My brother in-law finished his schooling for a natural healing practice called Naprapathy. It is similar to chiropractic, but the focus is on fixing the soft tissue problems that put the skeleton out of alignment. He has done work on me when I've hurt myself in the gym or dojo and it's amazing what a difference this healing form has on my compared to others I've tried. He also is licensed in and incorporates Tui Na Acupressure and Auricular Therapy. I just wanted to put a shout out for this little know healing form because I was amazed at how well it works, and I was very skeptical when he first started.
As I'm not part of the practice and just experienced it, I'll put the wikipedia description here, and a link to the Natinoal College of Naprapathic Medicine, then I'll try to describe what I experienced from my treatments I've had and other people I know have dad. Naprapathy (Czech náprava, correction - from napravit, to correct) is a branch of complementary medicine, a manipulative therapy that focuses on the evaluation and treatment of neuro-musculoskeletal conditions. History Naprapathy was founded in the early 1900s by Dr Oakley Smith, an early chiropractor. Naprapathy is a derivative of osteopathy and chiropractic which focuses on the spine and connective tissue. Naprapaths working with the spine emphasise the underlying ligaments. National College: http://napmed.edu/ Oh, and my brother in-law's website is http://www.adamsonnaturalremedies.com/ The way I understand it, chirpractors adjust the spine so it goes back in place, but if there are underlying problems causing the pain, the pain comes back eventually as the tissue pulls the spine out of whack again, so you go back and get adjusted again. Naprapathy works to fix the soft tissue problems through stretching and massage to fix the problems themselves, allowing the skeleton to go back to it's correct positioning. I hurt myself in the gym a couple times from lifting poorly, or rather, with poor form. I hurt my lower back once really bad to where I couldn't walk and just laying in bed hurt. It hurt so bad I was willing to tray just about anything. He did some treatments on me, including auricular therapy. That was neat because he used a type of stylus to stimulate points on my ear related to the injured parts of my back. I could feel a warm tingling sensation in my muscles of my back as he did this. I am a skeptic of many natural healing forms, so when I felt this happening I knew it wasn't phsycosematic since I was a skeptic. When he finished I could walk again, and was fully healed and back in the gym by the end of a week, after a second session. From what I was told, it could take 3 - 6 weeks for that type of injury to heal. He has also helped me with various pulled muscles. I've learned to lift properly now, lol. He also helped my sisters with carpal tunnel in the wrist from being a hair stylist, and with whiplash from a car accident. He did work on a family friend that is a veterinarian who had hurt his ribs, dislocated if I remember correctly, and he was freaking out during the auricular therapy part because he could feel the ribs being stimulated through the work on the ear. Hope I've made sense of this.
While my brother in-law is getting his practice up to supporting him and his family full time, he is also working as a massage therapist for extra income. He says there are many things that he isn't allowed to do as a massage therapist that are part of Naprapathy. As a Naprapathist, he is licensed for massage, but that is a lower art than what he does. Like, when I used to go to a chiropractor he would always have a massage therapist give a massage after a session, and sometimes when there wasn't a therapist the doctor would do it, and do a better job I always thought. But, if you pay for a massage, a chiropractor won't adjust you, or rather can't adjust you because that isn't what you paid for, it isn't the "agreement" for which you are there for. If he started treating people with Naprapathy he'd likely get in trouble if they came in for a massage. I'm sure there is a lot more to it. I wish he was answering your questions, he'd do better at it than me. Maybe I'll ask him to create an account and post here. I just wanted to make people aware of this new healing art because it is pretty cool and I had great experience with it.
Oakley Smith goes solo.. Naprapathy is an early offshhot of chiropractic founded by one of the Palmer's top students Oakley Smith. There were differences of opinion as to what the 'lesion' being treated was and he left to form his own profession. I have copies of a couple of his original text books. I think this profession is only practiced in Illinois and a couple Scandinavian countries. While its interesting to hear from someone who has experienced this profession I think they have the same problems that you see with any of the complementary professions - people often feel good with treatments but objective changes may not always be so obvious. LFD
following on from your comment.. Quotation from the Illinois Naprapathic Association website. ''The forgotten Dr. Smith cobbled together an entire system of health and illness, combining the Czech word naprapavit (to correct) and the Greek pathos (suffering) to produce a term that means “to correct the cause of suffering.” At chiropractic college years ago, he’d learned that all illness was caused by misalignment of the vertebrae, the bones in the spine. If you had chronic heart disease, for example, a misalignment of the vertebrae at the level of your heart blocked not only the blood and nerve pathways to the heart, but also your body’s own subtle energies. These are the same energies the Chinese call qi, Indian Ayurvedic physicians call prana, and a variety of US and European practitioners manipulate through Reiki and Healing Touch. Smith disagreed with the spinal misalignment theory (chiropractic history refers to this event as “Smith’s Schism”), believing the real source of chronic illness to be comparable blockages in the body’s soft tissues (muscles, fascia, ligaments, and tendons). A naprapath, or someone trained in myofascial release therapy, feels these blockages as chronic muscle contractions. They occur as a result of old but unhealed injury, psychological conflict, poor nutrition, or poor posture. I expect to receive some irritable comments from naprapaths with this comparison to myofascial release, but in both therapies the practitioner gently palpates connective tissue, feeling for areas that are contracted, rigid, and painful. Then, using a series of rhythmic manipulations, the contraction is stretched and released. Once the tension is cleared, there’s restoration of proper nerve and blood flow, healing energies travel without obstruction, and the body begins to function again. ... myofascial release therapists are usually specially trained massage therapists or physical therapists'' http://illinoisnaprapathicassociation.com/naprapathic-articles.html Naprapaths are a licensed profession in Illinoios, New Mexico and Sweden. Otherwise there is no legislation/registration in other localities to prevent someone from using the title. Vids of Naprapthic practice don't loook that different than chiropractic/osteopathic/manipulative practice. Hope that helps LFD
There was a napra in arkansas. People swore by him. It is a very gong fu sounding therapy, but I don't base all medicine on it. It does what it does better than barbarous therapies.
I am actually very glad to hear the word for this, I have been studying Chen stye Tai Chi for a good many years now and I started to notice the kinds of problems that Naprapathy is used to treat in my own body as I got a more acute of sensing the inner workings of my body. Since then, I have spent about 2 years working on my own misplaced pieces and parts, almost getting them all back into place. I notice that though this is thought as an undervalued kind of healing, since I have been trying it on myself I have also learned how to do this for other people, mapping out their body at a touch at finding what is out of position and correcting the problem. Often the muscles and soft tissues will get caught on the edges of bones or tendons as they try to move, usually moving due to us being in a constant bad posture/position that the body eventually comes to think of as our 'resting position' so it starts trying to move things to adjust to that position. Unfortunately, this makes it so that when you get up and do things, it feels terrible because they are no longer positioned for that. I think in our current world it is very important to address these issues as they are most caused due to our sedentary natures, so I was hoping to be able to become certified or whatever needs to be done in this field. Thank you for letting me know what it was called. Link removed.
