The Koren Wellness Journey
About Us - How Koren Wellness Came to Be
Throughout my life, I’ve experienced the ups and downs of healthcare. I’ve suffered, I’ve overcome, I’ve learned, I’ve grown. I’ve accumulated much knowledge as a result.
Koren Wellness encompasses exploring the wonders of the human body, vitalism and the differences between expressive and suppressive healthcare. I’ve come to believe that with knowledge we are able to make better choices and with better choices, we can achieve greater health. I am here to share that with you.
Expressive vs. Suppressive
One of the best ways to describe the difference between natural, vitalistic healthcare, my area of focus, and mechanistic or orthodox medicine can be summarized as the following: expressive versus suppressive care. Much of medical care involves the suppression of symptoms with drugs or the removal of symptoms with surgery. The patient may temporarily feel better but there is a downside to this: the problems do not go away or disappear – they go deeper into the body. The constant suppression of symptoms has long been known to lead to serious permanent or chronic disease.
Conversely, chiropractic and other natural healing approaches respect symptoms as how the body restores the individual to balance, homeostasis and health. My life story can shed some light on the how I came to trust such an approach.
The Early Years - Learning Through Experience
My Upbringing
I was born in Brooklyn, NY and the approach to healthcare those days was that people only went to doctors when they were sick, really sick. Who had money to spend on regular visits?
I am the oldest of four boys; the twins, Jeffrey and Jay, are 22 months younger than me and the youngest, David, is 8 years younger. Our grandmother brought her health methods with her from the old country. For example, whenever we had a fever out came the enema bulb. We hid in closets, bathrooms and under beds. “I’m feeling better,” we’d plead. It never worked. But the fever would miraculously disappear and we’d be hydrated as well and then have to go to school the next day. I remember how she was often there with a mustard plaster to apply to my chest and back whenever I had a bad cough. Her remedies always worked. Her sitting by the bed and talking, feeling our foreheads and holding us surely helped.
When the famous Robert Mendelsohn, MD said, “One grandmother is worth two pediatricians,” he was certainly talking about mine.
In the neighborhood, most everyone’s grandparents spoke with Eastern European accents and had the ritual of going to the sweat baths (the schvitzes) in Coney Island every week. It was a tradition. They would join their neighbors and friends, spending time detoxing from the stress of work, kids, family and problems.
The Measles
I was about five when I got the measles. Most everyone in my grade got it. It meant a rash, a few days off from school, reading in bed and orange soda (don’t ask). If a few kids in a neighborhood got measles today hysterical reporters would cry “epidemic” and the health department would declare some sort of emergency but it was a normal rite of passage and we’d never get the measles again. No one paid any great notice.
But a week later the family MD made a house call for a relative who lived downstairs and stopped in to give me a penicillin shot. I have no idea why. Shortly thereafter I was covered in red raised blotches. “I think the measles came back,” I told my parents. The MD immediately returned, looked at me and announced, “He’s allergic to penicillin. He’s OK now but If he gets another shot it may kill him.” I preferred the enema.
The twins also got the measles but the youngest got the measles shot. David is the only one of the four of us with allergies and asthma. Years later I asked him why he was the only one of us with asthma. “It was from the measles shot,” he told me. I think he would have preferred a few days of the measles instead of lifelong illness. He became an MD. Go figure.
Walking Pneumonia
When I was 9 I was diagnosed with walking pneumonia. I had to leave our summer bungalow in the wilds of far off New Jersey (it seemed wild and far off) to return to our apartment in Brooklyn to convalesce under the watchful eye of my grandmother. The family doctor made a house call, gave me a shot and struck my sciatic nerve. I still remember the searing pain. He came back two days later to give me another shot. The doctor came into my bedroom, woke me up, and was preparing my next injection, but grandma ran interference. She said to me, “First walk for the doctor.” I couldn’t. I fell to the floor, grabbed the dresser and pulled myself up, paralyzed and in pain on one side from the waist down.
“What did you do to my grandchild?” she screamed at him. He stood there silent. She physically threw him out of our apartment. I think the MD learned a big lesson that day: don’t mess with a Jewish grandmother’s grandchild.
Grandma called Dr. Friedland, the neighborhood chiropractor, who also made house calls. After his first visit, I could walk pain-free. After his second visit my pneumonia disappeared. He was warm, friendly and didn’t gave me any shots. I felt better each time he came to work on me. I liked him. I went back to New Jersey to enjoy the rest of the summer. (I was surprised to discover, years later, that chiropractors also helped back pain.) In retrospect, this was part of a larger journey that led me to chiropractic school after college.
