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January 2007, Vol. 17, No. 1
Table of Contents
• Are You Busy Selling Chiropractic or Correcting Subluxations
• BJ's House Needs Repairs • Another Look At Cell Phones
• Chiropractic R.I.P. • Colloca and CBP Nonprofit Study Wins Best Paper Award • Help Us Locate Allen Botnick • Letters to the Editor
• Michigan Chiropractic Society Sees Evidence of Growing Need For Chiropractic • Meeting With Success • A New Look At Mirror Image Exercise • Mourning The Loss Of Tony Keller • Past Present and Future In Chiropractic • Posture Study By UQTR Researchers and CBP® Published by JCO • PostureRay™, PosturePrint™ Helping Doctors Help Patients
• The Importance of A Clinically Relevant Presentation of Findings
• It's Pauls Opinion • Research Corner • Scoliosis: SpineCor Brace
• Triano and CCGPP's Will Give You Six Visits
• Clinical Indications for Videoflouroscopy
• Western States Chiropractic College Receives NIH Grant •
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Letters to the Editor
Dear Dr. Harrison :
I just read the front page article by Dr. Ferrantelli on the PostureRay. Its 50 years too late for me, but I wish I would have had such a device years ago.
After reading Dr. Joseph Ferrantelli’s AJCC article on the PostureRay last issue, I reflected and reminisced on the hundreds of courtroom testimonies, and the endless hours of courtroom preparation that I did for my testimonies, as well as the endless hours that I spent educating the patient’s attorney about chiropractic, providing the questions that the patient’s attorney should ask me, and how to protect me in my cross-examination, how to protect me with the judge and the jury. I thought to myself how easy my early courtroom chiropractic life would have been if there had been CBP® research, CBP® spinal models, PostureRay, and men such as Don, Deed Harrison, and Joe Ferrantelli.
After practicing chiropractic with my granduncle in NY from 1952-1955 as an unlicensed unidentifiable chiropractor (chiropractic was not licensed in NY at that time), I entered into chiropractic practice in Maryland in 1955. In Maryland, I took on the challenge of the Maryland Court system with my testimonies in automobile, workers’ compensation, and insurance cases. At that time, the majority of my testimonies were concentrated in and revolved around my education and its subject matter, my credentials, explanation of anatomy, and anatomy’s relationship to my x-ray interpretation. I could have used PostureRay back then!
It is of note that the judges, attorneys, and juries in those days had no knowledge of chiropractic, anatomy, or x-rays. With astute legal maneuvering, I had myself declared an expert witness and became the first Maryland DC expert witness.
At that time, there were no norms established in chiropractic (or medicine for that matter) for the normal sagittal curves of the cervical, thoracic, and lumbar spines, nor was there a normal for the sacral region. Juries did not know what a lordosis or a kyphosis was. Since I had no documentation like the Harrison CBP® spinal models and research, what I would declare as normal or abnormal was open to a debate by an educated clever attorney’s cross examination.
My education taught me that kyphosis was abnormal in the cervical and lumbar spines and lordosis was abnormal in the thoracic spine. Also I was taught that a scoliosis needs only to be a one degree lateral spinal deviation from vertical to be diagnosed as a scoliosis.
The opposing attorneys would use every means and methods at his/her disposal to challenge, negate, and discredit my testimony. Often they would cross-examine me for several days. The topics would include:
1. Not calling me a doctor and addressing me as mister;
2. Definitively and dialectically dissecting my education and clinical experience;
3. Questioning my x-ray techniques for table top and standing views, and my positioning of the patient;
4. Questioning my “hospital” and clinical experience in reading and interpreting an x-ray.
Soon I learned all the attorney tricks/traps and I worked hard to be able to name every muscle in the body, its origin & insertion, action, nerve supply, and blood supply. I spent a great deal of time preparing for every one of my courtroom appearances and was really an “expert” expert witness.
When the opposing attorney would use an orthopod or a radiologist’s report and testimony against me, I would simply respond with:
1. I am a chiropractor and give chiropractic testimony;
2. Chiropractic is not medicine and Maryland Law states that an MD cannot testify as to chiropractic matters;
3. I could only be supported or refuted by another DC.
Because of my reputation and expert status, there was not one Maryland Chiropractor who would oppose me. My testimonies became immune to any criticisms or refutation. I never lost a courtroom case and even the most premier orthopedists and neurologists did not want to become involved in a case treated by Charles N. Cooper. However, with PostureRay, I would have been able to reduce the thousands of hours that I spent in preparation.
Sincerely,
Charles N. Cooper, DC
First NY Chiropractic Licensee,
06-11-65
Maryland License 11-01-55
Drs. Harrison:
A letter from Dr. TN Campbell appeared In the October 2006 issue of AJCC. He proposed that financial benefits such as lower insurance premiums could reward people who invest in their own health by taking care of themselves, through optimal behavior and use of effective, less costly alternatives to drug therapy. I would like to add another aspect to the considerations. How many people do each of us know who have taken excellent care of themselves, who do not work in particularly toxic environments or live in slums, and who still develop cancers, including rare cancers?
For me, hearing this bad news about young people has become more common. Coupled with natural therapies, we also need to invest in the cleanest environment we can. We are in a cycle where synthetic chemicals address harm caused by the same. Providing incentives for personal responsibility will have to be integrated with broad changes in how we calculate profits, with systematic rehabilitation of toxic practices, and with support for sustainable economies. We need to find some means of instant gratification until the time when we share a deep conviction that broad changes will be successful, since the prospect of survival and a decent quality of life do not seem to be incentive enough.
Annette Osenga
Library Director
Life Chiropractic College West
25001 Industrial Boulevard
Hayward, CA 94545
Phone: 510-780-4599 ext. 2900
FAX: 510-780-4590
Drs. Harrison:
Thank you for all the work you have done to help me and others know the truth about Chiropractic. You have truly made a difference for us and our practice, but more importantly our patients. There is a list of testimonials on our website that would not be there if it had not been for your work.
Thank you,
Mike Wampfler, DC
Stockton, IL
www.pchiropractic.com
Dr. Wampfler:
Thank you for the compliments; they are appreciated. By the way, I read some of your patients’ testimonials and most of them were for your wife, Dr. DeeDee! Get some on the site for Mike! Also, I suggest that you two put your names under your photograph on your welcome page.
Sincerely,
Don Harrison, PhD, DC, MSE
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