You've heard it before, I'll say it again, children are our future. Therefore, it is fitting that I address the issue of children and chiropractic.

Fitting for a number of reasons.

This year we are celebrating chiropractic's Centennial. For the last 100 years chiropractors have been delivering their science and art to humanity, usually with mixed reactions on all fronts.

The medical community says chiropractors have no right to treat children. There are those in our own profession who take up the banner of criticism because some chiropractors say they can help any and all conditions, for numerous reasons.

It is really interesting to me to observe the nonsense and hoopla when it is a fact that chiropractors have been adjusting patients for 100 years. During those years, chiropractors have systematically been attacked, jailed and maligned for their treatment philosophy, science and art.

Also during those 100 years, chiropractic has seen an ever-larger patient base year after year. Chiropractors have seen back injuries, in young and old; diseased people, young and old; and still chiropractic has continued to grow.

The fact is chiropractic works and children are people who have spines. Due to the amount of trauma they are subjected to from falls, etc., they certainly need what we do. There are some sources that say 50% of all children have a major fall from their changing area or bed by age three. By age six, the average child has experienced over 1,000 bumps, falls and traumas. So what do you think? Maybe we should adjust them. Maybe they could grow with less malady, pain, insanity.

I have children and you'd better believe they get good chiropractic care. But, I know what you're saying. I can feel some of you thinking and figuring and thinking and figuring. So what if chiropractic has been here for 100 years, where is the scientific proof?

Okay, here they are -- drink them in -- the FACTS about chiropractic care for children:

*** The government inquiry that investigated chiropractic management of children most thoroughly in New Zealand agreed that children with a wide variety of disorders responded successfully to chiropractic treatment.

*** The Commission concluded that children should be viewed as a special population for chiropractic care and that government funding of chiropractic services should be at a substantially higher level for children than adults.

*** For every one child who needs and gets tubes for the ears, about 20 others who don't need them also get them. They almost always cause permanent scars on the eardrum and could impair hearing decades later -- Jack Paradise, University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine

*** A study involving children under both medical and chiropractic care found that the children under chiropractic care had significantly fewer ear infections than children under medical care -- 80% reported occurrence for medical patients, 31% for chiropractic patients. Children under chiropractic care were also found to be less susceptible to tonsillitis. They used fewer antibiotics, and other medications and had fewer allergies than "medical" children.

"Infantile colic" is a term used to describe persistent, often violent crying for no apparent reason in otherwise healthy and thriving young infants. The distressed behavior is believed to be a reaction to pain.[1] It is different from normal crying because distress does not stop when the infant's physiological needs are met.

Colic begins at one-to-four weeks of age and usually ends spontaneously at three-to-four months of age. In the meantime, especially in moderate to severe cases which may involve uncontrollable crying for many hours day and night, every day, it is destructive to both infant and family and is a cause of parental violence to infants.[2,3]

Clinical experience of good results has now been confirmed in a multi-center prospective study by Klougart D.C., Nilsson D.C., MD et al.

The study population was 316 infants with moderate-to-severe colic, an average 5.2 hours of persistent crying per day.

Criteria to be met for entry into the study included: weight gain of at least 150 grams per week; behavior during colic including motoric unrest, frequent flexing of the knees towards the abdomen and/or backward bending of the head and trunk; presence upon chiropractic examination of spinal functional disturbance; during colic inability to be comforted by various normal means, including cradling, change of diaper, of food or other comfort. 253 of 569 failed to meet the entry criteria, i.e., precise diagnosis was important.

Treatment comprised spinal manual therapy to correct joint dysfunction/subluxation, but actual technique was left to the discretion of each individual chiropractor. As the investigators report, chiropractic treatment of infants follows the same principals as for adults, but with important modifications.

Force is greatly decreased, the contact is usually one finger alone, and the adjustive thrust (if performed at all) is very modest. The manipulative "crack" from the release of gas within the joint which usually marks the joint manipulation of adults is very rarely, if ever, heard. Treatment is no more trouble to the infant than basic physical examination.

