Autobiography of janet travell md cases

In 1963, the prospect of a 2-day lecture demonstration on myofascial trigger points (MTrPs) by Janet G. Travell, the White House physician to President Kennedy, delighted me, a staff flight surgeon at the United States Air Force's School of Aerospace Medicine. She was responding to an invitation by my chief, Larry Lamb, MD, who was the lead cardiologist in the USAF and who thought of Janet as a great pioneer in cardiology and myogenic pain. The only thing I knew about MTrPs was that years earlier my chief at the Space Medicine Laboratory in Alamogordo, New Mexico—Col. John P. Stapp, the fastest man on earth via rocket sled—had identified a trigger point as the cause of an enigmatic shoulder pain in a staff member of the laboratory.

Janet's lectures were a revelation to me. So this was the cause of most of my muscular aches and pains and those of my friends, family, and colleagues! Although I preferred research to general clinical practice, such an enigmatic yet common myogenic source of human suffering posed an irresistible challenge. The cause of this myogenic pain was clearly overlooked in medical training and practice, but diagnosable and treatable by an expert.

Her demonstrations were awe-inspiring: a focused medical history, a meticulous history of the onset of pain, a detailed identification of the pain pattern, a demonstration of the painfully restricted range of motion, and a finger placed unerringly on the exquisitely tender trigger point. Her application of spray and stretch to that muscle (using Fluori-Methane) always produced immediate and impressive, if not complete, relief of pain and restored full range of motion. Occasionally, she injected a refractory MTrP with 0.5% procaine.

Two years later, in 1965, I retired from the US Air Force and joined the central office of the Veterans Administration (VA, now Veterans Affairs) as coordinator of research for physical medicine and rehabilitation throughout th

Chiropractic Applications

Janet Travell, MD, is one of the most recognized physicians of modern history. Her notoriety is attributed primarily to two events:

• Myofascial problems and its consequent symptoms are nearly a universal human experience. Dr. Travell was an early pioneer in understanding the science, pathophysiology, and treatment of myofascial problems. She has been referred to as “the mother of myofascial trigger point knowledge”(1).
• President John F. Kennedy suffered from a notorious bad back. His back problems significantly worsened by his legendary heroism in August of 1943 during the sinking of his boat PT-109 in the Pacific during WWII. Injured (he was awarded the Purple Heart for the event) Kennedy twice swam for miles in the Pacific Ocean, towing an injured crewmember with a life jacket strap in his teeth. Kennedy’s back problems never fully recovered. In 1954, Kennedy underwent an attempted spinal fusion operation, and it went badly; it was his second spinal surgery for his persistent low back pain. He nearly died, and his recovery took 8 months. The following year, Kennedy came under the care of myofascial pain expert Janet Travell, MD. When Kennedy was elected president of the United States (taking office in 1961), he chose Dr. Travell to be his personal White House Physician. Dr. Travell was the first female physician to hold this prestigious office (2, 3, 4).

Dr. Janet Travell was born in New York in 1901, the daughter of a physician. She died in 1997 at the age of 96. In 1926, she received her MD degree from the Cornell University Medical College in New York City, where she graduated at the head of her class. Interestingly, she was the first female to graduate from Cornell. In the first three decades of her professional career she practiced cardiology while teaching pharmacology at Cornell. Her interest in musculoskeletal pain came about as a consequence of the neck, trunk, shoulder, and arm pains her cardiac patient

by Erin McCloskey

In this issue of AK [the AK Journal] we proudly feature a past pioneer in alternative medicine. The work of Dr. Janet Travell has influenced traditional and alternative medicine and is one of the foundations of kinesiological medicine. Her revolutionary discoveries into the alleviation of myofascial pain led to the identification of what she defined as "trigger points" and the development of trigger point therapy which has not only led to a recognized modality for treating myofascial pain but it has allowed thousands of people to seek relief from pain that was often previously diagnosed as chronic or untreatable. Dr. Travell challenged a conservative medical profession hesitant to accept alternative health care back in the 1950s and she had a strong and positive influence on the public to investigate such options.

In 1922, she was accepted into Cornell University Medical College, one of nine women in a class of 63 students, and she proceeded to graduate with the John Metcalf Polk Memorial Award for highest academic achievement held throughout the 4-year program. She was taken on faculty at Cornell in 1930 and by 1951 she was Associate Professor of Clinical Pharmacology. Afterwards, she held the positions of Associate (1961-70) and then Emeritus (1970-88) Clinical Professor of Medicine at the George Washington University School of Medicine.

Dr. Travell remained, throughout her career, undaunted by a predominantly male institution. From medical school onward she was undoubtedly a great mentor for professional women throughout the 20th century. Perhaps some of her confidence came from the support she was given by one of her own mentors: her father. Willard Travell, M.D. (1869-1961) was a specialist in electrotherapy, and later physiotherapy, and a pioneer in the field of manipulative medicine and x-ray therapy. He encouraged both Janet and her sister Virginia to fulfill their intentions to

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