My Professional & Healing Journey
Chiropractic School
I was supposed to go to medical school and my younger brothers were to follow in my footsteps. But I zigged and they zagged and I went to chiropractic school instead. At the Sherman College of Chiropractic, I rediscovered the ancient natural philosophy of healing and vitalism that was being lost amidst the modern infatuation with drugs and surgery. I especially liked chiropractic’s natural, drug-free procedures of locating and addressing the cause of body malfunction rather than treating symptoms – allowing the body to do what it was designed to do.
When I entered chiropractic school I unknowingly became a participant in an ancient war. For over 2,500 years there has been a conflict in healthcare philosophies – best expressed as the conflict between empirical and mechanistic healers and often described as expressive versus suppressive healthcare. Chiropractic and various natural approaches are of the empirical school while orthodox medicine is of the mechanist school. Far from being a cause of stress this conflict helped me make sense out of the various ways healthcare was practiced in different professions.
From Educated to Educator
After graduating from Sherman College of Chiropractic (as class valedictorian) I jumped into private practice and professional involvement. I helped found Pennsylvania's only chiropractic college where I taught for nearly two years.
I later hosted a two-hour radio call-in show on commercial radio every week in Philadelphia called “Holistic Hotline.” I met many of the leaders of the natural healing community in the greater Philadelphia area and was exposed to various healing modalities. It was a great education to help me make sense out of this often-confusing world of health choices.
Vaccination
With a child on the way the question of childhood vaccination became a personal one. I had to know whether or not vaccinating my child was a good thing to do. I immersed myself in the subject; I went to professional conferences, read books, articles in bio-medical journals, met researchers and eventually formed an opinion: our children would not be vaccinated. I began writing on the subject and continue to do so.
Koren Publications
I also wrote for professional publications and practiced full time. My patients asked lots of questions but I couldn’t find good quality chiropractic patient education materials to give them. To fill that void, I founded Koren Publications to publish my writings as patient education brochures.
They were a hit! Koren Publications (KP) became the most popular supplier of patient education materials in the chiropractic profession with over 100 million in distribution; KP products have also been sold under license in the UK, Australia and Japan. In addition to brochures, we branched out to posters, charts, office forms, stickers, books and other unique products.
Speaking Circuit
My wife Beth felt that people needed to know the person behind the publications and convinced me (after a lot of resistance on my part) to get on the lecture circuit. I became a popular speaker for chiropractic state associations, conventions and other professional events all across North America, England, Japan, Korea, Australia, Panama, Ireland, Germany, Israel and other places speaking on chiropractic research, history, philosophy, childhood vaccinations, natural healing and other topics.
Koren Specific Technique
All was going well until I was in an accident. I was struck on the head and suffered a concussion. My arms, neck, head, shoulders, wrists and hands were so painful and weak that I was forced to give up my license to practice. I searched for help and over a ten-year period visited chiropractors, natural healers, MDs, osteopaths, bodyworkers and others seeking relief. No one could provide me with more than a brief respite. I always felt there was a natural approach to my problems; I did not wish to go the drugs and surgery route. With nowhere else to turn, I began to experiment on myself and in the process discovered what would later be called Koren Specific Technique (KST). Using KST, my (by that time) ten years of neck, shoulder and hand pain disappeared after five days of self-care using this new protocol. Beth’s 12 years of migraines never returned.
After spending nearly 18 months working on and helping the worst patients (doctors who, like me, continued to suffer after seeing numerous healers) I was asked to teach this new work. Now we teach Koren Specific Technique (KST) to various professionals, as well as lay people, all over the world.
It is incredibly gratifying. As a lone practitioner, I could only help my patients but through my students I could help millions. An added benefit.
And More To Come...
It's been my unshakeable belief in the wisdom of the body and its power to heal that has guided my choices throughout what you’ve read about above as well as healthcare decisions for my wife and our children. It’s also been at the core of my determination throughout my legal battles (including successfully standing up to the US government) on behalf of the chiropractic profession and the public’s right to freedom of choice in their healthcare.
I continue to teach, to lecture and to learn.
Please join me and the Koren Wellness team on this unfolding journey. We promise you exciting, informative and helpful information that will make a difference for your entire life.