HEALTH ADVISORY

CHIROPRACTIC TREATMENT CAUSING DEATH OR STROKE IS AN ISSUE OF
PUBLIC CONCERN …DELEGATES TO WORLD STROKE CONGRESS
IN VANCOUVER, B.C., JUNE 23-26 URGED TO SUPPORT INVESTIGATION

Families of those Canadian citizens who have died or suffered stroke paralysis as a result of chiropractic neck manipulation have asked the Ministers of Health in every Canadian Province, as well as the Federal Minister of Health, to implement a complete Moratorium on all chiropractic highest neck manipulation (commonly referred to as neck cracking or an adjustment). The families recommend that once the Moratorium is in place, an impartial Scientific Review Committee be established.

We urge medical professionals to the 5th World Stroke Congress, meeting in Vancouver, June 23-26, to support our call for a Moratorium and the establishment of the Scientific Review Committee before another person is paralyzed or dies as a result of neck manipulation by chiropractors.

Chiropractic neck manipulation is an issue of public concern. Physicians, neurologists, pediatricians and other medical specialists around the world have clearly warned the public that neck manipulation is causing everything from mild strokes, to quadriplegia, to death. Even the president of the Canadian Chiropractic Association, Grayden Bridge, is quoted as saying: "There is a risk of complications associated with neck adjustment", but he adds "serious complications are quite rare." How can this be when there is so much evidence to the contrary?

In January of 2004, an Ontario Coroner's Jury ruled that the death of 45 year old Lana Dale Lewis was the direct result of a chiropractic high neck manipulation. This was the second Canadian Jury to find that traumatic chiropractic neck manipulation was the direct cause of the death of a Canadian citizen. Twenty-year-old Laurie Jean Mathiason of Saskatoon, Saskatchewan was the other victim. These are but two of many examples of death following chiropractic neck manipulation.

Simply stated, no one should be permitted to hold the head of a person and twist it rapidly thus affecting the highest joints in the neck, doing what is called an "adjustment." No chiropractic authority has ever shown this particular act to be good for anything nor has it ever been shown that in fact anything has been "adjusted".

The request for a moratorium is totally reasonable and responsible. If highest neck manipulation were a medication it would never have been approved for use and with all that is known, would have been removed from the therapeutic market years ago.

The true number of cases is almost completely hidden by lawyers and confidentiality agreements, the privacy of hospital records and the lack of knowledge as to what really happened to patients who are injured by neck manipulation.

Death is the end point but it is the tip of the iceberg. Below the surface are countless cases of stroke -- one recent report in the Canadian Medical Association Journal counted 21 cases of stroke. Patients become quadriplegic, can have vision loss and can have what is called the Lock-In syndrome where patients are fully conscious but can only communicate by blinking their eyelids.

What exactly is the problem with seeking care from a chiropractor who is recognized as a professional and suppose to have the best interests of the patient in mind? Simply put, it is neck manipulation, the signature treatment of chiropractors, performed on almost every patient from newborn babies to senior citizens. This is being done with the claims by some chiropractors that it improves immunity to disease, can treat ear infections, helps digestive conditions and even autism. It is being done on adults to treat migraine headaches, low back, tail bone pain, sinusitis, hip pain and even A.I.D.S. by some chiropractors.

This so-called "adjustment" by chiropractors is taught at every chiropractic school and was the main reason that the teaching program at the Canadian Memorial Chiropractic College in Toronto was rejected as non-scientific by universities across Canada, the latest being York University in Toronto.

DANGEROUS MYTHS ABOUT CHIROPRACTIC NECK MANIPULATION

There are several myths about chiropractic highest neck manipulation. The first is that it is done because people have neck pain in that area. On the contrary, highest neck manipulation is performed on newborn babies to senior citizens. Babies don't have high neck pain. Just as most back pain is in the low back and most neck pain is in the low neck. It is part of a philosophical belief system by chiropractors that somehow making a cracking sound in the highest neck area is a cure all. This has no place in modern medical treatment.

The second myth is that chiropractic highest neck manipulation is safe. The Canadian Chiropractic Association quotes statistical comparisons that make no sense. They offer as their main proof a study that was done on 80-99 year old cadavers. This only proves that someone who is already dead cannot die twice nor have a stroke.

On the other hand, you have highly trained specialized neurologists all across Canada seeing these cases in their offices on a regular basis and using highly accurate radiology and other means of diagnosis. Their concerns are echoed by other neurologists from Harvard and other prestigious medical schools and over sixty years of scientific reports.

The third myth is that chiropractic high neck manipulation is properly regulated. In fact the regulators themselves fully endorse highest neck manipulation to treat everything from ear infections to migraine headaches to tailbone pain. In the words of one regulatory body, "they could not care less".

THERE ARE RESPONSIBLE CHIROPRACTORS

It is true, however, that some chiropractors, like some physiotherapy counterparts, are skilled in the scientific use of mobilization and manipulation therapy. They may have a good understanding of the mechanical aspects of the muscular-skeletal system. They can provide good care. The question remains, however, what percentage of chiropractors practice scientific and safe procedures? Or as one former chiropractor stated in a Scientific American television interview: "There is no standard of care in the profession. As Forrest Gump might say, A chiropractic office is like a box of chocolates: You never know what you are going to get!"

