 |
In a recent newsletter, I announced the release of the long-awaited English translation of Dr. Hans Barop's neural therapy textbook. His first edition was published over 20 years ago, and had already become a standard in the German-speaking world. Dr Barop's updated second German edition came in 2015. We are therefore fortunate to have this first English edition in an up-to-date form. Dr Barop is held in high regard not just as a clinician, but also as an expert in neuroanatomy and neurophysiology. He is in high demand as a speaker internationally and was the lead speaker in the first North American neural therapy conference in Ottawa, last year. Currently Dr. Barop is president of the German neural therapy association. The book "Textbook and Atlas of Neural Therapy" is attractively bound and features the high-quality layout, printing and illustration that we have come to expect from Thieme. It is divided into four sections: (1) History and theory, (2) Practice, (3) Injection techniques and indications, and (4) Indications and therapy. Section (3) is by far the biggest part, at 134 pages of a 292 page book. However the section that interested me most was section 1,because of Dr. Barop's reputation as an anatomist and neurophysiologist. The classical neurophysiology on which so much of our understanding of neural therapy depends was well covered, but for me, the best part was Dr. Barop's explanation of the work of Ricker(1870-1948), about which I knew little. Ricker was a researcher of the sympathetic nervous system's control of microcirculation. His work demonstrated that the cellular pathology described by the mid‐19th century Virchow was the functional end-result of sympathetic nervous system disturbance.This is not news to modern neural therapists, but Ricker in these long‐ago experiments showed exactly how this takes place. Ricker described "Three Stage Laws":
Many of these pearls explain phenomena that we see every day in our practices. It should come as no surprise that Barop refers to Ricker's work frequently in his clinical material. Barop also brings us up-to-date in modern neuroanatomy and neurophysiology. Some more pearls: "...the pain of cholecystitis or gastritis is transmitted by the sympathetic nervous system, while malaise, nausea and vomiting proceed via the parasympathetic afferents." "...a significant proportion of interference fields can be found in the innervation area of the trigeminal and vagus nerves...and it is crucial to consider the full innervation of an interference field." He goes on to point out the connections between the trigeminal, facial, glossopharyngeal, accessory and vagus nerves as well and sensory and motor nerves in the upper neck. No wonder so many of these interference fields translate into neck pain, headaches, low back pain etc. I liked the way the book was laid out with clear delineation of sections and bolded "notes", many of them of clinical import. A quick reading of just these notes would be a profitable way of introducing oneself to the book. My one criticism of the book is the translation and editing. It is spotty, with some smooth and easy reading, but other areas translated in a cumbersome way with paragraph-long sentences and seemingly unending dependent clauses. There are also some words and terms ("switching" meaning synapsing) awkward to an English‐speaker's ear: "This is how the autonomic functional area regulates itself in pure autonomic connectivity. The purely autonomic self‐regulation is relativized where there are neural connections to the somatic nervous system." Perhaps I am not alone in finding this hard reading! Overall however, this an essential book for any neural therapist. It is beautifully laid out, is rich in scientific and clinical material, and comes from an experienced and reliable source. It is an expensive book ($184.99 US), but reasonable when considering its size, high quality, and numerous coloured illustrations. It serves as a textbook and as a manual, and therefore compares favourably with the older Dosch textbook ($168.09)and the companion injection manual ($123 ‐ $156? ‐ on amazon). Available at Thieme. ------------------- Letter: Great case Robert. I assume the energetic treatment first time with the tonsil was TENSCAM. If this is not available, would you inject with procaine? Brian Shamess MD Sault Ste. Marie Canada Hi Brian, Yes, of course, procaine is actually the gold standard for neural therapy and I would never say that energetic methods such as the Tenscam are better. I only mention the Tenscam in these newsletters because that is actually how I do it. As you know, I have been using it for many years and I am confident my results are just as good with the Tenscam as with procaine. However energetics are very much affected by the therapist and I know some who have been unable to get any results with the Tenscam. So the jury is still out about the Tenscam. I am hoping that as the years go by, others will surface with their experiences. The Tenscam does not lend itself to comparison studies because every case is different. Best wishes, Robert Thanks Robert When I use TENSCAM after any block, it magnifies the block effect quite a bit. I have to be careful with anaesthetic side effects due to this. Brian ------------------- New neural therapy-related research article: Resolving bulimia using neural therapy Gurevich M., Chung Mk, La Riccia P Trigger point injections for renal colic Iguchi M. et al The effectiveness of neural therapy in Bell's Palsy Yavuz F., Kelle B., Balaban B. (With thanks to Dr. David Vinje at http://terapianeural.com). ------------------- Sincerely, Robert F. Kidd, MD, CM |