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Almost a month has passed since thefirst International Neural therapy conference in North America(in Ottawa, May 11-13, 2017). Many observed it to have beenan historic event, very successful by any measure, and memorable for a number of reasons. The organizers of this event were a small group of Canadian and American physicians (Robert Banner MDof London, ON,Michael Gurevich MDof Glen Head, NY,Richard Nahas MDof Ottawa, ON, and myself) who felt that a neural therapy organization in North America is badly needed. It is needed becauseneural therapists are scattered across North Americawith varying levels of training and skill and virtually no contact with each other. In fact finding those who practice neural therapy has proven to be difficult. It was also felt that the best way to "tease out" neural therapists was to offer an international conference, featuring high quality speakers with name recognition. Sowe created a "wish list" of speakerswith the hope that if we were able to invite even a few, we would have a good conference. To our surprise,every single speaker on the list accepted,(with one exception: North America's own Dietrich Klinghardt who unfortunately had other commitments). However the list contained the contemporary giants of neural therapy: two authors of neural therapy textbooks, academics, teachers, presidents of national organizations and others who have contributed to neural therapy at an international level in many ways. As a result the conference program was a smorgasbord of subjects ranging from hard science to the art of physical diagnosis, and from medical philosophy to the nuts and bolts of clinical practice. To our surprise, the workshops were major attractions and were filled to capacity, with some registrants turned away.Clearly there is a hunger for good practical teaching in North America. The organizers' goal was that this should be an international conference of not only speakers but also registrants. It was therefore a source of great satisfaction that registrations came from as far away as New Zealand and Pakistan. 17 countries in all were represented. The conference began with a lecture byDr Hans Barop, author of one of the most respected neural therapy textbooks (currently undergoing translation into English), and president of the German neural therapy society. Dr Barop clearly loves anatomy and neurophysiology and has made it his mission to explore and integrate old (early 1900s) and new literature. His lecture was rich in new information, but for me a highlight was his spot-lighting of"functional and structural neuroplasticity" as a basis of chronic disease - and evidence that neural therapy can correct it. Dr Barop's colleague and friendLorenz Fischerfrom Switzerland followed with a lecture on neurophysiological and clinical research into neural therapy. Professor Fischer is a tireless teacher and researcher, who has through his own work persuaded the Swiss medical authorities to include neural therapy in the conventional medical armamentarium, i.e.Neural therapy is not considered to be "alternative" to standard medicine in Switzerland, but rather part of it.He has done this through some powerful clinical studies of his own and alsoby demonstrating the positive financial and patient-satisfaction profile of neural therapy as compared to standard treatments. Our next speaker wasDr Laura Pinillaof Colombia, an academic, a researcher and president of the Colombian Association of Neural Therapy. Dr Pinilla's research has included in-depthstudy of the great neuro-scientific themes of the 19th and 20th centuries.Rather than dismissing these ideas as archaic and now irrelevant, she has brought them forward andincorporated them into current concepts of non-linear neuro-physiology. This synthetic approach, as opposed to the analytic approach of most contemporary neuroscience, raises profound questions about our whole system of diagnosis. In Dr. Pinilla's view, neural therapy opens our eyes to"A new way of reasoning in medicine!"‐ a thought-provoking and stimulating lecture. The last lecturer of the first morning wasDr Mark McClure,of Washington D.C., a dentist and one of the most experienced neural therapists in North America. As a biological dentist, he emphasized the phenomenon of sites of inflammation, especially periodontal areas, to be"toxic dump sites"where mercury and other toxins tend to precipitate. Time and space do not allow further reporting in this newsletter of the many other conference speakers. I plan to cover them and the genesis of a North American association of neural therapy in future newsletters. Sincerely, Robert F. Kidd, MD, CM |