Zone therapy; or, Relieving pain at home

by Wm. H. Fitzgerald; Edwin F. Bowers

And the Japs, in their uncanny knowledge of nerve anatomy, exemplified in their proficiency in jui jitsu, have shown that, by pressure upon certain nerve terminals, or upon plexuses of nerve groups they are able to do almost everything except murder a victim. Perhaps they could do this, also, if they were sufficiently industrious and persevering.

Indeed, for many years they have been aware that there are certain nerve centers in the neck and under the angle of the jaw, pressure upon which will temporarily suspend consciousness. In fact, their methods were tried by surgeons, prior to the discovery of anesthesia; but were discarded, owing to the fact that no one could guarantee that the patients would wake again after the operation.

Also, as showing how great oaks from little acorns grow, and how mickle and mickle makes muckle. Professor William Halstead, more than a dozen years ago, was operating upon a man with a rupture—under cocaine anesthesia, as he thought. It was found, however, after the operation had been painlessly completed, that the moon-stricken assistant, had forgotten to put the cocaine tablet in the syringe.

So that all the anesthetic the patient got was sterile water. However, this was enough, for the pressure of the water injection into the parts, had blocked the nerve tract, and inhibited the transmission of the message of pain.

This experience may or may not have given Dr. Crile the clue to his interesting and vastly important discovery of “nerve block,” but, in any event, we learned something new about the human body. But—and this is the point I wish to emphasize—we are not through learning about it yet.

So, if some time a doctor tells you that a woman of sixty-nine, suffering for years from one-sided paralysis, made pressures twice daily with an aluminum comb on the top (or front) of the hand, favoring the thumb side—and in two weeks noticed a decided improvement, and after five months can now lift her foot free from the floor and walk without a cane, don’t sneer.

If another tells you that a case of infantile paralysis, of five years’ standing—after several months’ treatment with a probe on the back wall of the pharynx, can now kick as high as his shoulder with either foot, don’t scoff. For that doctor has photos of the boy, showing him in the act of doing just this identical thing.

It may also be that catarrhal appendicitis is helped. For in unorthodox ways three cases of catarrhal appendicitis were apparently cured by pressures exerted with a comb over the first, second and third finger, and carried up as far as the wrist. These cases were diagnosed as catarrhal appendicitis by several competent medical men. They showed all the classical symptoms, including pain on pressure over McBurney’s point, vomiting, and digestive disturbances. They were treated three times daily for several days, and in the interim, treated themselves at home along the same lines. In ten days to two weeks, there was an apparent cure of all three cases. And now, after six months, there has been no return of the condition.

And, speaking of appendicitis, it is interesting to note that if pain is relieved by zone pressure, and returns after a short time, we can be morally certain that there is pus present, and that the case demands immediate operation. This same thing, as we before observed, applies to abscesses in the ear, teeth, tonsil, or anywhere else.

The injunction to “prove all things and hold fast to that which is true,” is as applicable and pertinent today as it was when first dropped from the lips of the old sage. So, if some time your progressive doctor should tell you to rub your finger nails together, and scratch the front of your hands and arms, and thereby cure falling hair, don’t laugh—because he may be repeating to you only what numbers of his patients have told him they did—and stopped their hair from leaving its moorings.