Published: February 01, 2008 11:06 am            

VIDEO: Watch Nutrition Response Testing demonstration

Dr. Glenda Rose’s father was a chiropractor. She was raised on chiropractic care.

Her father’s healing methods so influenced and inspired her that she eventually became a chiropractor herself. But several years into her career and treating patients with time-tested methods she was raised on, she suspected something was wrong with her own health.

“I had very low energy. I was putting on weight. All I did was work, and I didn’t have any energy to do anything else,” she said at Rose Chiropractic, a Lewiston clinic she shares with her husband, Dr. Thomas Barba.

In her search to feel better, she discovered a clinic in Glens Falls that was offering a health assessment treatment called nutrition response testing. After driving six hours back and forth to the clinic once a month and receiving the treatment for several years, she noticed a remarkable improvement in her energy level.

"Now I have energy. I can go home and clean my house after work. I can go home and write reports. I can study,” she said. “It gave me a whole new life.”

Nutritional response testing involves using a patient’s body reflexes or automatic nervous system response with kinesiology, a practice of muscle testing, to get information about the body’s nutritional requirements.

For many, it’s a challenging concept to believe.

“I don’t dismiss (nutrition response testing) if it works for people, but it’s not something I feel comfortable recommending because I don’t think there’s enough evidence-based research,” said Susan Levin, a registered dietitian and spokeswoman for the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine. Levin said she prefers the “tried and true formula of eating a healthy, plant-based diet.”

Still, Rose and some of her clients believe the treatments have been life-changing.

“Without it, I’m not sure where I would be today,” said Rosemarie Ross of Youngstown, who was seeing Rose for chiropractic care when she started getting flu-like symptoms in 2000, and felt she wasn’t getting satisfactory treatment from her primary care doctor.

Rose performed nutrition response testing on Ross, who then began taking the nutritional supplements.

“When she first started doing this to me I thought, ‘My God, this is some sort of voodoo,’ but I had already put my trust in her, so I thought, ‘Hey, it was worth a shot,’ ” Ross said. “It’s brought my health back.”

“It’s the cutting edge in natural health,” said Rose, who said she knew from her own experience that the treatment made people healthier. “I believed that with all my heart. I knew something had changed by what I was experiencing and what I was seeing in my patients.”

A nutrition response test is a process of the tester placing different capsules of food items in the hand of the patient and then testing a muscle response in the body. After Rose does nutrition response testing on a patient, she is able to also offer them with any nutrients they may appear to be missing through a product line of all-natural dried whole food products in capsule form.

In February, Rose will be offering free nutrition response testing to first time patients who bring in a bag of groceries during her 18th annual “Doctors with a Heart Day.” All food collected will go to the Niagara Community Action Food Pantry. New patients can choose a chiropractic treatment or receive a nutrition response testing and a consultation.

“Doctors with a Heart Day” also offers a free introductory appointment for potential chiropractic patients. Current patients can receive an adjustment with their grocery donations.

The fundraising event gathered nearly 1,000 food items for the food pantry last year over the course of two weeks, so Rose believes the whole community benefits from the effort. “It’s a win-win situation,” she said.

Contact editor Michele DeLuca at 693-1000, ext. 157.

        

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