"It was almost immediate, I couldn't believe it, I couldn't believe it actually took the pain away," Beasler said. She explained she worked at a desk job for years, when she was laid off stress brought on intense lower back pain. "When I would walk, it would feel like the middle of my spine was being dislocated."
But while at her hair salon, someone suggested she try the chiropractor next door. Chiropractor Dr. Kevin Kita offers this new technique.
He starts by checking for the occipital drop, which is on the back of head. Dr, Kita said this biofeedback mechanism helps him determine what needs re-adjusting. Then using what's called an artherostem, he gently re-adjusts the body. The artherostem delivers tiny pulses, about twelve to fourteen per second.
"It's a different chiropractic technique," Dr. Kita said, adding, "You're still adjusting the body but you're doing it in a different way, you're doing it in a more dynamic way."
The technique was developed by Dr. Tedd Koren, a chiropractor based in Montgomery County. It claims to help all kinds of pain and help athletes, especially golfers improve their game. So we enlisted PGA golf instructor Lou Guzzi, of the Lou Guzzi Golf Academy to try it out.
Lou suffers from typical golf-related aches and pains, back and neck stiffness and elbow tendonitis. Dr. Kita says he can fix them. After going over Guzzi's medical history, Dr. Kita performed KST on Guzzi for about 30 minutes, readjusting his back, hips, knees and elbows.
He said he was even able to feel that Lou was dehydrated by 40 ounces.
As he does with all KST patients, he also treated Lou in the positions that cause the most pain.
But there is little scientific evidence to prove KST works. Dr.Michael Goldberg, a pain management specialist and chief of anesthesiology at Cooper University Hospital is skeptical.
"There's no danger to it as I can see, looking at the technique in terms of injuring something. There is danger in terms of not treating," he said. Still he said, if someone wanted to try it, along with seeing their medical doctor, it could help but he warns patients not to expect this to be a magic bullet to get rid of chronic pain.
As for Guzzi, after his treatment we followed him back to the Talamore Country Club to find out his initial thoughts on KST. He hit a few balls on the driving range and said, "feel good, definitely feels looser."
His back and neck pain were gone but the elbow tendonitis was still there. Dr. Kita and Dr. Koren both say patients can expect to feel better upon the first treatment, but bigger problems such as tendonitis might take extra treatments.
Guzzi doesn't think he was hitting the ball any better, but said he felt better. "I can definitely say what he did I can feel a difference, how long term this would be, how effective this would be, I guess time will tell."
Guzzi tells Action News a week after the treatment, the effects of feeling looser were still with him. Still he is undecided whether he would do KST again.
The developer of this technique has faced complaints about who is being trained to perform KST. He tells us he is now creating a certification program.
KST costs $150 for the first treatment and $50 for post-treatments. However, insurance plans that cover chiropractor visits should cover KST.
KST also claims to cure dyslexia and other learning difficulties. For more information, visit:
