AAA Clinics

@ Copyright2003 by Arthur Dale Ericsson,MD. *, Kenneth Pittaway, ND. **, and Rongjian Lai, M.5.; USA

Introduction

There has been considerable controversy regarding the efficacy and accuracy of any of the ElectroDermal screening devices for either the analysis of medical conditions or any disorder of the biological system.

The basic concept for all of the ElectroDermal screening devices, was the invention of Dr. Reinhardt Voll[1], who in the 1940s, discovered that the electrical resistance of the human body is not homogenous and that meridians existed over the body which may be demonstrated as electrical fields. Furthermore, he showed that the skin is a semi-insulator to the outside environment. By the 1950s Voll had learned that the body had at least 1000 points on the skin which followed the 12 lines of the classical Chinese meridians. Each of these points, Voll[2] called a Measurement Point (MP). Working with an engineer, Fritz Werner, Voll created an instrument to measure the skin resistance at each of the acupuncture points, patterned after a technique called Galvanic Skin Resistance (GSR). This was named Point Testing. In 1953, Voll had established the procedure that became known as Electro-Acupuncture according to Voll (EAVJ. This included two parts:

1. The first part was point testing in which a conductance measurement was taken in selected acupuncture points.

2. The second part was the establishment of a balance of the points and conductance by the use of feedback medicine. This became known as Medicine Testing.

During the 1950s, many investigators[3] including Nakatani studied the electrical conductance of the skin. They evaluated the elasticity, resistance, permeability, and chemistry among many other properties of the skin and found that there was a much lower skin resistance (higher conductance) at specific points on the skin. Normally, the skin has a resistance of 2-4 million Ohms but over the specific conductance points, the resistance of only 100,000 Ohms is found in normal healthy persons. These points corresponded to classical acupuncture points.

Later, these acupuncture points were investigated and were considered to be "information access windows" and the assumption was made that the health status of an organ will affect the concentrations of the ions at the measurement points along the meridian (measurement points). It was considered that inflammation of an organ may cause increase ion concentration and the increase of ions enhances the flow of electrons causing resistance to decrease while the conductance may increase. On the other hand, a degeneration of an organ may cause decease in ion concentration that hinders the flow of electrons, so as the resistance increases conductance decreases.

During the procedure of ElectroDermal analysis the body becomes an integral part of a closed circuit. The conductance circuit touches two areas on the body being tested. In the first point of contact, the ground electrode is held in the palm of the opposite hand to be tested. In the second place the test probe touches the specific acupuncture or conductance points on skin. After completing this closed circuit, a known amount of electric current is emitted from the instrument through the probe. The instrument then measures the conductance from baseline to peak and return to baseline through the conductance point that is being tested by the probe. This represents a dynamic conductance value.

Study Design

This study of ElectroDermal Analysis was designed as blinded to the EDA technician in which 100 patients were evaluated by the EDA technique without the aid of either a medical history or a physical examination or diagnosis and the same patient/subject was immediately evaluated by a separate rater, a medical doctor (MD) who had the benefit of a complete history and physical examination and complete laboratory test results. Following the data pooling an additional biostatistician evaluated and correlated the results. The construction of the study was to measure the capability of the EDA system for the purpose of evaluating the functional disorders of various systems of the human body and to evaluate the EDA without interview technique. This study was conducted after filing and with the approval of a United States Food and Drug Administration-approved Investigational Review Board.

Method of Study
In the first phase, each of the patients was randomly assigned to the study after appropriate approval was granted under the Good Practice Act. A complete medical and surgical history and examination was obtained at the time of the study and all of the necessary supporting laboratory data was provided to support the medical diagnosis. Each patient was evaluated, without any interview, by the EDA technician and then by the medical doctor. A diagnosis was made on the basis of the neurological examination, presence of antibodies, previous teased single fiber Sural nerve and muscle biopsies and detailed biochemical laboratory data. The laboratory, biopsy data, and neurological evaluation for each patient was compared to the medical diagnosis and the EDA graphic recording. Control patients without Chronic Inflammatory Demyelinating Polyneuropathy were also tested by the same EDA technician. Complete Human Leukocyte Antigen (HLA) typing was performed on over 100 patients with symptomatic Chronic Inflammatory Demyelinating Peripheral neuropathy Associated with Silicone Breast Implants[4] and it was found that the consistent pattern of genetic preponderance was DR13 in 30%, DR15 in 44%, DR51 in 32%, DR52 in 60%, DR53 in 46% and DQ1-DQ2 each in 34% of the patients. Moreover, combinations of DR13, DR15 with DR51, DR52 and DR53 appeared to be present in the most severely afflicted patients.

