research library

What published research says about the upper neck, condition by condition.

When the tests come back fine, it's fair to ask whether anyone has studied what you're living with. Here is what has been published on upper cervical care, in plain words, with every study linked to its source.

43 studies across 21 topics

  • Published: 1998 to 2026
  • Every study links to its source. 28 are indexed in PubMed, the U.S. National Library of Medicine's database. 15 come from the Journal of Upper Cervical Chiropractic Research and its sister journals, which PubMed does not index, and link to the article on the journal's site.
  • Each summary says who was studied, what was measured, what was found, and where the study falls short.

Browse by condition →

how to read this library

What has been studied is not the same as what will happen for you.

Upper cervical research is young and small. Most of it is case reports, a few studies follow groups of people, and only a handful compare care with a sham or placebo. We list all of it, the careful and the preliminary, and we say which is which.

Much of the upper cervical work appears in the Journal of Upper Cervical Chiropractic Research, which PubMed does not index. We include those studies when their article page shows the title, authors and an abstract, and we mark each one "Not indexed in PubMed" so you know where it stands.

Nothing here is a promise, and none of it is a diagnosis. Each page ends with what its studies can't tell you.

  1. Controlled trial. Compares people who received care with people who received a sham, a placebo or no added care. The strongest design in this library, and still only as strong as its size and length.
  2. Cohort, pilot or before-and-after study. Follows a group over time, but without a comparison group, so it can't separate the care from time, expectation or chance.
  3. Case series. A few people, often described from existing files.
  4. Case report. One person, described in detail. Useful for raising a question, not for answering it.
  5. Review or method study. Summarizes other work, or tests how consistent a measurement is. No new patients.

where our work fits

Why the NUCCA studies matter to us

QSM3 (Quantum Spinal Mechanics), the method Dr. Jonathan Lazar, D.C. uses, is an orthogonal upper cervical method and a progression of NUCCA, the National Upper Cervical Chiropractic Association procedure. Seven of the studies here are NUCCA studies, including the 2007 blood pressure trial and the 2015 migraine pilot, and each is marked "NUCCA lineage." One case report used QSM3 itself, and it is marked too.

Other studies used other upper cervical techniques, and a few used styles of care that differ from ours. Each summary names the technique, so you can see how close it is to what happens at our office.

That's why The Lazar Method™ starts with measurement.

Before any correction we measure how your nervous system is regulating your body. Dr. Lazar or someone personally trained by him will go over your scans and images with you. If we can help, we'll tell you. If we can't, we'll help you find someone who can.

browse by condition

Research topics

The number is how many studies each page describes. The dots show its strongest study design.

Head and face

Ears and balance

Neck, back and injury

Nervous system and whole body

Don't see what you're living with? A missing topic means we haven't found a verified upper cervical study on it, not that the question doesn't matter. Many people arrive with symptoms across several systems at once. Start with what people describe on our conditions page, or the free 4-minute screening.

background reading

How upper cervical work is measured and described

Two papers that aren't about one condition: how consistently NUCCA X-rays are read, and an overview of upper cervical procedures.

Reliability study2023NUCCA X-ray analysisNUCCA lineage

Do two NUCCA doctors read the same X-rays the same way?

Who and how many
254 sets of upper neck X-rays, each marked independently by two board-certified NUCCA chiropractors with the same training.
What was measured
How closely the two agreed on which side the atlas sits toward and how much it is rotated.
What was found
They agreed on the side 96.1% of the time and on rotation 94.5% of the time, which the authors describe as almost perfect agreement, with no sign of one examiner reading consistently higher.
Limits
Two examiners with the same training. It tests whether the X-ray reading is consistent, not whether care changes anyone's symptoms.

Read the abstract on PubMed → Source 1

Narrative review2015Upper cervical procedures

A plain overview of upper cervical procedures

Who and how many
No new patients. A review written for practitioners, students and the public.
What was measured
How upper cervical techniques decide whether a correction is needed, and how they differ: some read the X-rays with an orthogonal model, others with an articular one.
What was found
Reported side effects after an upper cervical correction were mild, short reactions lasting under 24 hours.
Limits
The authors note that good indexed research was scarce, so the review leans on sources that were not indexed or not peer reviewed.

Read the abstract on PubMed → Source 2

Sources

  1. Landholm-Duvall J, Hasick DG, Ndetan H, Hart JF, Dickholtz M, Lapenski CP. 2023. Inter-Examiner Agreement of the National Upper Cervical Chiropractic Association Analysis of the Atlas Subluxation Complex in a 3-View Upper Cervical Radiographic Series. J Chiropr Med 22(3):189-196. PubMed 37645000 · DOI 10.1016/j.jcm.2023.04.001 · free full text
  2. Woodfield HC, York C, Rochester RP, Bales S, Beebe M, Salminen B, Scholten JN. 2015. Craniocervical chiropractic procedures - a précis of upper cervical chiropractic. J Can Chiropr Assoc 59(2):173-92. PubMed 26136610 · free full text

Titles are quoted exactly as published. Sources checked 2026-11-03. Studies for each condition are cited on its page.

tried everything

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