Applied Kinesiology

It is amazing how much the body will tell you if you just know how to ask it questions. Enter AK.

What is AK?

Applied Kinesiology (AK) is a system of analysis which aids in the diagnostic process. AK provides a means for the physician to dialogue with the human body and its nervous system via muscle testing indicators. In most cases, the patient's symptom and the cause of those symptoms are quite different - one from another.

AK is especially helpful in difficult cases. It gives the doctor an important additional avenue down which to seek meaningful information about the patient's physiology and its functional status. The entire human body is a mass of circuits. Like the electrical circuits in one's home, there are circuit breakers which can be reset. Analogously, if all the power went out in one room in our home, without effecting the other rooms, we would think to check our fuse box, or circuit breakers first.

Every muscle in our body is tied to a certain acupuncture meridian, and has specific vitamins, minerals, and herbs associated with it. Total body reflex beds are found on the bottom of the feet, in each ear, along the spine, on the face, across the shoulders, under the back of the skull, and on the hands. Every bone in the body is functionally on a tract (circuit). Each emotion is directly tied to a specific organ or gland (as in: he was venting his spleen).

A fly on the wall in an AK treatment room would quickly notice a number of different things. The physician or physician's assistant would be touching the patient - to audit the body through muscle testing, as a means of assessment. In too many offices today, there is little or no physical contact between the doctor and the patient. This is unfortunate because so much information can be gained from the feel of the patient's skin, the underlying muscle tensions, and reflex beds. Special attention is paid to body language: the reading of static and dynamic posture. Next, the person doing the muscle testing would be variously positioning the patient's arms and legs and body parts, asking them to resist the operator's pushes.

By the strength and weakness of the various muscles, the body communicates to the attentive observer information about what works and what doesn't work. Muscles can be tested manually or by machine. Once the skill of manual muscle testing is developed to an artful level, more and more information is gained.

The Beginning of AK

In the 1960s, Dr. George Goodhart of Detroit, Michigan learned important information about the ways muscles work. Local "brains" within each muscle allowed for the resetting of specific muscle tonus. These Golgi Tendons and Spindle Cells can be adjusted. Nutrient relationships, once discovered, allowed the doctors to manipulate the body's chemistry without the use of harmful drugs and their side effects. All the knowledge of Chinese Medicine and meridian therapy was integrated into AK. It was found that the body pivots around the five element law and the Kreb's Cycle. One discovery lead to another. Now, almost magically, doctors can now quickly access all areas of the patient's reality: body, mind, emotions, and spirit via the body's muscle system.

Goodhart is a chiropractic physician. Word spread. And naturally, the first group of healers to become interested in AK would be doctors of chiropractic. Later, these sharpest of the chiropractors were joined by dentists, osteopaths, medical doctors, optometrists, psychologists, and others. Today, AK is practiced all around the world by individuals in just about every possible profession.

I.C.A.K.

The International College of Applied Kinesiology (ICAK) was formed to foster a proper research environment. The earliest AK doctors found themselves spontaneously making one discovery after another. This created many discovery-based research practices. The members of ICAK come together every year to share their research, and generally have a good time.

Why Chiropractors Use AK?

For years, doctors of chiropractic have been unhappy with the problem of redundant subluxations. They would adjust a bone back into place, and send the patient home - feeling as though they had done a really good thing for this person's health. Then, just a few days later, the patient would return to the clinic with the same bone out of place. The doctor would adjust it again. It would go out again. There was a poor economy to this. Yet, the relief was real for the patient. The thinking physician learned to ask why that bone went out of place.

Realizing that muscles position bones - to a large extent - lead these doctors of chiropractic beyond the bones. AK shows the chiropractic physician that (for example) when the hip goes out of place - that being a sacroiliac subluxation - the sartorius muscle is often not being as strong as it should be. The sartorius muscle is an anterior-hip-holder-downer-and forwarder muscle. And, if it is weak (hypotonic), it allows the hip to move posterior and inferior (out of place). This muscle is tied into the adrenal and pituitary glands.

According to Hans Selye, M.D., the adrenals are the first line of defense against stress (all kinds of stress). Looking at the above scenario, we find: 1). that stress caused an adrenal problem, 2). the adrenal problem caused the muscle problem, 3). the muscle problem caused the bone to go out of place, 4). The bone going out of place (becoming subluxated) caused the patient's pain, and 5). the pain caused the patient to seek help. Which is better, dear reader, to give a potentially harmful drug for the pain, or to address the stress and the adrenal weakness? Hans Selye's book: The Stress of Life is highly recommended.

Why Dentists Use AK?

Dr. Harold Gelb, in his book Killing Pain Without Prescriptions tells about his success with using AK to treat pain. And Dr. George Eversaul has made a large impact on dental profession through the world teaching AK.

Every tooth in the mouth is tied into a specific circuit. Have you ever wondered why a person got a cavity in "that" tooth, as opposed to a different one? This can be important when we talk about a root canal procedure, and whether or not it is successful. Often, a tooth that has had a wonderful root canal procedure done on it, will still flash pain signals - due to sparks coming from a gland or organ on its circuit. (Wait a minute. Is "a wonderful root canal" an oxymoron, or what?)

Why Psychologists Use AK?

