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Regardless of argument to the contrary from academics ignorant of advances in evidence gathering, the Journal continues to place an emphasis on publishing case reports relevant to the discipline of Chiropractic. Here we provide both our rationale and our updated guidelines which are drawn from the model of evidence-based healthcare developed by the Joanna Briggs Institute (JBI) of The University of Adelaide. We explain the philosophical principles of 'aboutness' and 'consilience' which significantly increase the value of a case report to allow agglomeration to better inform the clinical practice of Chiropractic. We celebrate that case reports are the fertiliser of research proposals and as such are critical to the informed development of Chiropractic as a science-based discipline. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As demand for complementary and alternative medicine rises globally, introducing Chiropractic education in Hong Kong provides an opportunity to meet growing healthcare needs. This paper reports developments in Hong Kong, China and notes the challenges, regulatory barriers, limited public awareness of chiropractic care, competition from other healthcare professions, and constraints on funding and resources. I report strategies used by the successful group which has established the Hong Kong College of Chiropractic in Hong Kong, China in collaboration with the McTimoney College of Chiropractic of the UK, and note other Western institutions which were eager but not successful. Successful private chiropractic programs in New Zealand (NZCC) and Australia (ACC) have provided valuable examples to emulate. It is noted that over half the world's population now live in the region of which Hong Kong is an international city and looking to become a hub of Chiropractic education and Research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Elsewhere in this issue I state 'Chiropractic is the diagnosis and management of the neuromusculoskeletal system of the human body' and discuss the emergent problem of an increasing shrinkage of the constitutional framework of the discipline where current arguments continue to remove reference to subluxation from the profession's lexicon, even flagitiously mandating against teaching the idea within its natural context. In this editorial I give some examples of the good work being done to carry our profession to greatness, and balance that with some examples of wackiness from Canada and the United States of America, and once again from the usual dismal suspects in Europe. I am starting to think that Australia is one of the better places in the world to practice Conventional Chiropractic, yet offer caution that this may be about to change. Above all I hold that a Chiropractor carries spontaneous unspoken trust in what they see and feel, and conclude with a marvellous video of a Philosophy discussion about how strongly we can 'know things' from our patient's testimony. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Chiropractic is the diagnosis and management of the neuromusculoskeletal system of the human body with the emergent problem of an increasing shrinkage of the constitutional framework of the discipline where current arguments continue to remove reference to subluxation from the profession's lexicon, even flagitiously mandating against teaching the idea within its natural context. The challenge I address in this paper are my observations that subluxation on the one hand is not real as a materialist would want it to be, yet is alive and well in the majority of practices globally where fully-trained Chiropractors address and resolve this clinical entity many times a day. I hold that a Chiropractor carries spontaneous unspoken trust in what they see and feel, with the paradox that they can only convey this by constructing and conducting fuzzy narratives. Narration conveys the idea of the Chiropractor's perspectival truth of a particular subluxation in a particular patient, to allow correction by hand in a manner which the patient understands and accepts as their clinical reality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Narrative: Chiropractors world-wide were shocked and dismayed with the shameful announcement from RMIT University that there would be no Chiropractic student intake in 2024 and the program, which will have lasted 50 years or so by the time it ends, will be taught out over the next 4 years. While there has been little concern for staff as some will remain and happily teach students in the replacement program of physiotherapy and others will spend more time in their own practices, grave concern was expressed for those many potential students planning to submit their application to commence their studies with RMIT in 2024, and for the 4-years of students remaining. The profession has acted, knowing that these dear people are the future of Chiropractic. The Australian Chiropractic College, based in Adelaide, announced a giant growth step to introduce an enlightened form of study from 2024 where students can commence where-ever they live, completing first year while they consolidate and then move to Adelaide to finish and graduate. It may be that further options emerge during 2024 and this is a sign of strong, positive growth rooted in adversity which can only be good for the discipline of Chiropractic. The philosophical vacuum that long existed at RMIT has also