Written by: Jeffrey Sergent, DC
I have
been thinking for a few years, I need to start blog posting. (I go on many
rants throughout a day, most of which people probably don’t want to hear). I have started a blog, but I really never
got to the posting part. So, as my
dedication to the new year the rest of 2014, I want to give this year to my mentors, role
models and influences. I'm going to start with a person that came way before me, but has had tremendous effect on
medicine, chiropractic, manual therapy and movement therapies. She is not well known outside of those
communities by name, but many know the phrases she developed and treatments she
created. Her name is Janet Travell,
MD, the founder and author of Myofascial
pain syndrome (better known as trigger points) and pioneer of integrated
medicine.
Dr. Janet Travell in the 1920s.
Janet was a fascinating woman
from the beginning. She was way
ahead of her time. First off she
was a woman who went to college and onto medical school in a time when that was
not popular, graduating in 1929. Her career began as an ambulance surgeon, and
then on to a professorship at Cornell. Eventually, she began research on the
topic of arterial changes in response to medications. After her tenure there she relocated to
New York to continue her research on arterial conditions at Beth Isareli
Hospital. During her time there she began working with the orthopedic surgeons
on treating patients with back pain. She would use the work of Dr. Dudley
Morton, "father of trigger points" as the basis for her continued
work. This section would define
the rest of her life as she used a variety of injections, spray and stretch,
and oral medications. In fact, her methods are still used today.
In the
1950's Dr. Janet Travell started to see her most famous patient, John F.
Kennedy. JFK had suffered a
significant lower back injury during World War II. His patrol boat was involved
in a major collision, fracturing several vertebrae and damaging many of his
ligaments and muscles. After the
war he had several surgeries to correct the damage, however, this was a time
before MRI and CT scans. They basically did exploratory surgery into his back.
...As a side note, I have spoken to surgeons and other spine specialists who relayed to me that during that time they would just cut out the multifidi and rotatares because they were thought of as useless. Today we know that not to be true, and there are even whole therapies based on activating the multifidi...
Back to our story... JFK continued to have significant back pain after theses
surgeries. The story goes
that he was going to give up his political career due to pain and the demands
that came with the territory. He
was referred to Dr. Travell based on the results she was getting on these types
of cases in New York. Thus, she
began treating him with injections, medications and braces. As a result he was
able to go on with his political career, becoming a senator and of course eventually the President of the United States. JFK believed in her so much that he brought her to the
White House as his personal physician.
"President-elect Kennedy and Janet Travell, M.D.
November, 1960 by sea wall, Palm Beach"
Janet became the first woman to serve in this position and one of the
few who was non-military, as most often a high-ranking military physician
holds this place. During this time she continued to use techniques including spray and stretch,
medications and injections. This was also when she prescribed her most famous
addition, the JFK rocking chair.
She believed that he needed exercise throughout the day to keep his legs
strong and reduce his pain. In
addition, JFK was wearing a lumbar brace most hours of the day. Today some believe that this brace was
the fatal reason that JFK was shot the second time. It is speculated that the
brace restricted his movement from falling forward and almost caused him to
spring back up into the second shot.
Dr. Travell's daughter Janet Powell Pinci
posing in a Kennedy Rocker in 1984.
Dr.
Travell went on to serve Lyndon Johnson till the end of his term. She then dedicated her time to writing
and researching Myfascial pain and trigger points. She wrote both Myfascial
Pain Syndrome and Trigger Point Therapy.
These are very detailed, in-depth books. Furthermore, there are two
volumes that seem to be 500 pages each. In the practice we refer to these
beauties as the red books, due to their red binding.
Dr.
Travell was a leader and a pioneer in a field that is still innovating and
evolving. Although she created and
defined an entire area of medicine, to this day she has yet to be reviled in
that arena.
I have to
thank Dr. Travell for influencing me on trigger point therapies, soft tissue
and manual therapies. She has taught me that we need to integrate therapies;
exercise, medication, injections and manual therapy. Thinking of her also reminds me that as I get older I need
to continually keep an open mind to new and evolving treatments, just as she
continued to research into her last days. Lastly, she reminds me that we always need to treat people
as individuals and find what will work for them specifically, as she did with the rocking chair in JFK's situation, and for the thousands she treated throughout her
lifetime.
Thank you
Dr. Travell.
Janet
Travell, MD
1901-1997
Photography source: www.janettravellmd.com
_________________________________________________________________
Dr. Jeffrey Sergent is a certified Clinical Rehab Specialist and Chiropractor. He earned his Bachelor's Degree in 2004 from Michigan State University and his Doctorate Degree from the National University of Health Sciences in 2008. His special interests include Trigger Point Therapy, the Functional Movement System, Developmental Kinesiology, Pain Neuroscience and nutrition for chronic pain. Currently he practices at Goodyear Chiropractic Health Center in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