In 1994, Consumer Reports published guidelines as to what to be aware of when you decide to seek help from a chiropractor. In February 2004, the Wellness Letter from Berkeley California issued further guidelines and issued the caution, "Don't agree to neck manipulation".

In a nutshell, in the office of a safe chiropractor there are no infants and children undergoing spinal manipulation; there are no claims to treat ear infections, colic, bed-wetting, no personal testimonials, and no hard sell for maintenance therapy. Most important, there is no highest neck rotation manipulation being done.

The regulators of chiropractic should be offering 100% support for a Moratorium on all chiropractic highest neck manipulation. Their responsibility is to protect the public and they can show no better way to do so, than to support this Moratorium and participate in setting the framework for new safe and scientific guidelines.

The regulators should not continue to support taking the head of a baby and twisting it in any manner whatsoever. They should not continue to support high velocity neck twisting in anyone.

FEDERAL AND PROVINICAL GOVERNMENTS MUST ACT

The Federal and Provincial authorities should address the following:

First, do they agree with chiropractors that chiropractic highest neck manipulations should be used on newborn babies and children? Or do they agree with the Chiefs of Pediatrics and the Canadian Pediatric Society that the answer is clearly no? If they agree with the Canadian Pediatric Community, all public funding for pediatric chiropractic should be stopped immediately.

Second, do the government authorities agree with chiropractors that chiropractic highest neck manipulation should be used to treat conditions such as infantile colic, ear infections, bed-wetting, A.I.D.S., autism and as an alternative to scientific childhood immunizations? Or do they agree with scientific evidence that such claims are non-scientific and should not receive any public support?

Third, do the Ministers of Health agree with the findings of two Canadian inquest juries that chiropractic highest neck manipulation does cause death?

Fourth, do they agree with the professional warnings issued by neurologists all across Canada against such neck manipulations? Do the Ministers of Health agree with the scientific evidence accumulated over sixty years that chiropractic highest neck manipulation causes stroke and death?

Highest chiropractic neck manipulation is not an essential health service. The Ministers of
Health must look beyond political influences and do the right thing, call a Moratorium.

Chiropractic highest neck manipulation causing death is the tip of the iceberg. Lying below the surface are over 20 different kinds of stroke, from serious visual loss to Locked in Syndrome, where the fully conscious patient can only communicate by blinking the eyes.

"Stroke resulting from neck manipulation occurred in 28% (21 cases) of our cases".
Canadian Medical Association Journal July 2000. In other words 28% of all vertebral artery strokes are entirely preventable if chiropractic highest neck manipulation was stopped.

IS IT ALL ABOUT MONEY?

With all the scientific medical evidence available about the dangers of neck manipulation, why don't chiropractors eliminate this procedure? Is it financial loss? In their book, Spin Doctors: The Chiropractic Industry Under Examination, authors Paul Benedetti and Wayne McPhail state: "Faced with the evidence that a procedure offers little or no benefit to patients, but potentially catastrophic damage, why do chiropractors continue to adjust necks? Money may be one reason. Chiropractors (in North America) make tens of millions of dollars a year manipulating necks. The vast majority also believe that it works. To give it up would mean a huge financial loss, and it would be a monumental philosophical setback, because many chiropractors adjust the neck for myriad problems, including ones that have nothing to do with the neck."

Additionally, many incidents of stroke directly related to chiropractic treatment go unreported.

Victims have died or been seriously injured and there has been no central registry where medical officials can report such cases. In some situations where death occurs, no autopsy is performed to show cause of the fatality. In Canada, the Chiropractic Protective Agency, the insurance arm of the Canadian Chiropractic Association, appears reluctant to report cases where there is documented evidence of chiropractic mistreatment. For the most part, the agency resorts to abusive legal tactics to deny any association in what many families of the victims feel is a cover-up.

To counter-act the deniability claims by the Chiropractic Protective Agency and other such bodies, FAACT has launched the International Chiropractic Abuse Agency (ICAR), seeking participation by the public and medical authorities throughout the world to report incidents of injury or death where chiropractic treatment has been involved. This can be done through the FAACT website at www.faact.com where a form for reporting incidents is available.

The public position taken by the chiropractic associations has many parallels to the stance taken by tobacco industry executives in the sixties when they refused to admit any responsibility whatsoever that smoking contributed to respiratory and lung disease, including cancer, by using in-house or financially-backed studies and legal maneuvering to avoid being found culpable.

How many lives could have been saved if regulatory authorities had acted sooner to educate the public about the health hazards of tobacco?

How many more people will die or suffer debilitating strokes or even blindness before the authorities address the issue of chiropractic neck manipulation?

Contact: Michael deChamplain Tel: 604-982-0929 Cell: 604-868-9565
email: Michael@faact.com

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