Findings were as follows.

*** Infants had a median age of two weeks at commencement of colic, a median age of 5.7 weeks at beginning of treatment.

*** Prior to treatment the average time with colic was 5.2 hours per day, average number of episodes 2.5 per day. There was dramatic reduction in hours of colic occurring on the first day of treatment -- reduced by more than half to 2.5 hours. There was then a pattern of continuous reduction to an average of 0.65 hours per day on day 14. Average colic episodes per day were 2.5 at outset, 1.3 after one week, and 0.9 after two weeks.

*** At two weeks, following an average number of three treatments, there was a success rate of 94% (colic stopped 60%, improved 34%). Of the balance of six percent, there was no significant change in four percent, and two percent were worse. On assessment at four weeks improvement was maintained. A brief time span of 14 days was chosen so that the influence of spontaneous resolution of colic symptoms could properly be disregarded. (Average age of the infants at two-week assessment in the study was only 7.7 weeks). There was a dramatic then consistent correlation between course of treatment and recovery.

The researchers conclude that "standard chiropractic treatment constitutes an effective treatment of infantile colic."[4]

The previous two studies are by chiropractors. Lewit, a neurologist who practices manual medicine, writes at length about "vertebrovisceral correlations" in his recent text and describes a study performed by him after he had been "struck by the high incidence of chronic relapsing tonsillitis" amongst children he had examined for spinal disturbances.

The study comprised 76 children with chronic tonsillitis under the care of a throat specialist for whom "the most striking and constant clinical finding was movement restriction at the craniocervical junction," i.e., in the top few cervical vertebrae beneath the skull. "70 to 76 children had dysfunction between the occiput and atlas."

Twenty-five of the children with upper cervical dysfunction had their tonsils removed by operation. Nineteen of these (76%) still suffered from movement restriction, which was later treated by manipulation (in these cases spinal dysfunction persisted after the tonsils were gone).

Thirty-seven children were given manipulation, with results reviewed or followed up for five years. Of these 25 (67.6%) were cured of tonsillitis -- with 18 there were no future problems at all, with seven a relapse of movement restriction that required a later short course of manipulation.

Lewit concludes from his study: "...tonsillitis goes hand in hand with movement restriction in the craniocervical junction...with little tendency to spontaneously recover (and) with the danger of permanently disturbed function in one of the most sensitive regions of the locomotor system. Our experience suggests that blockage at this level increases the susceptibility to recurrent tonsillitis."[5]

Now, let's say: "Moms and dads, bring in your children. Let's check their spines!"

1. Promote children days.

2. Offer family plans.

3. Do the consultation with both the child and parent. Tell the child that you'll ask him or her some questions, and mom and dad some questions.

4. Get physically down to the level of the child.

5. When going from room to room with the child, hold his or her hand.

6. On the exam, be sure to tell the child there will be no pain.

7. Have a doll to show how you may use an instrument first, then the child's turn.

8. Explain everything thoroughly, being sure to point out what you find.

9. For the adjustment, show the child what it feels like on another part of the body.

10. Make it a game.

Kids are our future and deserve all our best. So get out there, and start making our future brighter!

References

1. Illingworth RS (1985) "Infantile Colic Revisited," Arch Dis Child 60:981-985.

2. Caffey J (1972) "On the Theory and Practice of Shaking Infants," AM J Dis Child 124:161-69.

3. Frodi AM (1981) "Contribution of Infant Characteristics to Child Abuse," AM J Ment Defic 85:341-49

4. Klougart N, Nilsson N and Jackbsen J (1989) "Infantile Colic Treated by Chiropractors A Prospective Study of 316 Cases," J. Manipulative Physiol Ther, 12:281-288.

5. Lewit K (1991) "Manipulative Therapy and Rehabilitation of the Locomotor System," Second Edition, Butterworth-heineman, Oxford 259.