Over the past 21 years I have seen hundreds of autistic children benefit from adding chiropractic care to their health care routine. I have witnessed the miracles of speech, movement, and smiles that come from a child functioning at a higher level after nerve interference is corrected. Your spine is the conduit that connects your brain to your body. Any misalignment of that conduit disrupts that connection and reduces overall body function. We all know this when it’s an extreme case of the spine fracturing and paralyzation resulting. Subtle, longstanding misalignment affect function as well and can lead to devastating health issues. Autistic children can’t afford even the slightest disruption in nerve function, and when found and corrected, miracles happen!
Please read and share the following studies that shove how chiropractic care changes lives! As always, Be Well!
Two separate papers published in two scientific journals hold hope for children with autism through chiropractic care. One paper published in the March 2006 issue of Clinical Chiropractic reviews past studies on chiropractic and Autism. This paper recounts in clinical studies where children with autism are helped with chiropractic care. Most of the studies reviewed speak of problems in the upper cervical (neck) spine.
In addition to the Clinical Chiropractic paper, a study published in the March 9, 2006 Journal of Vertebral Subluxation (JVSR) compares two groups of children with autism and their response under chiropractic care. In this study 14 children diagnosed with autism were studied undergoing chiropractic care. Seven of these children received one form of chiropractic adjustments focusing on the entire spine while the other seven received a form of chiropractic adjustment focusing on the upper cervical spine.
The children in this study were diagnosed with autism at the Child Evaluation Center at the University of Louisville Medical School. The evaluation of any progress made was done by using the Autism Treatment Evaluation Checklist (ATEC) created by the researchers at the Autism Research Institute of San Diego, California. According to the JVSR study, the ATEC is a one-page questionnaire designed to be completed by parents, teachers, or caretakers. It consists of 4 subsets: I. Speech/Language Communication (14 items); II. Sociability (20 items); III. Sensory/Cognitive Awareness (18 items); and IV. Health/Physical/Behavior (25 items).
Each of the children in this study was scored according to the ATEC evaluation. Then, twice each week for the following 3 months, the children were checked and adjusted as indicated. Follow up ATEC evaluations were performed each month to monitor the progress.
The results showed that improvement of ATEC scores occurred in six of the seven children under upper cervical adjustment and in five of the seven children under full spine adjustment. The children in the upper cervical group did show greater score improvements overall. In this group, two of the children improved so much that they no longer met the criteria to be classified as autistic. Overall, the study noted that the most common clinical aspects of improvement were in communication, verbal skills, eye contact, mood, and physical sport skills. The study also acknowledged that both groups improved significantly and suggested chiropractic care for non-drug treatment of Autistic children.