Sep
5
2023
The Father of Applied Kinesiology, George J. Goodheart, DC 1918 – 2008 died on March 5, 2008 at his home at the age of 90.
He was the Founder and Developer of Applied Kinesiology. Through his remarkable observation skills and analytical mind, Dr Goodheart found that normal and abnormal body function could be evaluated using muscle tests.
A 1939 graduate of National College of Chiropractic, Dr. Goodheart was in active practice for over 60 years in Detroit and Grosse Pointe, Michigan. He has authored numerous articles and books on Chiropractic Technique for greater than four decades. His distinguished career includes such highlights as Director of the National Chiropractic Mutual Insurance Company, Research Director for the ICAK-USA., and being the first doctor of chiropractic appointed to the U.S. Olympic Sports Medicine Committee for the 1980 Lake Placid Games.
A second generation Doctor of Chiropractic, nearly 40 years ago, he began to focus not just on skeletal structure but also on the hundreds of muscles that support the bones. He thinks of them as the body’s ambassadors — engaged in a constant, lively communication with the rest of the body. He developed a system, known as applied kinesiology, in which the muscles and surrounding nerves are manipulated not only to alleviate ordinary aches and pains but also to diagnose and treat organic diseases.
Linking muscle dysfunction to diseased organs is not entirely out of the mainstream. For years doctors measured thyroid function by testing how fast the tibial muscle jerks when the Achilles tendon is tapped. But for Goodheart, muscle testing is the diagnostic gold standard. He prods and palpates patients head to toe, searching for tiny tears where muscles attach to bone. These tears feel, he says, like “a bb under a strip of raw bacon.” When “directional pressure” is applied, the bb’s flatten, and slack muscles snap back, their strength restored.
And that, says Goodheart, may help strengthen a weakened organ. Goodheart believes that muscles and organs are linked by the same invisible neuropathways and meridian lines tweaked by acupuncturists. It took
Dr. Goodheart is listed as Innovators in Alternative Medicine by the Time magazine.
