The History of Reflexology and the Zone Concept

Zone Therapy, the system upon which modern reflexology is based, was developed in the early 20^th century by an American doctor, William Fitzgerald from Hartford, Connecticut.

A graduate of the University of Vermont, Fitzgerald first worked in Boston City Hospital before two periods abroad, at specialist Ear, Nose and Throat hospitals in London and Vienna. He went on to become a senior nose and throat surgeon at St. Francis Hospital in Hartford, and it was here that he first made public his work on Zone Therapy.

It was Fitzgerald's belief that the human body could be divided into ten longitudinal zones, five on each side of the body's median line. Each zone extends from the centre of one of the toes, runs up through the body to the top of the head and out along the arm to the fingers or thumbs.

The zones are numbered one to five on both the left and right sides of the body, radiating out from the middle. Fitzgerald referred to the zone lines as ten invisible currents of energy running through the body, with each line representing the centre of the respective zone. Each zone could be treated by working on either the feet or the hands.

He found that if pressure was applied to any bony part of the body within a particular zone, especially on the hands and feet. Body organs elsewhere in the same zone were affected positively.

Pain caused by an injury somewhere in the zone was relieved and, if pressure was applied firmly enough, a type of localised anaesthesia would occur sometimes causing the injury or problem to disappear completely. Fitzgerald used clamps, combs and pegs, mainly on the hands, to create the desired anaesthetic effect throughout the whole zone.

In 1917, Fitzgerald and a colleague, Dr. Edwin Bowers, published Zone Therapy, or Relieving Pain at Home, a pioneering volume still much used by reflexologists today. In it Fitzgerald also referred to "anatomical correspondences". This refers to the pairing of corresponding parts of the body in terms of reflexology practice for example, hand and foot, wrist and ankle, elbow and knee, upper arm and thigh, shoulder and hip.