been addressed and educational sessions have been delivered which were greatly appreciated by the student body. These will be ongoing and supplemented with further offerings. We also note the new WHO Benchmarks for Anthroposophic Medicine, which I see as a layer of whole-body thinking to sit across established healing disciplines. These Benchmarks provide a challenging backdrop for the WFC as it develops a belated set of Benchmarks for the training of Chiropractors. If implemented properly, the WFC Benchmarks will sideline the destructive negativity of the UK's GCC which refuses to accredit any chiropractic program that teaches what they consider 'unorthodox' ideas such as we see embraced as the focus of Anthroposophic Medicine. We think the GCC is in for an awakening until it differentiates and identifies Chiropractic as a distinct profession in its own right. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Context: The chiropractic clinical encounter is a vague event in terms given by Swinburne56 and is difficult to define. This vagueness or indeterminacy is drawn from the variability of the Chiropractor and their training, the variability of the clinical entity within and about the spine that they seek to treat, and the unpredictable variability of individual patients. Collectively these create Chiropractic's indeterminacy. Discussion: The clinical outcomes from a Chiropractor's care are remarkable. There are over 3,089 indexed, published Case Reports of Chiropractors telling their unique story of positive clinical outcomes resulting from their clinical management at the intersection of these indeterminacies. I question how this can be in the face of the interaction presenting as a complex problem with multiple indeterminacies. Using the philosophical approach of a Pragmatist I absolve these indeterminacies by applying the Japanese philosophy of kokoro with 'affective sensibility and rational thought' to explain the Conventional, Realist Chiropractor's clinical encounter through interdependency. Here I argue how and why this could be so and that this argument most probably applies also to the interactions of post-realist small-c chiropractors. Conclusion: I conclude that interdependency is an acceptable explanation for the effectiveness of the Chiropractic healing encounter. This contention places importance on the interdependency of the relationships in the Chiropractic clinical encounter and removes Western ideas of cause and effect. Interdependence allows inclusion of McDowall's concept of tone and Richards' understanding of vitalism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In October 2023 the former Anglo-European College of Chiropractic, at that time a degree-granting 'University College', announced it's merger with another University College, formerly the 'British School of Osteopathy'. The matter was meant to be a low-key, under-the-radar event and the announcement was widely distributed several days before 9 October under embargo to that date and time. However the embargo became a smoke-screen meant to control the narrative by being unilaterally broken earlier by the Osteopaths as they embedded the plan on their web site. McCoy Press ran with the story on Saturday Melbourne (Australia) time and this Journal followed suit on Sunday 8th October Melbourne time. Events of this significance can not be kept from the global profession in the name of comfortable spin and we present, with references, what is known at this time. This Journal also attempts to provide a context for what can only be described as a blatant sell-out of the principles of Chiropractic as it was founded in 1895. We implore the resultant entity to now completely remove any reference to Chiropractic in the programs it delivers as they move forward in this unholy alliance. The former Anglo-European College is not and now can never be a 'Chiropractic College'; it joins the Welsh Institute as a provider of small-c chiropractic education, yet will no doubt continue with the accreditation of the GCC which is lacking any intellectual capacity to discern the substance which warrants accreditation as a 'Chiropractic College'. In turn, this renders the GCC as a fault-line which must be addressed by the profession in the name of survival. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This is the final paper of a 6-paper series which presents a descriptive narrative of the Western medical literature to identify and report evidence for each of the five principles of the Vertebral Subluxation Complex (VSC) premise as established in 1947 by Janse, Houser, and Wells (National College of Chiropractic). This literature includes medical and Chiropractic papers in the medical indices and is additional to that available in the electronic Index to Chiropractic Literature. This paper presents the evidence for Principle Five by documenting the evidence that supports a Chiropractor's manual intervention to correct subluxations is associated with changes to dysfunction and neural pathophysiology. These changes are shown to ameliorate symptoms and restore physiology. This 6-part series describes the incontrovertible acknowledgement and weight of recognition of the effect of physical, biomechanical, and physiological vertebral disturbances collectively contributing to the VSC and demonstrates strong support of the chiropractic nomenclature, neurophysiological and clinical implications of the Vertebral Subluxation Complex as recorded in the medical literature. