Activate Your Practice Podcast
Activate Your Practice Podcast
Exploring Pediatric Chiropractic Care and the Evolution of Digital Learning with Dr. Ed Shepherd
Journey with us as we step into the intriguing world of pediatric chiropractic alongside Dr. Ed Shepherd, an Activator practitioner with 40 years of experience. Brace yourself as we traverse a wide-ranging adventure through Illinois, Maine, and Seattle, each location brimming with unique challenges and experiences. We illuminate the profound impact of chiropractic care in the pediatric world, with a focus on the safety and efficacy of using an Activator on our youngest patients. Listen closely as Dr. Shepherd shares the heartwarming story of his youngest patient, a mere nine hours old, and the transformative experience of another young life forever changed by the simple adjustment of an atlas subluxation.
Shifting gears, we immerse ourselves in an insightful discussion comparing digital learning to live seminars. With the seasoned wisdom of Dr. Ed Shepherd, we explore the vast opportunities ushered in by the technological advancements of digital learning and virtual training. Discover how these innovative educational mediums are not only challenging the status quo but often outperforming traditional live seminars. Learn more about the flexibility of virtual seminars which, open for 30 days, offer the convenience to revisit and review at leisure. Thank you, dear listeners, for your continuous support as we continue to activate your practice on this enlightening journey. So grab your headphones, sit back and let's step into a world where pediatric chiropractic care meets virtual education.
Welcome to the activate your practice podcast. I'm Dr Four. Data always wins. Hi, I'm Dr Arlen Four. I'm bringing to you today a new podcast called activate your practice, and today we have a guest that's been an activator practitioner for a long time and it's Dr Ed Shepard. He's from the state of Washington, been an instructor for years. And, ed, how did you get into activator?
Speaker 2:Well, back in 1983, I had the pleasure of going to a partner seminar and it was my good fortune that you were doing an entire weekend with activator methods at the partner seminar and I sat in the end of my seat for two days and learned everything I could about activators. I thought it was an amazing experience. I came back home and been using activator ever since, so that's been 40 years now.
Speaker 1:So you'd say and I believe that you started in Maine, isn't that correct?
Speaker 2:I actually started in Illinois and then I practiced there for nine years and then to Maine. I was in Maine for 24 years and now I've been in Seattle for the last 10 years.
Speaker 1:So you've had some opportunity to see how it is to start a new practice in different areas.
Speaker 2:Oh, I have, and this one's been the hardest one, I would say, and that's practicing in a big city is a lot different than practicing in rural Maine or suburban Chicago. And so there have been challenges. And then COVID didn't help matters, but it wasn't all bad. We were able to continue our business, and so many of the businesses in our area were not so, but yes, it's been a challenge.
Speaker 1:Now we're going to talk about pediatrics today and we just got done doing a whole digital thing on pediatrics last year and so it's ready to go. It's been approved throughout the country. Is there really a need for chiropractic care in the pediatric world?
Speaker 2:That's a great question.
Speaker 2:If you look at the research I Googled the other day on NIH and PubMed just to see about spinal issues with children and I was surprised to see how many papers that are written about spinal injuries traumas in particular they were focusing on, but sporting activities and other things kids get involved with, not to mention just living life there's fines, are subject to the same stresses that I've got, and when you add in this day and age of electronics, there's a whole new level of stress is put on spine.
Speaker 2:Even back in 2010, dr Drew Rubin wrote a paper that was published in the journal of care recognizing and he did a paper on four patients that he'd seen who had what was casually referred to in the literature as me eyes, if you remember the Nintendo Wii, the gaming console that kids use or that anybody could use he had four patients that came in kids that had been using this electronic device and had injured their arms and their necks. When we look at that kind of a thing and even now all the electronics that are being used, that puts even more stress in the spine of things like tech neck, which is more associated with tech workers but with kids looking at phones and looking at devices and looking at gaming devices. There's fines are under a lot of stress from the electronic role too. I think there's a need for pediatric care in chiropractic.
Speaker 1:Well, question two is it safe to adjust a pediatric patient with an activator?