A number of AK procedures have been developed which allow the practitioner to access deep levels of the patients emotional structure, and fixations therein. One of these techniques is explained in the book The 5 Minute Phobia Cure, written by an AK physician. Astoundingly, the simple resetting of a circuit in the patient's physiology can sometimes transform an extreme emotional problem into its disappearance. Granted, most cases are not quite that easy.

It seems as though all old stresses that get stuck in the patient are quite literally stuck in the flesh. This explains why practitioners of Rolfing, Alexander Technique, Structural Integration, and Receptor-Tonus work get such fine changes to the emotional fields with their work. To quote Ida Rolf, the founder of Rolfing: "we put our fingers into the flesh and we see spirit move."

Why Optometrists Use AK?

Dr. Harry Sirota discovered that a large percentage of people are wearing glasses that are stronger than they need to be. Have you - or someone you know - had the experience of having been put into a new pair of glasses, only to get a nasty headache? And then, to be told that the eyes just need to adapt to the new lenses.

He further discovered that this causes stress to be locked into the vision circuits. Often this causes the emotions to be locked, until the vision circuits are properly addressed. I "found" Harry via the profound effect he had on one of my patients. I've been a major fan of his ever since.

Dr. Sirota prescribes lenses for the nervous system, not for acuity. And, it is not uncommon for him to take patients out of their glasses all together. He uses AK technique as one of his methods of evaluating the patient.

Why Other Professionals Use AK

Practitioners are finding with AK they can help patients they've never been able to help before. And in most cases, get better results faster. The ability to dialogue with the patient's body is helpful.

Today

AK is taught in a number of Chiropractic Colleges. According to a recent survey, about 63% of chiropractic physicians use some form of AK, making us the heaviest user of this science. Thanks to the likes of ICAK heavyweight Dr. Evan Mladenoff, many college and professional sports teams - including important NFL teams - have discovered the benefits of having an AK doctor at hand. AK is becoming widely recognized in sports medicine.

AK has become the common denominator in "alternative" health care. Doctors of Chiropractic with an holistic and eclectic frame of mind have discovered that, as a technique, it allows for the easy integration of all other techniques. In AK, it is not uncommon to find a chiropractic physician utilizing vitamins, herbs, acupuncture (meridian therapy), minerals, flower remedies, color, microcurrent stimulation, aroma therapy, homeopathy, exercise, colonic therapy, mental exercises, diet and lifestyle modification, muscle reeducation, and more.

The other professions are paying attention to AK, too. They're just not being as fast on the uptake, with much smaller percentages of their members using AK.

The American public likes AK. About 50% of the out of pocket dollars being spent on health care in America today are being spent on "alternative" health care. Chiropractic physicians have lead the world into the most effective and creative "alternatives" available today. AK has lead the way.

Today's Health Care Dilemma

In our present environment where the HMOs and PPOs rein supreme, the patient's needs come last, all too often. A patient's progress on the road towards health has traditionally been handled by the relationship structure between doctor and patient. Managed Care, by design, damages the doctor/patient relationship. And what is worse, the bean counters are the primary decision makers who select which patient gets the extra tests or treatments needed, versus the patients who must do without. It's becoming a kind of economic triage, where the lucky patient gets what's best - while the less fortunate others do without. What good can come from a system where all the not-for-profit hospitals are being bought up by for-profit groups?

Is it any wonder that in the summer of 1997 a troubling trend surfaced concerning Managed Care membership rolls. It was found that a good number of Medicare patients would readily sign up for the HMO type plan. But that after they got sick, for some reason, they were leaving The Plan. Pray tell, what could the reason be?

A Time of Conflicting Trends

On the one hand today, a great number of Americans are now selecting "alternative" health care as their provider mechanism of choice. While on the other hand, employer are climbing on the Managed Care bus almost a quickly as they can make the arrangements to do so. And, few in Managed Care include anything more than vague lip-service regarding "alternative" approaches to patient care.

Sadly, this leaves the individual on the short end of both sticks. They now have to choose between paying themselves for the highly effective natural choices offered by "alternative" therapies, or they go along with the Managed Care program. I think it was P.T. Barnum who once said that the best way to get a person to go in an unpleasant direction is to give them two less than pleasant choices.

Tomorrow Via Research

According to Anita Green of The National Institutes of Health, (NIH) Office of Alternative Medicine, AK has not made its way onto their radar screen, as yet. However, rumors abound within the AK community about impending attention from NIH. Stay tuned to this channel for further updates.

ICAK star, Dr. Rene' Espy, has developed the mapping of the microcurrent frequencies for every bone and muscle in the human body. In the future, we will be looking at adjusting the bones of the body and resetting muscle tonus by utilizing a machine to put the proper hertz into the proper circuit.

In seminar, I watched her treat a man who had been suffering with a frozen eye for many years. One eye looked around and moved just fine; the other looked to be dead, stuck straight ahead. She put a minute yet specific frequency into a certain point for two minutes. He then got up and walked around. The difference being that both eyes now tracked perfectly together. This was an astounding display of skill!

There are many AK physicians around the world conducting research today. The gains being made each year that add meaningfully to the collective pool of knowledge are almost more than one can keep up with.

Summary

In today's health care world, there are two parallel realities. One is the insurance company arena of the HMOs and PPOs, with non-physician types determining how much may be spent and what a doctor may or may not do for the patient in need. The other arena is peopled be those of us who choose to put the patient's needs first. AK is a healthy alternative, and a boon for the patient. America was built upon freedom of choice. And this freedom, like all others, works best when well-exercised.