The Discovery Health Network -- a sister station to the popular Discovery Channel -- is airing a documentary on the role of chiropractic in drug rehabilitation programs.

The one-hour program began airing May 12, and will continue to be shown at least 11 times through September 6, 2002.

The segment, titled "Wiped Out," is part of the "Lifeline" series, which presents news of the latest medical and health-related breakthroughs.

The Medical Review Board at Discovery Health chose to produce the program after a research project by Jay M. Holder, D.C., on Torque Release Technique (TRT) appeared in the journal Molecular Psychiatry.

The journal, published by Nature, is rated second out of 80 journals in psychiatry, 10th out of 201 journals in neurosciences and 20th out of 295 journals in biochemistry and molecular biology according to Journal Citation Reports, which rates peer-reviewed journals. 

The television documentary examines the role of the subluxation in addictions and compulsive disorders as well as methods invented and used by Dr. Holder at his Exodus Treatment Center in Miami Beach.

When Holder performed the first government-funded study in auriculotherapy to determine its outcome in addiction patients, he discovered that auriculotherapy could electronically detect the level and listing side of the subluxation, as well as discovering the limbic system point.

This led him to collaborate with researchers in human genetics and neuropharmacology in support of the "Brain Reward Cascade" theory, and help establish the Reward Deficiency Syndrome (RDS) as a biogenic model.

The Brain Reward Cascade and RDS explain how persons can manifest a deficiency in their state of well-being, which interferes in their potential and quality of life. This work was eventually published in the Journal of Psychoactive Drugs.

Although RDS is estimated to be as high as 30% of the general population, persons suffering from addiction best represent RDS, as RDS is responsible for most addictions and compulsive disorders. The five addictions include work, eating disorders, sex, gambling, and drugs. Compulsive disorders include Attention Deficit Disorder, ADHD, and Tourette's Syndrome.

Because of this, Holder, who served on the faculty at the University of Miami teaching pharmacology, chose this population to measure the outcome of subluxation-based chiropractic in a randomized, blinded and placebo-controlled clinical trial.

Bob Duncan, Ph.D., and Biostatistician at the University of Miami School of Medicine, designed the study.

When the Discovery Channel contacted Holder, he was skeptical. "I asked why they wanted to do a program on chiropractic. Their response was that they were excited about chiropractic's role for something other than neck and low back pain. I certainly agreed and felt that although musculoskeletal conditions do well under chiropractic care, the last thing we needed was another study on neck and low back pain," said Holder. "It's time to move on, and support with sound scientific research, the true broad-based scope of chiropractic practice, which lies in subluxation care providing fulfillment of human potential, state of well-being and quality of life."

Holder added, "I, and others, were always warned by certain leaders in our profession that if research on chiropractic were to be accepted by the main stream scientific community and ever get published in their journals, we must never invoke the term 'subluxation,' the 'S' word. I am proud and excited to tell you that in both the preparation of the Journal of Psychoactive Drugs, as well as the journal Molecular Psychiatry, the powers that be had absolutely no problem with the 'S' word. Their problem was with the term 'chiropractic,' in that it was not specific enough for them."

After the Miami Drug Court's success in using auriculotherapy as an alternative to incarceration for first offenders of drug related crimes, hundreds of drug courts were established across the nation.

With the realization that Drug Courts would benefit from court-ordered chiropractic care as well, Holder decided to prove it with a more comprehensive research design than he had used with the previous auriculotherapy study, thereby validating D.D. and B.J. Palmer's claim that "Chiropractic would empty the prisons."

According to the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy, more people are in federal prison for a drug-related crime than in the active military, and the leading cause of death and crime is drug related.

Saying that principled chiropractic required a computer upgrade from first century linear and mechanistic technique models, Holder developed TRT, which he describes as "a non-linear, tonal and vitalistic technique model," to provide a subluxation-based protocol to execute the study.

According to Holder, "All chiropractic techniques work. However, they work better if they are delivered with a non-linear tonal model to avoid patient plateau."

At first, the research project was to use Toggle Recoil by hand, because this method was considered a classic in chiropractic.

However, to avoid difficulty and anticipated concerns in statistically measuring the hands, research design flaws, and interprofessional reproducibility, Holder was obliged to invent a device that totally reproduced what the hands were intended to perform in providing the Toggle Recoil thrust.

Both the device known as the Integrator, and Torque Release Technique were created for the sole purpose of conducting the study.

Holder notes that the Integrator was the first adjusting instrument to apply for an FDA 510K, which was granted in 1995. That made the FDA the second U.S. Government agency, after Medicare, to recognize the subluxation, in that this 510K's indication is for the "safe and effective correction of the vertebral subluxation."

The Discovery Health Channel production is the first non-agenda chiropractic documentary ever to be released on a major network, Holder states. "This is a big break for chiropractors and their patients everywhere. Our success was made possible by the support, vision and direction of many special people and organizations, such as the Florida Chiropractic Society and the World Chiropractic Alliance," he explained.

Holder is the chairman of the World Chiropractic Alliance Council on Addictions and Compulsive Disorders, president of the American College of Addictionology and Compulsive Disorders and is in his 23rd year of chiropractic practice.

For more information contact the Holder Research Institute at: 305/535-8803 or visit their website: www.torquerelease.com