We are thrilled to announce that we are now offering Neural Therapy! Below is a great article that was published on Practical Pain Management that outlines Neural Therapy, how it works, and its history!
Neural therapy is a powerful treatment that can be quite effective in resolving autonomic nervous system dysfunction and pain, especially in the complex pain patient. By Gerald R. Harris, DO Neural therapy is an injection treatment that stimulates healing. Developed in Europe in the early 1900s, neural therapy has continued to grow in use. It is an effective treatment for chronic pain, especially when practiced by a well-trained physician. Neural therapy is also a wonderful complementary procedure for use with prolotherapy, a treatment that stimulates healing of ligaments, tendons and joints. Gerald Harris, DO, has been practicing prolotherapy and neural therapy for almost 20 years. He is a leader in the field of neural therapy, having trained with world renowned Dietrich Klinghardt, MD, in the early 1990s. Dr. Harris’ quest to help his chronic pain patients led him to develop the Harris Method of Pain Treatment that integrates both neural therapy and prolotherapy to maximize patient results. In this article, Dr. Harris presents a thorough, organized and stimulating review of neural therapy history, concepts and practice. Donna Alderman, DO
Chronic pain is a major problem in our society not just because of its prevalence, but also because of the general lack of effective treatment for patients afflicted with chronic pain.
When I was in medical school learning how to treat these pain problems, diagnosis and treatment was reduced to an algorithm or “recipe.” I dutifully memorized these algorithms and when I began practice, applied them as I was taught. While I would go through the algorithm, unfortunately most of the time the patient would be only slightly improved, and sometimes they would even get worse! I began a long quest for more knowledge by attending numerous conferences, seminars and workshops that had to do with pain treatment.
One of the most effective treatments I encountered was a technique developed in Europe called “neural therapy.”
This treatment is designed to repair dysfunction of the autonomic nervous system—that part of the nervous system responsible for the “automatic” functions of the body. When used in conjunction with other techniques, such as prolotherapy, I have found neural therapy to be very effective in resolving even the worst cases of chronic, seemingly intractable, pain.
This article will discuss neural therapy, its history, background, technique and application. I will also discuss my protocol, the Harris Method of Pain Treatment, which provides a sequence for treatment of the chronic pain patient, along with case reports of typical patients treated.
The Autonomic Nervous System (ANS) To understand neural therapy, it is important to understand what the autonomic nervous system (ANS) is. Once outside the brain, the nervous system has two basic divisions: the somatic (voluntary) nervous system and the autonomic (involuntary) nervous system. The somatic or voluntary nervous system is the part most people are familiar with because it controls voluntary movements such as walking, talking and movement of limbs.
The autonomic (involuntary) nervous system, on the other hand, regulates internal body functions such as immune function, blood pressure and circulation, hormones, digestion, body temperature, heart rate, breathing, urination, sexual function, menstruation, and other automatic body functions. If the ANS is injured, these internal functions will not perform at optimum levels and ultimately lead to disease and chronic pain. History and Theory of Neural Therapy
Neural therapy is a gentle, healing technique developed in Germany that involves the injection of local anesthetics into autonomic nerve ganglia (grouping of nerves), peripheral nerves, scars, glands, acupuncture points, trigger points, and other tissues.1
Two German physicians practicing in the early 1900s, Ferdinand and Walter Huneke, are considered the founders of neural therapy.2
Neural therapy is one of the best-known natural healing methods in Germany where there are more than 5,000 practitioners. It is now also practiced in other countries in Europe and the United States.
Neural therapy is based on the theory that any trauma, infection, or surgery can damage the autonomic nervous system and produce long-standing disturbances in the electrochemical or electromagnetic functions of tissues.3
If there is a disturbance of the autonomic nervous system, the resulting dysfunction can last indefinitely unless repaired. When the autonomic nervous system is injured or not functioning correctly, various consequences result.
An example is blood flow going out of synch with demand in an area that needs it, such as a soft tissue injury, thus resulting in incomplete healing. It has been reported that “a correctly applied neural therapy injection can often instantly and permanently resolve chronic long-standing illness and chronic pain.”4
In my experience, it usually requires more than one treatment to reach this end. However, the phenomena of a “lightning reaction” (instant reaction) has been noted by researchers and physicians over the years.5
Development of Neural Therapy Neural therapy evolved and developed along with the discovery of local anesthetics. The first local anesthetic, cocaine, was discovered to have anesthetic effects by the famous Sigmund Freud. Dr. Freud shared his knowledge with his friend, ophthalmologist Koller, who was the first physician to perform eye surgery using a cocaine solution in 1884.6
Because of the addictive and toxic qualities of cocaine, a search for a safer local anesthetic ensued and resulted in the discovery of procaine (introduced under the trade name “Novocain”) in 1905 by Einhorn.7 In 1906, Spiess and Schleich discovered that infiltration of procaine into a wound greatly enhanced healing.
This extreme healing lasted much longer than the duration of action of the actual anesthesia.
The famous French surgeon, Leriche, was the first to successfully treat a migraine headache with a local anesthetic nerve block injection and who called Novocain (procaine) “the surgeon’s bloodless knife.”8 In 1925, the brothers Dr. Ferdinand and Walter Huneke—both sons and grandsons of physicians—discovered the healing aspects of procaine without any prior knowledge of the work of Spiess, Schleich or Leriche.
