A White Paper
Cause of Disease: A New Perspective
By Richard
Barwell, DC
Abstract
Brain function Research in the last 15 years has lead
to a major shift in the understanding of the relationship between health
and disease. All health professions are now looking at the role of stress,
meaning neurological response and recovery, as the foundation of illness
and health.
The medical "Germ Theory" and the chiropractic theory
of "Vertebral Subluxation" are no longer valid. These two theories
represent the observation of signs and symptoms and do not address the
true "cause" of illness. While both medical and chiropractic research no
longer support these old concepts, the practitioners in the field will be
slow to change. Old habits die hard!
In the 1980s medicine finally recognized that there
was a direct connection between the immune system and the nervous system.
Research has now established the connection between brain function and all
disease, including cancer and autoimmune disorders as well as recovery
ability. Much of the credit for the application of this knowledge must go
to the neuro/biofeedback research done by psychologists.
The most important news is that inexpensive
computerized technology, called "NeuroInfiniti", can now bring this
current research into health practices around the world. A simple 30
minute non evasive test can not only determine neurological imbalance but
further, the "NeuroInfiniti" can empower the patient to reestablish normal
neurological function and health.
Key Words -- stress, neurological response, recovery,
neuro/biofeedback, research, NeuroInfiniti, health, illness.
Latest research reveals
stress factors
outweigh germs as cause of disease
For decades, billions of
research dollars have been poured into the study of bacteria and viruses
as the cause of ill health and disease. The results have produced more
medicines and treatments, but with failing results! We now have more
listed diseases and so many drugs that no one can keep track. It seems
that everyone over 50 is on some level of drug care with the general
concept being this is normal. IT ISN'T. What is going on? There has to be
a better way.
The 1990s were known as
the decade of the brain. During these ten years more knowledge was
gathered about the brain and its function than had been known in all the
previous years. Now, in this decade, the focus is on "consciousness" and
again, the research shows that the role the nervous system plays in our
ability to be healthy has changed the concepts of health and disease.
Why don't you know about
this? The answer is simple: it doesn't involve the sale of drugs and has
created a major dilemma for the medical profession. The medical profession
has become so invested in drug based therapy that is virtually impossible
for them to shift to a new understanding.
This is not the case for
most researchers as their attitude is, "The truth shall set you free".
Over the last 40 years there has been a group of PhDs working on bio and
neuro feedback with fantastic results. These researchers have created a
way to objectively measure changes in nervous system function and the
resulting effects on people's health.
When we look at both
research groups (the neuroscience and the biofeedback) a completely new
understanding of the cause of disease and illness takes shape.
In 1977 Dr. John
Knowles, President of the Rockefeller Foundation wrote in DAEDALUS,
(Winter, 1977): "80% of serious illnesses seem to develop when the
individual feels helpless or hopeless"… "over 99 percent of us are born
healthy and made sick as a result of human misbehavior"
In 2000 a paper produced
by the National Institute of Health (NIH) stated:
"But in the last
decade, scientists like Dr. Esther Sternberg, director of the Integrative
Neural Immune Program at NIH's National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH),
have been rediscovering the links between the brain and the immune
system."
It has now become obvious
that when it comes to disease, in either prevention of, or creation of,
the relationship between the nervous system and the immune system is the
key factor and not viruses and/or bacteria. The billions or trillions
spent on disease, such as cancer, research has only produced limited
results with the primary benefit being early detection.
It is time for this new
perspective to become the foundation for not only further research, but
more importantly, patient care! Over the last ten years there has been
much talk about the need for evidence based care. This term has become the
buzz word in all health professions and has taken on the power of becoming
a method of evaluating the quality of patient care. While this is an
important concept, what has been missed with evidence based care is the
true need of establishing "caused based care".
Historical Foundation
for Care
The statement of "caused
based care" begs the question of, "What is Cause?" When we look at
traditional approaches in health care we find that they are based on signs
and symptoms to form a diagnosis. Once a diagnosis (disease name) has been
established, then the treatment is applied. This approach is reflected in
current medical practice: patient complaints (symptoms), then various
tests (signs), which lead to a drug or procedure indicated as the
treatment for this pattern (disease). We have come to accept this as
typical practice, and over time it has become the standard by which all
care is measured. This is the foundation of the "evidence based care"
mentioned earlier.
However, what we actually
have is "symptom based care" not "cause" based. As research continues to
produce a greater understanding of the role of the stress response as it
relates to the cause of disease, health professions around the world are
being forced to revisit their approaches to patient care.
Today we know that today
we have research which connects the nervous system with the immune system,
but this is a relatively new discovery. It wasn't until the 1980s that
medical research finally found these two systems directly connected. Until
then, the position was that they were two completely different and
separate systems. The importance of this point is that until we understood
the relationship between the nervous system and the immune system, there
was no foundation to establish "cause" beyond signs and symptoms.
The Role of the Nervous
System
An anatomy textbook, by
Lockhart, Hamilton and Fyfe, describes the nervous system this way: "Even
in the smallest community of men the activities of different individuals
must be coordinated by some central authority for the common good --
nature has solved the same problem by creating a controlling system."
