William Alfred "Bill" Ellis, D.O. (February 25, 1906-September 16, 1986), the son of an inventor, graduated from Philadelphia Osteopathic College in 1931 and spent the next 55 years trying to make people more healthy. Just out of his internship, he was hired by the Musebeck Shoe company, serving as Director of Research and Education. This put the young man on the road for 15 years, visiting stores, working trade shows, lecturing to various groups, instructing in proper methods of fitting shoes, and adjusting customers' feet when necessary. In 1936, after five years of eating poorly and not resting properly, Dr. Ellis had a physical breakdown, fortunately coinciding with America's physical culture movement. With a lot of information available from sources such as Drs. Weston Price and Melvin Page, he began a lifelong study of diet and blood chemistry, discovering the great importance of digestion and protein metabolism to sustained health. Dr. Ellis believed in treating the whole person, restoring balance to a patient's physiology, rather than simply addressing a single complaint and sending the patient on his or her way. Over time, he formulated a comprehensive program to restore individual patients' health while treating them for the specific conditions for which they presented. In addition to a face-to-face clinical analysis, his program included intelligent measures based on the results of four elements: CBC/blood chemistry, urinalysis, diet diary, and a hair mineral analysis, all of which are described in Doctor to Doctor. Dr. Ellis used his program successfully with his own patients in Grand Rapids, Michigan and Tarentum, Pennsylvania for a number of years and gained an international reputation in 1964, when he was the subject of a Prevention magazine article about his success in treating arthritis. When he retired in 1972, Dr. Ellis moved to the Dallas/Fort Worth, Texas area, where he consulted to over 300 licensed physicians, outlining individual programs for their patients. The submitting physicians performed the clinical examinations themselves and managed their patients' programs over time. Being busy with consultations and traveling on the lecture circuit, during which he regularly exchanged information with other health practitioners, Dr. Ellis never took time to write down the program. However, attendees of his many lectures recorded him, either on audiotape or on paper, and this material, along with his personal notes and references, went into creation of Doctor to Doctor. This book is intended for use by trained, licensed health professionals who desire to provide Dr. Ellis' comprehensive program to their patients. It is not intended to be a self-help guide. It is hoped that a new generation of health physicians find Doctor to Doctor to be a useful reference, and that it reflects Dr. Ellis' commitment to his profession. He was a joy to know, and this book was a pleasure to put together in memory of this exceptional man.
About the Author: Born in San Mateo, California and raised in Dallas, Texas, Bob Strickland earned a B.S. degree in biology from the University of Texas at Arlington, with minor studies in chemistry and economics. He attended graduate school on an NDEA Title IV fellowship at the University of Georgia, where his area of study was the transmission of antibiotic resistance factors in staphylococcus. During his second year of graduate studies, he was called to active duty in the military. Returning to the University of Georgia, Bob earned an M. S. in microbiology and was honorably discharged from the U.S. Navy. Desiring to live in the Pacific Northwest, he moved to Portland, Oregon after graduate school and worked briefly at KOAP-FM as a program producer and on-air announcer. For family reasons, he returned to Dallas, and worked for two nutritional supplement companies, becoming manager of a regional wholesale sales office. Later, Bob served physician-faculty members and medical students as a graphics coordinator at the University of Texas, Southwest Medical School. In 1987, Bob began a career in freelance technical and business writing and business process analysis. In 2002, he and his wife, Sue, fulfilled a dream of living in the Pacific Northwest and settled in Everett, Washington.