Sutherland's Cranial Bowl_Kenneth J. Lossing, DO

W.G. Sutherland started thinking of cranial bone movement while a student at Kirksville (1899). He worked on his approach while treating patients for the next 40 years or so, before he started to formally teach.  These first 40 years he treated the sutures like joints, using interlaced fingers to apply a force on either side of the suture to improve its flexibility and position. His diagnosis was made from observation, and motion testing. Shortly after the time he started formally teaching, he modified his approach to using, in addition to manual technique, respiration as an activating force, thereby requiring less force from the practitioner. He also changed his diagnostic approach from motion testing to simply initiating motion. In the last few years of his life, the treatment approach was modified again to use the inherent motility of the CNS, inherent force of the tide, and “Liquid Light” to do the treatment. As far as we can tell, his 40+ years of freeing the mobility of the container of the skull, allowed him to be able to palpate deeper, feeling specific motions of the brain, since if the container is softer, you can more easily palpate deeper. 

In this class we will explore the earliest approaches, as explained in his first book “The Cranial Bowl”. This approach is very efficient, very fast, and is reproducible. It provides the cranial practitioner with safe approaches that can deal very effectively with trauma and “locked” sutures. Dr. Sutherland also analyzed cranial trauma vectors and resultant strain patterns. As far as we can tell, this approach had not been organized as a course for nearly 65 years. 

Topics: History of Dr. Sutherland, Dr. Arbuckle and Dr. Fulford. Trauma biomechanics of the head, locking, normal range of mobility. Evaluation, diagnosis of SBS, base, OA, face. Mandible, cervical spine, sacrum, diaphragm. Unlocking. General technique, occiput. Traumatic lesions: frontoparietal, parietosquamous, parietofrontal, parietooccipital, occiptomastoid, occiptoatlantal, migraine, dental, zygomatic, maxillary, palatine, ethmoid. Reciprocal Tension Membrane. Ventricles: 3^rd, 4^th, lateral. Techniques:  incitant CSF, vault lift, parietal spread, frontal lift, SBS, petrous, 4 hand, molding, venous drainage.