History of Chiropractics (cont.)

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Patiently, Palmer managed to communicate with the man, and learned that he had normal hearing for most of his life. However, he had been over in a cramped, stooping position, and felt something "pop" in his back. When he stood up, he realized he couldn’t hear.

Palmer deduced that the two events -- the popping in his back and the deafness -- had to be connected.

He ran his hand carefully down Lillard’s spine and felt one of the vertebra was not in its normal position. "I reasoned that if that vertebra was replaced, the man's hearing should be restored," he wrote in his notes afterwards. "With this object in view, a half hour's talk persuaded Mr. Lillard to allow me to replace it. I racked it into position by using the spinous process as a lever, and soon the man could hear as before."

Over the succeeding months, other patients came to Palmer with every conceivable problem, including flu, sciatica, migraine headaches, stomach complaints, epilepsy and heart trouble.

D.D. Palmer found each of these conditions responded well to the adjustments which he was calling "hand treatments." Later he coined the term chiropractic -- from the Greek words, Chiro, meaning (hand) and practic, meaning (practice or operation).

He renamed his clinic the Palmer School & Infirmary of Chiropractic. In 1898, he accepted his first students.

Although he never used drugs, under Palmer's care fevers broke, pain ended, infections healed, vision improved, stomach disorders disappeared, and of course, hearing returned.

Often surprised at the effectiveness of his adjustments, D.D. Palmer returned to his studies of anatomy and physiology to learn more about the vital connection between the spine and one's health.

He realized spinal adjustments to correct vertebral misalignments, or subluxations, were eliminating the nerve interference causing the patients' complaints.

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"The Doctor of the Future Will Give No Medicine, But Will Interest His Patients in the Care of the Human Frame, in Diet, and in the Cause and Prevention of Disease."

-Thomas Edison-