November 17, 2006

The Best Wealth is Your Health

Chiropractic and the 1918 Influenza Epidemic

By Dr. Adam Fields, D.C.
Special to the Times

What? Chiropractic and the ‘flu? 

Is this some kind of quacking gobbledygook or is it an historical perspective worth exploring?

By the year 1930, there were over 30,000 jail sentences served by chiropractors for practicing medicine without a license. Picture chiropractors behind bars adjusting the prison guards while mad patients picketed with signs and shouts of “We want our doctor!” and “Save our doctor!” 

From its inception to present time, chiropractic has been a grass roots profession which has risen to the top through the hearts and minds of Americans getting well. One pivotal example where chiropractic made further ground into society politically and healthfully was the 1917-1918 influenza (flu) epidemics.

This epidemic shocked the world with an estimated 20 million deaths, including about 500,000 in our great United States. In less than three months, 400,000 American citizens had lost their lives. Life insurance companies paid death losses amounting to more than a hundred million dollars in 1918 money. The country had just come off of losing approximately 60,000 of our soldiers in World War I to the cause of freedom and was now getting pummeled with more death. 

It was believed that prophylactic science had made vast strides in the previous few years. The progress of the knowledge of bacteriology had been marvelous. Sanitation and hygiene had erected great barriers against the advancement of infection. Yet with these forces of enlightenment in full play, disease broke in, and in a brief time, did ten times the destruction of World War I. German bullets of the Great War were dribble on the Spaniards compared to the 1,200 a day who were dying of the ‘flu epidemic in Barcelona alone. Maybe it is our societal misadventures of the past that make us so panic-stricken when we hear of words like SARS, Avian Bird ‘flu or Anthrax.

Before you drop what you’re doing and board up your windows and bleach the floors, let me give you the beacon of light in this story: There were tireless chiropractors who knew their vision and began adjusting many of these over seven million who were sick in the U.S. Some were given authorization to write prescriptions for the duration of the epidemic by county health officers. Yet they did not write prescriptions but administered Chiropractic adjustments to the bones of the spine in an effort to boost immune system function.

The results: Patients of Medical Doctors were dying at a rate of approximately 1 in 15 while those of chiropractors were 1 in over 800. National figures show that 1,142 chiropractors treated 46,394 patients for influenza during 1918, with a loss of 54 patients, one out of every 886. State figures concur. In Oklahoma, 3,490 cases of influenza were treated by chiropractors with only seven deaths. In Oklahoma, there is clear record showing that chiropractors were called in 233 cases where medical doctors had cared for the patients, and finally gave them up as lost. The chiropractors saved all these lost cases but 25. 

Davenport, Iowa, medical doctors treated 93,590 patients with 6,116 deaths - a loss of one patient out of every 15. Chiropractors at the Palmer School of Chiropractic adjusted 1,635 cases with only one death. Outside Davenport, chiropractors in Iowa cared for 4,735 cases with only six deaths - one out of 866. 

The fabulous success of chiropractic in combating the 1917-1918 influenza outbreaks was a great public relations and legislative breakthrough that catapulted the profession to new heights. Out of the epidemic were borne chiropractors who had courage, background and conviction which helped them withstand all that would be thrown against them.

A comprehensive review of the literature shows our current understanding of anatomy:

The brain and the immune system are the two major adaptive systems of the body. During an immune response, like fighting of the flu, the brain and the immune system “talk to each other” and this process is essential for maintaining health.

There are two pathways that link the brain and the immune system. Neuroendocrine humoral outflow via the pituitary gland in the brain is one. The second is the autonomic nervous system via direct neural influence using the hard wiring of the brain, spinal cord and nerves. While not being a treatment for disease, Chiropractic helps the two supersystems of the body communicate with one another to aid in the efficiency of the body to fight disease.

In a world where we are faced with antibiotic resistant bacteria, and viral diseases where effective treatments are lacking, the role of chiropractic care in allowing for optimum immune system function deserves thorough exploration.

Dr. Adam B. Fields is a chiropractor in the Evergreen area at Fields Family Chiropractic, located at 2919 The Villages Parkway, San Jose, Ca 95135. He also has a satellite office in downtown Los Gatos.