DEFENDING APPLIED KINESIOLOGY AND MANUAL MUSCLE TESTING

 Drs.  McDowall and Cuthbert responded to a publication entitled  “A Review of the Literature in Applied and Specialised Kinesiology” by Hall, Lewith, Brien, and Little that appeared in the peer-reviewed and PubMed indexed journal Forschende Komplementarmedizin, 2008;15:40-46. We replied to their critique denying the reliability and validity of the manual muscle test, applied kinesiology, and Touch for Health methods with a commentary.  Our work was given a generous word count in the Letter to the Editor section.

You can view the abstract of the Hall et al paper by CLICKING HERE.

Hall’s literature review used inclusion criteria that paradoxically excluded the research behind the standardized methods of MMT (from Kendall and Kendall and used by the ICAK ) because, according to Hall et al this research does not investigate the type of MMT used in the “kinesiology” method. The type of testing their literature review limited itself to, was the light “two-finger pressure testing” used by some elements of the Touch for Health community.  From their review of the literature regarding this type of “two-finger pressure testing,” they assert that there is no substantive evidence for the reliability or the validity of the MMT used by ICAK member doctors and other physicians who use the MMT (neurologists, rheumatologists, orthopaedists, physical therapists, dentists, etc.).

The authors do provide a useful methodology for future “Kinesiology” research, but why they chose to ignore the research literature that validates traditional MMT is perplexing.  Their paper definitely reflected negatively upon AK as well as Touch for Health (two methods that should not have been confused with one another), and the published research evidence for AK they simply ignored.

Hall’s original paper and our commentary about it can be purchased from Forschende Komplementarmedizin by download for $15 each.  We believe this journal will continue to publish papers regarding Applied Kinesiology and Touch for Health.  We encourage our colleagues, both English and German speaking, to submit papers of interest to this journal. It is peer reviewed and indexed with PubMed.

Contact Dr. McDowall or Dr. Cuthbert if you would like more information or help.

Donald McDowall:  cosmos2k@bigpond.net.au

Scott Cuthbert:  cranialdc@hotmail.com

AK Article on the Treatment of Asthma in Children

Highly accessed study confirms the validity of Applied Kinesiology manual muscle testing