Sunday, October 23, 2005

Natural Healing vs. Western Medicine

After 10 days of watching Brenda lye in bed and sleep, I decided to look for other options to help with her rehabilitation. Although I am a firm believer in all of Dr. Upledgers work, I also believe in Dr. John F. Barnes, Internationally recognized therapist, lecturer and author. He is the President and Director of the Myofascial Release Treatment Centers. I use MFR with many of my clients and I have witnessed the results.

The more research I did on-line, the more I realized she needed movement, she needed to get out of bed and start to move around. She had loss quite a bit of muscle mass and was suffering from constant pain and fluid retention. She had suffered a concussion so she was experiencing headaches 24 hours a day.

I remember the results my sister experienced 35 years ago at Hot Springs Arkansas. For those of you who are not familiar with Hot Springs. It is the home of a thermal well, pumping over 700,000 gallons a day of mineral water which comes flowing out of the ground at 142 degrees. The Federal Government owns the well and controls the water supply.

They have cooling towers which cools the water to about 108 degrees. The water is then pumped to several rehabilitation centers and a few hotel spas. The first hospital built was the Army-Navy Hospital, it opened in 1886. It was the first permanent military hospital in the US. It was torn down and the current facility was completed on that site in October 1933. The Army-Navy Hospital is now the Hot Springs Rehabilitation Center.

Along with the Army-Navy Hospital is the Levi Hospital and Libby Memorial Physical Medicine Center. On December 31, 2005 the Federal Government is closing the Libby after 75 years for major repairs and renovations. The future of the Libby is not certain.

I spoke with our family doctor who is familiar with the benefits of water therapy, especially natural mineral water and he gave us the written orders to take Brenda to Hot Springs for treatment.

Our family doctor cited the fact that Brenda was not recovering as well as he had hoped. Even with pain killers, muscle relaxers and anti-inflammatory medications, she was still in severe pain, had little or no range of motion and was not improving.

After speaking with our insurance agent and doctor, Brenda and I decided that she needed to be in Hot Springs not only for the natural mineral water, but for the facilities, they are exceptional. I have never seen a facility in the Southeast United States that compares with Hot Springs.

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