This occurred by accident when, in 1925, Ferdinand Huneke gave his nurse, whom he had been treating for rheumatism, an I.V. infusion of procaine and her previously therapy-resistant migraine disappeared.
This “lightning reaction” impressed Dr. Huneke who realized he may have found a new therapy for pain. He named this new therapy “Healing Anesthetics.” Ferdinand Huneke, along with his brother, Walter, first reported the results of their research into the healing properties of local anesthetics with the publication in 1928 of “Unknown Distant Effects of the Local Anesthesia.”9
The Hunekes reported that reaction to the injections could help organs at a distant site and described this phenomenon as a reflex. The publication of the book “Cybernetics” by Weiner in 1948 led to more clarification about neural therapy in that the main concept of that book is that the body functions as a whole and that every disease, every scar, and every treatment affects the whole body system.10
“It has been reported that ‘a correctly applied neural therapy injection can often instantly and permanently resolve chronic long-standing illness and chronic pain.’4 In my experience, it usually requires more than one treatment to reach this end.”
How Neural Therapy Works There are several theories on how and why neural therapy works. It can be understood better by a short review of nerve cell physiology.
Normal resting nerve cells have a “resting membrane potential” which is the difference between the electrical charges inside the cell and outside the cell. While at rest, a healthy nerve cell does not generate nerve impulses. In most neurons, this resting membrane potential has a value of approximately 70 mV.11 If there is a stimulus to the cell, the membrane resting potential drops. When it drops to approximately 45 mV there is an “action potential” generated12 and the nerve fires an impulse.
In a nerve cell damaged by surgery or trauma, the resting membrane potential is chronically low—for example, it may be at 47 or 50mV.13 This means the nerve will fire off a nerve impulse with much less of a stimulus.
While different theories exist as to the mechanism of action for local anesthetics, it is well known that these substances raise the resting membrane potential, making the nerve less likely to fire a nerve impulse even with more stimuli.14
In addition, studies with procaine have shown its ability to increase the refractory period (time interval between nerve firing).15 Kidd sums this up: “A pathological reduction (usually) or increase (less often) in membrane resting potential leads to a reduced threshold of excitation within the affected tissue.
The lower threshold creates chronic low-grade excitation, impaired intracellular metabolism and ion exchange, and persistent inability to maintain a normal resting potential, resulting in chronic neurophysiologic instability.”16
Since the half-life of local anesthetics is short, how does treatment with a local anesthetic affect long-term change? It is believed that by repeatedly infiltrating the local anesthetic around the cell wall, the ion pumps progressively resume normal activity and eventually the autonomic nervous system starts functioning properly again.
Treatment Agents Neural therapy is performed with local anesthetics, usually procaine or lidocaine, and occasionally carbocaine if allergy problems are encountered.
These anesthetics should never contain epinephrine. The standard solution I use for superficial infiltration (scars) is 1% procaine or 1% lidocaine with a small amount of sodium bicarbonate to buffer the PH and decrease the pain of the injection, although the sodium bicarbonate is optional.
Conditions Appropriate for Treatment With Neural Therapy Neural therapy is potentially useful for any type of musculoskeletal pain complaint, including low back pain or other chronic joint pain not responsive to other treatments.
Painful, sensitive or keloided scars are particularly responsive. Chronic pelvic pain is frequently responsive to neural therapy, as are dysmenorrhea and menstrual irregularities.
What are deemed “regional pain syndromes” are frequently secondary to autonomic dysfunction and amenable to treatment with neural therapy if initiated soon enough.
Trigeminal neuralgia can be effectively treated if combined with treatment of dental infections.
Raynaud’s also will frequently respond to neural therapy.
Jurgen Huneke, MD, nephew of Ferdinand and Walter Huneke, and president of the International Association for Neural Therapy, summarizes a list of conditions for which neural therapy is used:
acute and chronic pain (including headaches of different origins),
inflammatory responses,
poor circulation,
multiple chronic conditions, caused by interrupted interference fields (such as rheumatism),
diseases of the motor system (sciatica, arthritic joint conditions, shoulder or arm syndrome),
internal diseases such as prostate, female, allergies, kidney; and
sports injuries where it assists in healing.17
Types of Neural Therapy
There are three types of neural therapy treatment:
Segmental therapy. This involves intracutaneous injections of the cutaneous branches of the deep autonomic nervous system structures that are malfunctioning. These skin injections work by indirectly correcting the function of the deeper nerves. There are charts of the location of these cutaneous branches for many body organs so that the practitioner knows where to place these injections.
Injection of scars. Scars are often sites of dysfunctional nerve tissue. Direct injection of scars with local anesthetic is thought not only to help restore function of damaged nerve cells but has a secondary benefit of reducing the mechanical “pull” of the scar on other normal tissue. For example, a large scar on a patient’s sternum acquired from open-heart surgery may put unnatural tension on the thoracic spine, causing back pain. Injections into the scar soften it and reduce the pull.
Locating and treating “interference fields.”
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The article then goes into interference fields, ART, and several other concepts. Click Here for Full Article
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