---
title: "Vertebral subluxation"
chunk: 3/5
source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vertebral_subluxation"
category: "reference"
tags: "science, encyclopedia"
date_saved: "2026-05-05T03:38:10.932831+00:00"
instance: "kb-cron"
---

It has been proposed that a vertebral subluxation can negatively affect general health by altering the neurological communication between the brain, spinal cord and peripheral nervous system. Although individuals may not always be symptomatic, straight chiropractors believe that the presence of vertebral subluxation is in itself justification for correction via spinal adjustment.
V. Strang, D.C., describes several hypotheses on how a misaligned vertebra may cause interference to the nervous system in his book, Essential Principles of Chiropractic:

Nerve compression hypothesis: suggests that when the vertebrae are out of alignment, the nerve roots and/or spinal cord can become pinched or irritated.  While the most commonly referenced hypothesis, and easiest for a patient to understand, it may be the least likely to occur.
Proprioceptive insult hypothesis: focuses on articular alterations causing hyperactivity of the sensory nerve fibers.
Somatosympathetic reflex hypothesis: all the visceral organ functions can be reflexly affected by cutaneous or muscular stimulation.
Somatosomatic reflex hypothesis: afferent impulses from one part of the body can result in reflex activity in other parts of the body.
Viscerosomatic reflex hypothesis: visceral afferent fibers cause reflex somatic problems.
Somatopsychic hypothesis: the effects of a subluxation on the ascending paths of the reticular activating system.
Neurodystrophic hypothesis: focuses on lowered tissue resistance that results from abnormal innervation.
Dentate ligament-cord distortion hypothesis: upper cervical misalignment can cause the dentate ligaments to put a stress on the spinal cord.
Psychogenic hypothesis: emotions, such as stress, causing contraction in skeletal muscles.
The vertebral subluxation has been described as a syndrome with signs and symptoms which include: altered alignment; aberrant motion; palpable soft tissue changes; localized/referred pain; muscle contraction or imbalance; altered physiological function; reversible with adjustment/manipulation; focal tenderness.

=== Procedure ===

Chiropractic treatment of vertebral subluxation focuses on delivering a chiropractic adjustment which is a high velocity low amplitude (HVLA) thrust to the dysfunctional spinal segments to help correct the chiropractic subluxation complex. Spinal adjustment is the primary procedure used by chiropractors in the adjustment.

=== Disagreement amongst practitioners ===
The chiropractic subluxation is the heart of the split between "straight" and "mixer" chiropractors. Straight chiropractors continue to follow Palmer's vitalistic tradition, claiming that subluxation has considerable health effects and also adding a visceral component to the definition, while mixers, as exemplified by the United Kingdom's General Chiropractic Council, consider it a historical concept with no evidence identifying it as the cause of disease.

Some chiropractors have described the disagreements within the profession about the concept, and have written skeptically about BOOP as an antiquated idea. In 1992 one wrote:The main problem we often run into is the bone out of place (BOOP) concept. It seems we somehow step on toes when we describe the spine as a functioning entity instead of a stack of bones that can be shifted back and forth into the ideal configuration. The BOOP concept will eventually fade, and we are grateful for its contribution to chiropractic. For many decades, it offered a model to work from. This model has been updated by the rest of the healing profession, but chiropractors have been hesitant to let this antiquated model go. Some within our profession hold onto this model with a religious fervor. The chiropractic profession has moved into a new age. The BOOP concept has been updated and science is ever upon us in the 90s. Let's start asking questions again and drive the chiropractic profession kicking and screaming into the 21st century.Chiropractor David Seaman wrote in 1994 about the "brutal civil war":According to various gossip columnists in chiropractic, our profession appears to be currently enmeshed in a brutal civil war between BOOP (bone-out-of-place) practitioners and low back pain practitioners. It should be known that the BOOPers incorrectly call themselves subluxation-based practitioners. My experience has demonstrated that the BOOPers do not know enough about subluxation to call themselves subluxation-based chiropractors. We would all do well to not be subluxation-based in the BOOP sense. It should also be known that this so-called war is really an over-dramatized skirmish between vocal BOOPers and a theoretical group of anti-chiropractic DCs. I have yet to meet any of these anti-chiropractic DCs. Unfortunately, the BOOPers seem to think that those who do not embrace the totality of BOOP philosophy are merely non-BOOPers who are still very pro-chiropractic and appreciate the philosophy of chiropractic from a contemporary and nondogmatic perspective.In an article written in 2004, Seaman openly disparaged the idea still propounded by "modern-day advocates of this concept":... it is essentially impossible to have nerve interference. To summarize, nerve interference is described, by modern-day advocates of this concept, as a reduction of neural or mental impulses, which occurs in response to a bone-out-of-place (BOOP) subluxation... Clearly, the BOOP subluxation model fails miserably when considered in the light of basic neuroscience facts... BOOP subluxationists become angry and defensive when the BOOP model of subluxation is criticized... The reactionary nature of certain BOOP subluxationists is to accuse those who don't buy into the BOOP model of being anti-chiropractic—an astonishing leap of ignorance, to say the least. Furthermore, anyone who does not buy into the model is trying to "medicalize chiropractic"—another example of low-IQ thinking. And if tears do not well up in your eyes when you hear the phrase, "The power that made the body, heals the body," you are accused of having no passion for chiropractic—still another example of depressed, frontal-lobe activity. Even worse, if you don't buy into every bizarre, New Age, tree-hugging notion that comes down the pike and is circularly attached to subluxation, you will be accused of being an atheist—an excellent example of the need for psychiatrists and the drugs they prescribe.

== Evidence of condition ==