About the Book
My formal/informal training in the use of cranial methods took place over a seven- to eight-year period, starting in the late 1960s and ending around 1974. Over that period a group of approximately 20 colleagues, mainly UK-based osteopaths but also other health-care professionals, including French physiotherapists, met about once every 6 weeks for weekends of intensive training with the late, great, Denis Brookes DO. Often those weekends took place in his home town of Shrewsbury, as well as in various locations scattered around England. They involved both social gatherings as well as workshops and study-group sessions in which we worked on each other as we learned to apply the methods that Denis taught. He was an old school DO, having worked in the USA with many of the pioneers of early osteopathic cranial development, and so the model of cranial methodology that this group taught was largely structurally oriented. It also included some methods (V-Spread for instance) that lacked coherent biomechanical explanations, which left a sense of slightly uncomfortable confusion as to just what was happening.
Over the decades, a greater understanding of just what may be happening when cranial methods are applied has emerged - as outlined in Chapters 1 to 4 in particular. These chapters provide back-ground details of the apparent schism between the mechanistic and the biodynamic models and methods. In truth, though, there are probably more similarities than differences in technique between biomechanical and biodynamic cranial work, although underlying explanations as to the physiological mechanisms involved are very different, as will become clear. Taking a different model entirely may help to explain why these differences should not necessarily be seen as a negative. When you palpate an area of tenderness and tension in someone's musculature, you might readily locate areas that demonstrate differences from surrounding tissue, involving perhaps altered tone, sensitivity and tissue texture.
Applied pressure to such an area would have a number of predictable effects including: compression of mechanoreceptors - inducing modification of pain perception via the gate mechanism; the release of local analgesic endorphins and possibly brain enkephalins; creation of a local ischemic effect that would allow a flushing of fresh oxygenated blood on release of the pressure; and a mechanical stretching of the tissues under pressure. In other words, from a Western medical perspective, there would be neurological, endocrine, circulatory and mechanical effects deriving from applied pressure. Now if virtually the same pressure was being applied by someone trained in traditional Chinese medicine methods, such as shiatsu (acupressure), exactly the same influences would be taking place; however, the explanations arising from TCM would involve energy (chi) movement or obstruction. Which of these explanations is correct? Is it neurology, fluid movement, stretching, hormonal change or energy movement? Or is it all of these, and possibly unknown others as well?
Translate this to a cranial treatment setting and we can see that while the model, the story, the explanation, may differ, the effect of applied cranial treatment might be precisely the same, whether the practitioner's thoughts as to the underlying mechanisms involve fluid-electric/energy concepts or biomechanics and fascial release. When cranial treatment is applied, almost all instruction asks for a sense of centeredness, stillness, focus, and applied intent. As will be seen (see Chapter 4 in particular on the topic of entrainment) a combination of a calm, unhurried, compassionate, physical contact from a caring practitioner/therapist almost certainly has a therapeutic benefit of its own. On the other hand, at times, pure biomechanics enters the frame, as will be seen in the discussions of dental and facial influences. Much cranial methodology has emerged from particular personal philosophies and beliefs, based on the work of individuals such as Upledger, Jealous and DeJarnette (see Chapter 5 for more on this theme).
Today the expert, the authority, needs to base instruction and information on as much objective fact as possible; and in the absence of research evidence, clinical experience must of course inform opinion, but this carries less weight in modern health care than in the past. As the healing professions move away from authority-based approaches toward evidence-based practice, a merging of what can be shown by research and clinical audit to be safe and effective should take place. What I have tried to do in this book is to explain the various philosophies and methods, to offer what explanations already exist, and so to begin the process that will eventually unite apparently disparate ideas and methods.
Table of Contents:
1. A brief historical perspective. 2. Cranial fundamentals revisited. Exercises: refining cranial palpation skills 3. Integration with medicine - the scope of cranial work 4. The biodynamic model of osteopathy in the cranial field. 5. Chiropractic in the cranial field. 6. Cranial movement: mechanical and subtle 7. Cranial bones: assessment and manipulation. 8. Cranial implications of muscular and fascial distress. 9. Assessment and treatment of key cranially associated muscles 10. Positional release and cranial pain and dysfunction. 11. Cranial therapy and dentistry. 12. Clinical applications of cranial manipulation Appendix 1. Soft tissue manipulation fundamentals Appendix 2. Cranial treatment and the infant. Index
About the Author :
Leon Chaitow ND DO is an internationally known and respected osteopathic and naturopathic practitioner and teacher of soft tissue manipulation methods of treatment. He is author of over 60 books, including a series on Advanced Soft Tissue Manipulation (Muscle Energy Techniques, Positional Release Techniques, Modern Neuromuscular Techniques) and also Palpation Skills; Cranial Manipulation: Theory and Practice; Fibromyalgia Syndrome: A Practitioner's Guide to Treatment, and many more. He is editor of the peer reviewed Journal of Bodywork and Movement Therapies, that offers a multidisciplinary perspective on physical methods of patient care. Leon Chaitow was for many years senior lecturer on the Therapeutic Bodywork degree courses which he helped to design at the School of Integrated Health, University of Westminster, London, where is he now an Honorary Fellow. He continues to teach and practice part-time in London, when not in Corfu, Greece where he focuses on his writing.
Review :
"By far the best basic book I have read on the subject. Filled with research references, clear descriptions of anatomy, functional rationale and skill-building exercises."Russell Stolzoff, Certified Advanced Rolfer, Rolf Movement Practitioner
