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July 2004 Table of Contents
History: The Art of Palpation
As Taught by the Columbia College of Chiropractic
by Charles N. Cooper, DC
Dr. Charles Cooper graduated
from National Chiropractic College in 1955 and has been in practice for 40 years
in Baltimore, MD. He has written hundreds of chiropractic articles, essays and
opuses. Dr. Cooper has traveled the entire world and is presently writing his
seventh volume of a ten volume series, I Cast My Shadow on the Earth, Memoirs of
the World Travels of a Man of His Own Dimension.
Following are excerpts from a chapter from my book on the techniques of the
Columbia College of Chiropractic. The techniques were never placed into writing,
because Dr. Frank Dean feared, as he stated, usurpation and plagiarism by MDs,
PTs, Osteopaths and massage therapists. However, I wrote every technique in the
most definitive and minute detail that I could. I shall refine and publish
these, providing I live long enough. I feel that these Columbia College of
Chiropractic techniques and stories are important to Chiropractic History, and
without these, Dr. Frank Dean might be forgotten. The following concerns
palpation.
During my developmental, formative years and early youth, the sense of touch was
advertised by the art of reading Braille and the professions of safe cracking.
Early movies depicted the safecracker using a nail file over his fingertips in
order to increase and exaggerate his sense of touch in feeling the movements of
the tumblers in the safe’s locking mechanism.
When I entered the chiropractic profession at
the Columbia College of Chiropractic located in Baltimore, MD in 1952, technique
classes required the super development of the sense of touch in order to palpate
the spine, locate subluxations and the subsequent execution of a specific
adjustment. In order to develop the ultimate sensitivity of touch for spinal
palpation, many of the students would use a nail file to debride the skin on
their fingertips until they were at the point of bleeding in order to increase
their touch sensitivity. I thought the nail file debridement was ludicrous and
harmful in that the debrided skin would create blisters and be replaced by
callosities.
Two basic
palpation tests were given to the students. The first test was to palpate and
find a human hair under one page from a telephone book while blindfolded. The
telephone book pages were continually added until 10 pages cover the hair; and
only when you could find the hair under 10 pages did you pass the palpation
test. The second test was to find a specific used nickel (5 cent piece) that was
painted with nail polish from 19 other nickels while blindfolded. Nickels in the
1950s had an Indian head on one side and a buffalo on the other side and each
nickel palpated differently.
Since I played
the violin from the age of 4 and my father always forbade my from doing anything
that might injure by hands; including using any tools or saws and engaging in
most sports, my hands were perfect for the sensitive art of palpation used in
chiropractic.
The first day I
entered the Columbia College of Chiropractic and met it’s Dean, Dr. Frank Dean,
he welcome me and said, “Child (Dean called everyone child regardless of your
age or status) come over to me and let me see your hands”. Dean immediately took
my hands into his and turned them over and over again, again and again. I
observed that Dean’s hands were smaller than mine, very strong, warm and
extremely clean. His fingernails were well manicured and the skin on his hands
felt like crushed velvet. Continuing to hold my hands, Dean looked directly into
my eyes with his deep-set eyes and penetrating stare, slightly smiled and said,
“Child, you and your hands will make a fine chiropractor.”
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