This controlling system
(the nervous system) receives information from the environment, both
external and internal, sends it to the brain (the central organizing
authority) and then the brain sends signals out to the systems of the body
to create an appropriate response. We now know that this includes the
immune system, whose responsibility is to protect us from outside
influences such as bacteria and viruses.
The nervous system has
several divisions. It has a sensory division, whose job is to relay
information into the brain; and a motor division, which carries action
information to the muscles. There is another division, the autonomic
nervous system, takes care of the subconscious needs such as heart rate,
respiratory rate, temperature, skin moisture, muscle tone, digestion,
excretion and many other factors.
About 84% of brain
activity is dedicated to just keeping the body running without us ever
being aware of the activities. The immune system depends upon the nervous
system information to keep us healthy. As the body is considered to be a
closed loop system, meaning that all the systems have an influence on one
another, it requires a level of balance or harmony to function correctly.
Any factor that upsets the controlling system will create
disturbances in the other systems, including the immune response.
The Role of the Immune
System
The immune system is our
"On Guard 24/7" system. It never sleeps and responds to any injury. It
does not have to wait for injury to happen and will even be "kicked" into
action as a result of a perceived threat. The nervous system creates
special hormones such as adrenalin and cortisol to stimulate the immune
and other systems into action. These threats are called "stressors" and
may be as serious as a severe wound all the way down to a merely perceived
(may not be real) threat.
The first level of
response to a stress (perceived or real) lies within the nervous system
and the immune response is the first to answer the call. There are several
levels of activity initiated including: increases in heart rate,
respiration rate, blood pressure, sweat gland activity, muscle tone, and
platelet production; deceased hand and feet temperature; and changes in
brain wave activity. In fact, there are many other factors involved
including the release of hormones such as glucagons (pancreas
stimulating), glucocorticoids (steroids), and prolactin (pituitary -
reproduction suppression). The latest research and books being published
on the effects of "stressors" and "stress response" clearly explain the
connection between neurological function, immune system involvement and
health patterns. I recommend
Why
Zebras Don't Get Ulcers: an updated guide to stress,
stress-related diseases and coping, by Robert M. Sapolsky.
According to researchers at Duke University,
as a result of the stress/inflammation link, stress hormones
stimulate the immune system to release of inflammatory chemicals. This
stress response is now the primary factor in
arteriole plaque formation - so neurological stress responses play a much
bigger factor in cardiovascular health than diet.
The reason for the
plaguing is because of the release of sticky platelets (clotting factor)
due to the perception of danger (possible bleed injury) during a stress
response. Some very revealing work on this was released in an article
titled: "Beyond Cholesterol" by Judith Mandelbaum-Schmid in
"Body and Soul" magazine, July/August 2004.
The Role of Stress Reponses
Stress is a fact of life! Stressors in moderation
are, in reality, good for our systems! Even exercise is a stressor, yet
without it muscle tone deceases and we lose power and mobility. Gravity
helps our bones retain their strength. Our nervous system has developed a
variety of responses to stressors that will provide a better ability to
survive environmental challenges. These challenges can range from a
perceived threat to an outright life threatening event. Even a
subconscious concept of a threat will be registered and the
neurophysiology will act accordingly. An example: if an adult was attacked
as a child by a dog and later on in life see a dog similar to the one that
attacked, the subconscious mind will trigger a stressful fear response.
This will happen even though the adult knows they are safe from an attack,
because the subconscious will remember the danger and there will be
changes in the neurophysiology of the body.
Here is the catch -- it is not so much a matter of
stressors or the stress response being the culprits here, but rather it's
your ability to recover from the experience that matters. The ideal goal
is for your body to regain a normal balance within your neurological
function. Blood pressure must return to ideal, hand temperature warms up,
heart rate slows down, and respiration becomes slow and regular.
Internally the stress response chemicals such as cortisol and adrenalin
return to normal levels. Insulin and blood sugar levels return to normal.
If this does not happen, then we have a problem and systems will start to
breakdown because they are not designed to maintain a constant stress
response activity level. If the body remains in the stress response state
(even at a low level) over time there is a price to be paid. Remember the
role of the immune system and its relationship to the nervous system? A
prolonged level of a stress response state shuts down the immune response!
In the past 20 years, the field of
psychoneuroimmunology has demonstrated major connections between the
stress pathways and the immune system. They are interactive two way
connections between the nervous system, the endocrine system, and the
immune system. These stress pathways include: the Hypothalmo-pituitary-medulla
(HPA) Axis; the Sympathetic-Adrenal-Medulla (SNS) Axis and the Vagus Nerve
(PNS).
The pathways have a direct and powerful effect on the
immune system. The immune system has an innate or natural immune response
(genetic patterns) and an adaptive immune response (experienced).
