April 2002

Journal of Spinal Disorders to Publish

the Harrison Thoracic Model

By Deed E. Harrison, DC

After his undergraduate pre-chiropractic courses at the University of Utah, Dr. Deed Harrison graduated from Life-West in 1996. He is co-author of more than 50 peer-reviewed, indexed, research articles. These include 32 in JMPT, 3 in Chiropractic Technique, and 15 at major Index Medicus journals. He is a Reviewer for an Index Medicus Orthopaedic journal. He is a certified instructor for CBP® Seminars, has written three new CBP® text books, and is Vice-President of CBP® Nonprofit, Inc. He has a private practice in Elko, Nevada.

    In January, 2002, I received a letter from the editor of the Journal of Spinal Disorders informing us that our thoracic spinal model had been accepted for publication. This research paper is entitled “Can the Thoracic Kyphosis be Modeled with a Simple Geometric Shape? The Results of Circular and Elliptical Modeling in 80 Asymptomatic Subjects” and is authored by Deed E. Harrison, DC, Jadeusz J. Janik, PhD, Donald D. Harrison, PhD, DC, MSE, Rene Cailliet, MD, and Stacy F. Harmon, DC, MD. JSD just changed their name to Journal of Spinal Disorders and Techniques.

            Data for this research project was collected at Dr. Phil Paulk’s office in Stockbridge, Georgia. Eighty students from the Lfe University CBP® Club volunteered for lateral full spine radiographs at Dr. Paulk’s office. Dr. Deed Harrison, Dr. Don Harrison, and Dr. Tad Janik spent many hours digitizing these 80 full-spine radiographs.

            The Journal of Spinal Disorders and Techniques is one of the most prestigious orthopedic journal in the Index Medicus and we are very proud to have our “average” thoracic model published there. This makes our 3rd publication in that journal and we have another one in review there at present. This nearly finishes the Harrison full-spine model in the lateral view. Our lumbar spine model was published in 1998 in the Journal of Orthopedic Research, while our cervical spine model was published in SPINE in 1996.

            We are presently writing our ideal spinal model based on an ellipse with uniform vertebral to disc heights. After this project is finished, we will attach our three area models (cervical, thoracic, & lumbar) at the points of inflection (T1 and T12) by solving for slope, bending moments and shear. These two projects should be finished by the end of this year and will complete one of my father’s lifetime goals. He wanted to support and/or improve his old spinal model and get it published in the Index Medicus in order that practicing Chiropractors have references for normal spinal position.