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This is the fifth of a 6-paper series which presents a descriptive narrative of the Western medical literature to identify and report evidence for each of the five principles of the Vertebral Subluxation Complex (VSC) premise as established in 1947 by Janse, Houser, and Wells (National College of Chiropractic). This literature includes Chiropractic papers in the medical indices and is additional to that from the chiropractic perspective which is available in the electronic Index to Chiropractic Literature. This paper presents the evidence for Principle Four by documenting the evidence for the signs, symptoms, and a range of conditions associated with segmental, neural disturbance. This 6-part series describes the incontrovertible acknowledgement and weight of recognition of the effect of physical, biomechanical, and physiological vertebral disturbances collectively contributing to the VSC and demonstrates strong support of the chiropractic nomenclature, neurophysiological and clinical implications of the Vertebral Subluxation Complex as recorded in the medical literature. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This is the fourth of a 6-paper series which presents a descriptive narrative of the Western medical literature to identify and report evidence for each of the five principles of the Vertebral Subluxation Complex (VSC) premise as established in 1947 by Janse, Houser, and Wells (National College of Chiropractic). This literature comprises predominately medical referencing and includes Chiropractic papers in the electronic Index to Chiropractic Literature. This paper presents the evidence for Principle Three by documenting the evidence for the clinical findings of altered physiological function associated with the VSC including effects on skeletal muscle, vascular smooth muscle, sphincters and organs. This 6-part series describes the incontrovertible acknowledgement and weight of recognition of the effect of physical, biomechanical, and physiological vertebral disturbances collectively contributing to the VSC and demonstrates strong support of the chiropractic nomenclature, neurophysiological and clinical implications of the Vertebral Subluxation Complex as recorded in the medical literature. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This is the third of a 6-paper series which presents a descriptive narrative of the Western medical literature to identify and report evidence for each of the five principles of the Vertebral Subluxation Complex (VSC) premise as established in 1947 by Janse, Houser, and Wells (National College of Chiropractic). This literature is additional to that from the chiropractic perspective which is available in the electronic Index to Chiropractic Literature. The first paper, in two parts, introduced the series and gave evidence for Principle One that 'a vertebrae may subluxate'. This third paper presents the evidence for Principle Two by documenting the evidence for the factors associated with the somatic vertebrogenic element. This 6-part series describes the incontrovertible acknowledgement and weight of recognition of the effect of physical, biomechanical, and physiological vertebral disturbances collectively contributing to the VSC and demonstrates strong support of the chiropractic nomenclature, neurophysiological and clinical implications of the Vertebral Subluxation Complex as recorded in the medical literature. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In August 2023 RMIT University (Melbourne, Australia) announced it would cease delivering a program of chiropractic education. The program commenced in 1975 and was the first in the world to be funded by a National government. Today it is officially being 'taught out' and will cease to be in just 4 years. As irresponsible as this decision may seem from a Chiropractor's perspective, it remains RMIT's right to determine which programs it delivers and those which it does not. The lesson the profession must learn is that state-funded universities can not be expected to reflect the passion that their education creates in its graduates, especially Chiropractors. In past papers I have made this comment and now formalise and index it: 'Australia's publicly-funded institutions of higher education have no redeeming qualities to warrant them holding custody of a program of Chiropractic education'; they most certainly do not and can not replicate the integrity of a purpose-focussed private college nor match the integrity and academic commitment evident in many non-Australian universities throughout East Asia which are guided by a strong social conscience. The usual claim is that a university with multiple disciplines provides cross-fertilisation of ideas and high levels of teaching quality from discipline experts in other fields, but in Australia this can not really be claimed to have been found true. There is also a claim that within a university Chiropractic academics will hone their scholarship, write, and publish; we know this is laughable. RMIT has been far from exceptional for Chiropractic education for most of its 30 or so years as a university created by one political party's agenda. It is healthy for the profession to now be forced into examining new models of education to better serve the profession and create a stronger professional identity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]