Components of the Innate Immune system:
- Anatomical Barriers
(mucous membrane)
- Lymphatic system
-
Phagocytosis
-
Inflammation (Mast cells)
Natural
Killer Cells:
Neutraphils
Monocytes
Molecules:
Complement proteins
Acute phase proteins
Cytokines
The Immune Adaptive Group
The adaptive group involves the formation of immune
cells produced by cytokines (interleukins, interferons)
called T Helper cells, named Th1 and Th2. Maintaining a
balance between TH1 and TH2 is optimal for good
immune system function. The critical information about this balance
is that in a time of stress response there is a
shift of cytokines away from the Th1 cells (which involve cellular
immunity) and toward the production of Th2 cells (which involve "humoral"
immunity or Antibody production) as well as decreasing the production of
the innate factors of the immune response.
What this means is that
our stress response recovery patterns are critical to understanding why
our immune system is not functioning correctly. A decease in cellular
protection (Th1) leads to the formation of cellular breakdown and
mutations (such as cancer) while an increase of humoral immunity (Th2)
leads to increased sensitivities to chemical agents.
As we now look at our high
stress life styles we can begin to understand the exponential increase in
cancers, hyper-sensitivities to nuts, other foods or chemicals and the
exponential growth of autoimmune system diseases.
The research on the brain
and it function continues to reveal a new understanding of the cause of
disease and illness.
As we now have an
explanation of the role of the brain and the nervous system in
relationship to immune system activity, any brain injury will have serious
direct effect on the state of health for the individual. Meisel et al.,
Nature Rev. Neurosci. 6:775-786, 2005
We tend to view the term
"brain injury" as a massive trauma, but with the above information we need
to rethink the term. Any level of altered brain activity (abnormal
pattern) is in fact a brain injury. The only difference is that the low
level abnormal pattern is covert (unnoticed) in nature but has the same
outcome over time. It will interfere with the immune system and create the
shift to the right in Cytokine production (the Th1-Th2 relationship). When
you add the altered brain function and the distorted messages being sent
to the other body systems, we can begin to see how this new perspective on
the cause of disease is rapidly gaining acceptance throughout the health
professions.
We are now beginning to
see articles and papers on the effects of stress on every aspect of heath
concerns. Dentists are talking about the effects of stress on teeth and
decay. Prestigious medical schools such as: Stanford, Yale, Harvard,
Duke, Johns Hopkins and Northwestern
have recently published
research that is changing the way in
which doctors will treat pain
or dysfunction. Chronic pain
and dysfunction are now also seen as disorders of the
brain and nerve system, not just the
spine, joints or muscles. The
research also states that the best treatments are the least invasive,
don't involve surgery, and address both
the injured spine, joints, or muscles
AND also address the painful or
disruptive nerve signals in the brain
Missing the Rug
So now that the rug has
been pulled out from under the "germ theory" as the cause of disease,
where does this leave us in the health care field? All you have to do is
go online and do a search for "stress and disease" and you will see that
this field is ever expanding. The new understanding of the relationship
between stress and disease is changing every form of health care. What we
need now is a method of stress response measurement. With objective
measurements of the neurophysiological response and recovery during and
after a stressful experience, we will have a great deal of valuable
information regarding the state of a patient's health. The challenge
therein is that we are dealing with a dynamic being, always sensing and
adapting. This means that any type of static examination such as x-ray,
static para-spinal scanning including sEMG and thermal, postural, or even
blood testing only presents information on that patient as a moment in
time. It is rather like looking at a small part of a Salvador Dali
painting and thinking that you have seen the entire picture. (If you have
never done this you owe yourself the experience - The Dalí Museum - 1000
Third Street S., St. Petersburg, FL 33701)
We now have certified
methods of stress response measurement. Instrumentation such as the
NeuroInfiniti ™ now offers the ability to present printed reports the
providing cortical activity (Via EEG) as well as neurophysiological
responses to both stressors and recovery. It is now possible to see the
abnormal cortical activity and the effect it has on the other base systems
of the body, before signs and symptoms appear. Heart Rate Variability (HRV)
, an analysis program developed by the cardiologists of America and
Europe, represents then application of this new approach and has the
ability to reveal damaging heart activity even before the abnormal blood
chemistry shows up.
Knowledge has the power to
change the world in which we live. Knowledge has lengthened our life span
and reduced the level of sickness and disease. It has provided us with
increased comfort and free time. Knowledge continues to create the
opportunity to change and grow but is not always welcomed with open arms.
This holds true within the health profession and yet we now stand on the
greatest breakthrough in the knowledge of the cause of disease in the
history of mankind. Many unanswered questions of the past including the
great mystery of "spontaneous remission" of serious diseases can now be
explained and understood; however, it requires letting go of concepts such
as the "germ theory" on the part of Medicine or the "nerve root
compression theory" in chiropractic.
Letting go of these
theories does not detract from a profession while applying the newly
revealed workings of the human body has the power to advance our ability
to live healthier and happier lives.
This information is not
only a call to health professionals to stop and consider the power of this
new information on their practices, but it is also to the public, so that
they can recognize that they too play a major role in the gathering of new
knowledge to guide their health actions. With this in mind I leave you
with this quote.
Innovators are seldom
received with joy. For every crossroads of the future there are a thousand
self- appointed guardians of the past. -- Dr. Allan Beer M.D. Fertility
Expert
For information on the
NeuroInfiniti go to
www.NeuroInfiniti.com or call 1 877 233 0022
