Concussions and the Problem with Cranial Therapy.
In the past few weeks, I have seen several people that have been suffering with head symptoms since being impacted by a concussion. Each of them have seen many doctors, chiropractors and physical therapists. The treatments provided to them included medications, manipulations, stretches and electrical stimulation.
Even after suffering with symptoms for several years none of them had been referred for the most congruent solution to their injury. Why didn't any of their healthcare team consider cranial therapy?
When I was in physical therapy school I was taught that there was a fraction of therapists that were on the fringe and believed that they could help people by treating the skull. We were taught that cranial bones did not move and could not be a source of patient problems. In fact, medical students, chiropractic students and physical therapy students are still taught that the skull has no motion so therefore can not be a source of discomfort following a concussion. The result of this education and resultant guidance away from cranial therapy results in patients spending a prolonged amount of time before they find this incredible treatment. 25 years of treating real people with real problems has assured me that the cranial bones do in fact move and they need to be treated after a significant injury like a concussion.
Last week, I met an 18 year old woman who has been suffering with daily headaches since her concussion 6 years ago. The large majority of her child hood included intolerance for even mild activities, difficulty reading and disabling headaches. She had been treated with weekly chiropractic visits that provided short term, but well needed respites from her pain. Medications did not provide much relief and the side effects were not well tolerated.
She gave an excellent history that correlated with the physical exam of her skull. Compression of the temporal bone explained all of her symptoms and allowed me to identify may other symptoms that she had but didn't not think were related to her concussion. Gut problems, weakness in her voice, and anxiety were also related to the compression of nerves that exit the skull near the temporal bone. In 2 visits, she experienced 90% relief in the symptoms that she had been experiencing daily for 6 years.
Medications, neck adjustments and electric stim were not successful because they were not treating the obvious source of her problem. She knew that all of her symptoms occurred when she was mechanically injured in the head but no one applied the logical treatment of a mechanical treatment to the head. The sensibility is simple but again the problem was all of the health professionals she saw were taught that the skull didn't move. If it didn't move then how could an injury to the skull have caused her so many problems? How could a treatment of the skull remove all those problems when there is no motion anyway?
The problem with cranial therapy is that the education of our healthcare professionals have not caught up with the sensible truth that the joints seen in the skull do provide motion and flexibility in the skull. Ignoring this simple truth prevents patients from being treated effectively after concussions.