Speaker 2:Well, we have been fortunate to have been looking at some research that's been done about chiropractic adjustment in the pediatric population. There was a chiropractor in Italy. We wrote a paper about safety and chiropractic adjusting and looking at and we apply forces to a pediatric spine and is it safe? The end result of all of that for us was that the forces that we deliver to a pediatric spine are well within the margins that are considered safe in the pediatric world of adjusting the spine. I think it's very safe and we've got a device that allows us to control our forces and know what amount of force we deliver to a pediatric spine. So yes, I think it's safe.
Speaker 1:What age was your youngest pediatric patient?
Speaker 2:Well, my youngest pediatric patient was nine hours old. That was my granddaughter. She had just been born and her parents were just noticing that she was having some trouble with latching and when she was trying to breastfeed and was fussy and just didn't, they wanted her checked, which is an interesting thing because her father is a pediatrician. So he actually wanted me to check her because he had some experience with chiropractic through me and through me adjusting my kids, and so we adjusted her and it really made a difference for her. So that was my youngest patient, but I feel very comfortable adjusting babies also using the activator method. It's very safe and can be very effective in helping them in those early stages of life.
Speaker 1:Is there a particular patient that you recall that had a remarkable response to pediatric adjusting?
Speaker 2:Yes, I think the one that stands out the most to me was one of my very first patients when I was visualization practicing back in Illinois. This was the early 80s, and his neighbor was a patient of mine and she was telling me how their family was really struggling because this baby was crying nonstop, like 24 hours a day, crying it might stop for a little while, but it woke everybody in the family up all day and he was just really struggling. And so I just suggested why don't they bring the baby in? Let's see what we can do? Because the next step that they were going to take was to just drug the baby with hemobarbacillin to knock it out so that it could rest and everybody else could rest, and they didn't really want to do that.
Speaker 2:But they decided to get pyrotechnic at trial. We checked the baby. I checked the baby and he had an atlas subluxation. I cleared that out and that night, for the first time in six weeks, the baby slept and this changed the whole family's life and from that point on the rest of the family became patients. The mom and dad came in, the other brothers came in and we took care of that family for a long time and it really made a difference for them. So I think that was probably the most memorable child patient that would just really fit me in a young time in my practice and my career and made a big difference in my thinking.
Speaker 1:Well, I remember, like you do, I was a young practitioner and an activator. We were just developing it. But in Minnesota it seemed like in October we had colic month and the kids would not sleep and they were driving their mothers crazy, and so we started having a colic time in the office. In other words, when they came at noon they'd come in and we'd put three babies across the table. We'd put the ones that had had an adjustment first and then another one next to it. Next to it, and we had a reason, because the people that had one adjustment they were telling raving to the other mothers how much better their children were feeling, and so they would sell the other mothers about the chiropractic care and we would have tables lined and we had six tables and we'd have about 18 kids at noon, all in colic, and the reports that we got around the community were great. So I know what it feels like to have a particular type of case that gets well quickly. What other conditions do you see pediatric patients presenting within your office?
Speaker 2:A number of different things, from infant reflux to constipation, corticolus an interesting experience. Over this past week and a half. Another patient was brought in to me.
Speaker 2:This mom is a pediatric choscorilus and he's been suffering with constipation for several weeks. They've had him on an intestinal stimulant to try to keep him going, which he said was helping, but she said I don't want him on this for long term. So for anything else we can do, we'd like to see if this could help, and so we've been working with him and she just came in the other day to get her adjustment and brought him in for follow up and she said that he was doing much better than just having regular bowel movements and she was just quite happy about all that. So there's a lot of different types of things, especially in the infant population. I think they don't just come in complaining of neck pain although obviously the birth process might produce problems with their necks like that but they tend to come in with other types of problems just because the kids have been under a lot of stress and their bodies are having a hard time regulating themselves and if you can get them checked and adjusted it seems to really make a difference.
Speaker 1:You know, the next question I was going to ask you is do your parents feel comfortable? But I think you already answered it, because here's a pediatrician that's bringing his child to you and I would say, if he's comfortable, well then the average layperson out there is going to be real comfortable.
Speaker 2:That's right, I mean I think patients, once they see the instrument and feel what it does, they realize oh okay, that's not as scary as I might have thought it was. And I always tell patients to quit watching YouTube about chiropractic adjustments because they've seen too many crazy things. And I show them how the activator works and they really seem to have a sense of relief and understanding about what we're going to deal.
Speaker 1:Do the children themselves seem scared at all?
