“People come in and they’re in terrible pain, and when they walk out, they feel a lot better,” says Dr. Alan Duben of Duben Holistic Chiropractic Center in Westlake Village. “They can play with their grandkids again, or sit at their computers and work, and just continue with their lifestyles.”
As an athlete and competitor in Olympic weightlifting, in 1996 Dr. Duben was benched by a serious back injury. After going to many traditional doctors and therapists, he went to a chiropractor and was back on his feet in less than a week.
“I went on to become a two-time collegiate national champion in 1997 and 1998. I owe a great deal to him for my athletic accomplishments; he kept my body balanced and after that, I rarely got hurt or even sick.”
His partner, Dr. Lindsay Erickson, also discovered the wonders of chiropractic medicine at a young age. She went from being a healthy child to a sickly college student suffering from bouts of strep throat and chronic sinus infections. After having her tonsils removed and taking rounds of antibiotics, she entered chiropractic college and found a better solution for her problems. She began to get adjusted on a regular basis and never suffered from another sinus infection.
While traditional chiropractors make adjustments to put the body back into alignment, Drs. Duben and Erickson take it much further. Back in 1895, the originator of chiropractic medicine, Dr. Daniel David Palmer, had something called a Triad of Health, which encompassed structure, nutrition and emotion, explains Dr. Duben.
“Most other chiropractors are just doing one side of that triangle—they're dealing with the structure, and it works, but I knew it wasn't enough.”
Their approach is holistic—they deal with each part of the triad to provide patients with not only temporary pain relief, but lifelong physical and emotional health.
“Our diagnostic is based off of a technique called applied kinesiology, which is muscle testing, so we’re essentially using your body as its own diagnostic tool, like a biofeedback mechanism,” he says.
For example, if a patient is experiencing hip pain, they’re going to test all the muscles around the hip. Is the muscle turned on or off? If they find a muscle's not working, they then figure out what modality is needed to treat it.
“That's when we get into the holistic approach,” says Dr. Duben. “Do we need to go in a physical direction, an emotional direction or a nutritional direction?
“What I found through different types of nutritional testing was that if their physiology wasn't functioning well, I had to figure out the specific nutrient or nutrients they needed,” he says. In order to discover what these deficiencies are, Duben Holistic Chiropractic Center utilizes functional testing that allows the doctors to find if a specific nutrient is needed. These results also allow the doctors to ascertain whether patients are predisposed to any conditions or issues that could impact their health.
“We also use the Heart Sound Recorder, where we're listening to the mechanical movements of the heart,” says Dr. Duben. “From the noises of the heart, we're able to find out what nutrition their heart is missing. The brain and heart are fantastic windows into the body.”
For the past 20 years, the practice has been using supplements from an organic farm in Wisconsin and others from an herbal company in Australia. These supplements can also be ordered on their website.
“We were doing a lot of nutritional work but still didn't feel like we were helping people enough,” he says. “Since the last part of that triad was emotions, we started using NET (Neuro-emotional Technique), which identifies and helps patients release emotional patterns that can lead to physical ailments. It’s a very simple, quick adjustment that happens to the spine while the patient focuses on a traumatic event.”
When it comes to his own nutrition, Dr. Duben is fortunate to be married to a personal chef.
“Marcy and I are definitely foodies and whenever we go on vacation, it's about the restaurants and trying new things.” One of the couple’s favorite pastimes is going on walking food tours in different cities with their teenagers, Asher and Kaia.
To experience this holistic treatment for yourself and live life to the fullest, visit DocDuben.com.
