active stage of the disease than before, and this fact has led some careless or insufficiently skilled palpaters to assume that the disease caused the subluxation.

The development of germ life is accompanied by the excretion of toxins of greater or less virulence which circulate through the blood and affect the entire body. This poison, irritating sensor nerves, brings about motor reactions in the segments irritated and, since the normal operation of the laws of reflex action is interrupted somewhat by subluxation, and since the muscles immediately around a subluxated vertebra tend to pull upon it with unequal leverage, this motor reaction is likely to _increase_ already existing malalignments, especially in the same body segment in which the poison is generated and in which the irritation is consequently greatest. Thus subluxation is most pronounced during the activity of the disease caused by it and reacting upon it and thus a disease which began as a localized destructive process may manifest systemic effects through its action upon other abnormal spinal segments.

DIET

The internal chemistry of the body varies so greatly under changing conditions, the operation of any two different organisms is so hard to compare accurately, that it is impossible to set down any rule for diet which will apply properly to all patients or to all with the same disease or habit of body. In fact, only experiment with an individual can determine the exactly proper diet for him.

Through lack of judgment or of observation of the effects of certain foods upon us we often eat that which our bodies cannot properly digest and assimilate. Sometimes through accident or negligence we partake of food which is proper in kind for us but improper in quality, perhaps partially decomposed. Improper food, when taken into the body, tends to exert a deleterious effect upon health. This fact should not lead us to confine ourselves to reasoning superficially that improper foods _cause disease_ or that dietary measures will _cure_ disease.

Some Chiropractors have held that the hunger of individuals for certain foods is a safe guide to a proper diet. This is manifestly untrue in some cases; the voracious appetite of the convalescent typhoid patient is an example. But it would probably be true _if all men were normal_. Close observation of a few exceptionally well-developed and normal individuals has disclosed an interesting fact. If a man has no subluxation in that portion of the spine which controls the stomach, the ingestion of decomposing food, even though the alteration be so slight as to escape notice on casual examination, induces immediate vomiting followed by no untoward consequences. Only occasionally does one find persons without subluxations in some way affecting the stomach; in such cases the body promptly rejects and expels injurious material.

This carries us to the rather surprising conclusion that _the normal person is not susceptible to the influence of bad food_. In the majority of individuals, some degree of abnormality existing, improper food has a decidedly bad effect. Passing through the alimentary canal it is improperly digested; toxins are developed; these chemically affect the entire body, perhaps leading only to a congestion and inflammation of some part of the lining of the alimentary tract, perhaps producing a general fever, malaise, diarrhea, and the other effects of a general poisoning.

It has been found that proper adjustment is followed by quick relief in such cases, the commonest effect being the rapid expulsion of the deleterious matter by vomiting and diarrhea with breaking of the fever and lessening of all symptoms.

It has also been observed that during the suffering from dietetic error the subluxation controlling the stomach or some part of the small intestines is often found increased in degree with tension of the adjacent muscles. With adjustment and relief of the other symptoms the muscular tension tends to disappear. This motor reaction from the irritation of food poison undoubtedly serves to _increase_ subluxation already existing, thus intensifying effects. But for its primary effect food poison requires a previous subluxation lowering the natural protective power of the body. Food poisoning is often a secondary cause of disease.

When it is found in any specific case that certain foods exert a bad influence upon the progress of the case, that the symptoms are aggravated by the taking of these foods, they must be abandoned. Yet no rigid diet need be prescribed in any case. Every patient will require a different diet, nor is it possible to understand the intimate chemical relations within the body sufficiently to fix a proper diet except by experiment.

A word here about fasting. If improper food were a primary cause of disease, fasting would be an effective, though somewhat radical, removal of the cause of disease and a logical procedure. Since improper food is _not_ a primary cause of disease and since nature requires food for the repair work made possible through adjustments, it would seem unwise for Chiropractors to prescribe fasting. Also it is well to remember that fasting and starvation are synonymous and their symptoms identical.

POISONS

Any substance taken into the body and not usable as food may be considered poison. Most drugs administered as medicine or used habitually are either directly poisonous and commonly so considered or are poisonous in the sense that they do not build but rather tend to injure the body. Injurious substances accidentally taken into the body; certain products included in the preparation of otherwise nutritious foods, alcohol, tobacco, etc., affect the body in varying degrees but in accordance with the same laws. Poisons may be internally generated through the action of pathogenic germs or through the failure of the body to digest food and to prevent injurious chemical changes in it. It has even been said by some that abnormal mental states so affect metabolism as to cause the formation of certain auto-toxins which injuriously affect the entire body.

However poison may make its appearance in the body its presence is associated with certain bad effects. Poison may be corrosive, destroying tissue wherever it touches; it may be stimulating, affecting the nerves so as to increase their activity, following which waste of energy there is a weakening reaction; it may be narcotic, lowering some physiologic process below normal.

If a man without subluxation--and therefore normal--have poison introduced into his body one of two effects will follow. Either the poison will be sufficient to produce death in a short time, and will do so, or the poison will be ejected from the body and the patient recover naturally and without treatment, and recover fully.

This is the statement of the ideal, not the real. The fact is that no person has yet been found without subluxation in some part of the spinal column. Occasional cases have been reported but always by Chiropractors whose statements are open to question on account of imperfect training in vertebral palpation or a known habit of unconsidered statement. And in the weakened body, whose natural protective power has been lowered, the effect is different.

The body fails to throw off all the poison normally and some of it remains in the circulation and tends to cause progressively increasing damage. In addition to the direct effect of the poison upon the tissues, the irritation of sensory nerves gives rise to a motor reaction which increases subluxation generally throughout the spine but especially in the segment in which the sensory irritation is greatest. If the poison be taken into the stomach the vertebrae affecting that organ are most affected in the resulting motor disturbances. When vaccine virus is introduced into the arm the greatest influence is upon the last two Cervicals and first Dorsal, causing increased weakening of the nerves to the arm. If the vaccination does not “take” it is because the body is so normal as to be able to take up and rapidly excrete the poison or to neutralize it with an internally generated antitoxin.