Speaker 2:At first. You know their kids tend to be shy and scared about a lot of things, but I tried to make a game out of it with them. I let them touch the activator. It's the activator five. I let them put all the buttons, which is sometimes a mistake, because then that's all they want to do is push the buttons but make them comfortable. And then I show them how it works and usually there's not an issue. So they do feel pretty comfortable with it Once they've gotten to see that it's not going to hurt them.
Speaker 1:I have a thing that I used to do and I would take the 12 year old you know that size child put them on the table and they go for a ride. And they love to get the ride on those tables. I would adjust them, then I'm, let them up and if there's a four year old sitting there I'd say, would you like to take a ride with your sister? And of course they couldn't refuse that. So they hop on the footpeast beside their sister and they both go for a ride. Then I tell them, would you like to have me fix you like I fixed your sister? And they'd say, yes, I'd like to have that. And they've had an adjustment and they haven't even had any objection to it whatsoever. They just had a good time.
Speaker 2:They just it looked like fun and they wanted to do it Right.
Speaker 1:They get to do what the big kids get to do, and so that was a way that I entered them into it. Is it difficult to learn about activator pediatric adjusting on activator virtual training?
Speaker 2:I think I don't think it's difficult at all. I think once you've mastered some activator technique, that it's easy to go onto the virtual training module and learn more about the specifics of just how to how they address pediatric issues. I think learning about the safety and efficacy is important and how the instrument works and when you understand more about that and understand the force settings you can be more comfortable with adjusting children of all ages. So I think I think it's really easy for you.
Speaker 1:You know you talked about adjusting a baby nine hours old. The literature also, if you remember the one you're talking about from Italy. Uh, marsha said that you can do zero to 90 days and you just don't want to use more than 20 newtons of force. Now I got some real good news for you are bio mechanism from Baylor medical school has been working on a new cervical tip, or a new pediatric tip I guess I should call it, and in this the pediatric tip on an activator five with setting one guarantees there's no more than 20 newtons of force. So that will take the uh, anybody that's concerned about putting too much force into a zero to 90 day old baby. That will end that fear and we should have that out here within the next couple of months.
Speaker 2:So I think that's going to be a great step forward, and and that's one of the things I appreciate so much about activator is that you don't just stop at some point and keep going and looking for how can we continue this, how can we make sure we're doing things the right way, and I think that's one of the big takeaways that we all get developed with um before the follow up that you continue to do Well, thanks for that.
Speaker 1:I guess what you would say then is get activator proficiency rated or, you know, learn the basic scan protocol so you know how to do activator in its own.
Speaker 1:And then from there you can take the pediatric course which we just put out now on virtual training. It's about a four hour course, I believe, and that's something you can add to it then and it counts for a CE and it counts for renewing your proficiency rating. So I think we're coming to the state now where we've got it, where it's very easy that you can take it in sections.
Speaker 2:Yes, I think it's very easy. I think it's easy to get into it and the pediatric module is awesome because it specifically goes over all the pediatric things. But don't forget, we've also got the textbook for being able to review the basic scan procedures easily, which then directly be applied into the pediatric or just things.
Speaker 1:You know, somebody asked me one time do you think digital learning or you know, virtual training is as good as live seminars? And I said, well, there's no count, there's no action between people. You know people like to have collegial action, if you will, but as far as learning, it's open for 30 days. You know when you used to take a seminar that it was eight hours. At the end of the eight hours it was over and you didn't have anything else to look at. Here, when you take one of these virtual training seminars, you can. It stays open for 30 days so you can go, take care of patients, go back, take a look again and see what you missed, and it actually makes it stronger. So well, dr Ed Shepherd from Washington today and, ed, you put a lot of time in pediatrics and so thank you for sharing with our audience that activator practices and we're trying to activate your practice. We want your practice to get bigger and we want it to be serving more people. So, ed, thank you again.
Speaker 2:Yes, you're welcome, thank you.
Speaker 1:Well, we want to thank all of you for tuning in to activate your practice, and Ed Shepherd did a great job of using his experience of some 40 years of how he has used activator in pediatrics and we thank him for that. And you want to take a look at our virtual training, because at the Activator Institute of Higher Learning we've got almost 70 hours now of virtual training and I think you'll be very excited to take a look and see how well it's done.
