West Campus alumnus Dr.
Robert Adams, ’87, was recently featured on the PBS program “Healing Quest,”
which, according to the show’s website, “is the only weekly national television
series focused on the latest in integrative health and natural approaches in
wellness.”
Dr. Adams’ segment on the program, which debuted in
2003, and is now broadcast on more than 100 PBS stations throughout the U.S., as
well as nearly a dozen broadcast networks around the world, focused on his work
in the field of chiropractic neurology, and how he is utilizing this technique
to help children with learning disabilities reduce their dependency on
pharmaceutical drugs.
Dr. Adams has maintained a practice with his father,
Davenport graduate Dr. James Adams, ’62, in Sonoma, Calif., since graduating
from Palmer’s West Campus 23 years ago. The Adams chiropractic family also
includes Dr. Robert’s cousin, fellow West graduate Dr. David Adams, ’88, the son
of Davenport graduate Dr. James Adams, who maintains a practice in Santa
Clara.
One of Dr.
Robert’s current patients knows one of the Healing Quest producers, who
contacted him to discuss a segment on chiropractic. When Dr. Adams mentioned his
success in utilizing chiropractic neurology as a means by which to help children
with learning disabilities, the producer decided to make this the focus of the
segment, which was one of the stories featured in the episode originally
broadcast the last week of November.
Dr. Adams, who earned his diplomate from the American
College of Chiropractic Neurology in 1993, says the ability to precisely adjust
certain areas of the nervous system without drugs is a major advantage of
chiropractic. By providing parents of ADD-afflicted children with a powerful,
natural alternative, Dr. Adams has had many young patients referred to him by
teachers throughout Sonoma who are interested in learning about how to deal with
learning challenges without using pharmaceuticals.
“The nervous systems in
these kids are phenomenal; they’re just waiting for some help, they’re trying to
get stimulated,” says Dr. Adams in the segment.
“The paradox here is that you have a child with
hyperactivity, yet the typical medical model (in treating ADD) is to do what? To
give them medications, which are amphetamines, to slow them down. Instead of
taking a medication that affect both sides of the brain, which affects
everything, you want to target the area of the brain that’s deficient, to bring
it up to higher frequency of firing, so it won’t inhibit itself.”
In addition to focusing
on Dr. Adams’ specific work in helping children with learning disabilities
through his “Brain Back Body” neurotechology-focused exercise program (www.theneurotechnologies.com), he also promotes
chiropractic as an effective way for patients to maintain a strong immune
system, and cites the results of a study by the Sloan-Kettering Institute in New
York, which showed that patients who’d been adjusted monthly for five years had
200 percent better immuno-competence than the average person, and 400 percent
better than sick people.
Four hours of filming in Dr. Adams’ office resulted in
the 6:56 segment on the program, whose trio of hosts include singer Olivia
Newton-John, and which also features weekly advice from alternative medicine
proponent Dr. Deepak Chopra. Dr. Adams, a former Eagle Scout who has served as a
Sonoma-area Scoutmaster for 12 years, gives the producers a “thumbs-up” for
their final edited report.
“My primary motivation for agreeing to take part was
to use this national stage as way to help promote chiropractic, not to promote
me,” said Dr. Adams, a third-degree black belt in Tae Kwon Do, who served as ASG
treasurer during his days as a West Campus student, and also was a two-time West
Campus delegate at the World Congress of Chiropractic Students (WCCS).
“I think it’s a nice
presentation, and it shows that as doctors of chiropractic, we’re more than just
musculoskeletal specialists,” said Dr. Adams, past president of the California
Chiropractic Association North Bay Society, from which he received “Doctor of
the Year” Honors in 1995.
To learn more about the “Healing Quest”
program, go to: www.healingquest.tv. To see the
“Healing Quest” segment with Dr. Adams, go to the program’s YouTube page: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3IZ4-bnf_2U.