Equipment and Use

ElectroDermal Screening (EDS) and Analysis (EDA) consists of obtaining conductance measurements at different (acupuncture) locations on the skin, storing these baseline measurements and displaying these readings on a monitor. The normal flow of electrical energy is briefly inhibited by a micro current and the conductance was again measured. Three recordings are made at each acupuncture point; baseline, peak recovery and a second baseline. These recordings have been named the base and the balance tests. While the subject is the ground for a closed system, the instrument functions as a micro-Ohm meter. The technique is non-invasive and has no-risk to the subject. The instrument is calibrated to read the resistance on a scale of 0 (lowest conductance) to 100 (highest conductance). The higher conductance has been associated with inflammation while the lower conductance is associated with degeneration. Each of these acupuncture points become part of one or more channels or meridians and generally follow the Chinese Meridian lines. It is customary, therefore, to measure the conductance over many acupuncture points in one meridian. Thus, one point served to be a control for another point. Ordinarily, the normal individual will register about 50 plus or minus 5-10 on this scale for each point. In general, it is thought that the point of higher conductance represents an imbalance with higher energy while a lower conductance represent an imbalance with lower energy. However, this does not imply that a EDS disturbance (higher or lower conductance) corresponds to pathological changes in an organ that is named as a specific acupuncture point or meridian.

Analysis of Data

The patient population ranged in age from 25 to 62 with a mean of 47.5. There were 130 females in the study as compared to 0 males. The diagnostic categories included:

1.

Chronic Inflammatory Demyelinating Polyneuropathy - 100 patients

Each of these symptomatic patients were associated with a autoimmune etiology and had significant weakness and muscle bulk loss, distal sensory abnormalities as well as a variety of ELISA abnormalities and conclusive nerve -muscle biopsy that confirmed the diagnosis.

2.

Age-matched control subjects - 30 patients.

Each of the patients/means of the data was statistically analyzed for rise/fall and peak in each of 54 acupuncture points. Furthermore, each patient was screened for history of medical illness, clinical features of disease and each had a complete laboratory evaluation which included a automated chemistry profile, glucose and complete blood count with sedimentation rate.

3.

Statistical Analysis

Deviations of more than 1 standard deviation from the mean for each acupuncture (testing point) were calculated and the statistical mean was plotted for each patient/subject and group. Statistical difference of the means was then developed and calculated using the ANOVA method.

Results

The acupuncture points/meridians used for this study were lymph, palatine tonsil, lung, peripheral and central nervous systems, circulation, allergy, endocrine system (thyroid, pituitary, adrenal), heart, stomach, small and large intestines, pancreas, liver and gallbladder, kidney, carbohydrate metabolism, joint degeneration, connective tissue, skin, spleen, urinary bladder, uterus and fatty degeneration.

The mean data points with 1 SD variance for the 100 patients with peripheral neuropathy were consistently found in allergy (each patient has diffuse autoimmune disease with multiple allergies), circulation (profound vascular arteritis was demonstrated on biopsy), endocrine abnormities included 47% incidence of measurable symptomatic thyroiditis and multiple estrogen/progesterone abnormalities, subtle hepatic (liver abnormalities with gall bladder obstructive disease, and significant lymphatic disturbances with silicone deposits found in multiple nodes and spleen).

Utilizing this technique, the statistical variation for each mean acupuncture point was calculated for the purpose of defining the appropriate diagnosis/ drug/remedy for therapy for the peripheral neuropathy. It was noted that the variance of the means in the peripheral neuropathy group demonstrates significantly less variation than the control (non-neuropathy) patients.