Osteopaths look at the body as a whole when they treat you and try to find out where there are problems in your frame – your muscles, joints and skeleton. For example, an imbalance in the pelvis following a fall might cause lower back pain. While stiffness in the shoulders and ribs from poor posture or injury could make breathing even more difficult for someone with asthma.Tension and inflammation in the spine can affect the whole nervous system. Osteopaths will often focus on posture and flexibility of the spine to overcome such problems. If the whole body framework of muscles, joints and bones is aligned and in full working order then the tissues of the body which includes the nerves and brain will not be under undue pressure. The digestive, circulation, lymph and other systems too will benefit.
What Happens During A Treatment?
At your first osteopathy session, the osteopath will take a detailed case history of your symptoms, your medical history, and even lifestyle. Only then will they begin to look at your posture, mobility of joints. You might also have your blood pressure taken and reflexes tested depending on your symptoms.Once the osteopath has begun to build up an overall picture of you personally, they will then begin to look at specific areas of the spine and neck and other joints for particular problems. In particular an osteopath will seek out ‘misaligned’ joints, points of inflammation that may be causing painful pressure on nerves and general stiffness and immobility.An osteopath may use massage, muscle stretching and articulation of joints to relax and loosen muscles and free up stiff joints. This includes the joints in the spine.The more well-known ‘thrust’ mobilisation techniques, which involve applying a gentle force to a particular joint to ‘realign’ it are reserved for specific problems. The thrust techniques often cause joints to pop and click but there is usually very little pain. The action itself can be quite liberating as joints that have been seized up for long periods are once again free to move.Usually several sessions are required to overcome a problem and as with most forms of medicine it helps to alleviate symptoms but is not necessarily a cure. However, an osteopath will show you how to achieve a better posture, change aspects of your lifestyle that may be making a problem worse, such as slouching at the computer or lifting heavy objects – including children – badly, and teach you various simple exercises that can be done at home or even at work to help the healing process. The overall aim is often to prevent the problem coming back.What problems can osteopathy help?Osteopathy can help patients old and young with many different problems including:
- Asthma and breathing problems
- Back and neck pain
- Back pain in pregnancy
- Digestive disorders
- Foot, calf and knee pain
- Frozen or stiff shoulders
- Headache and migraine
- Hip and thigh problems
- Insomnia
- Joint pain, such as arthritis
- Postural problems
- Repetitive strain injuries
- Slipped discs
- Tennis elbow
- Trapped nerves
- Whiplash injuries
Where’s the evidence?
Osteopathy today is fully recognised and endorsed by the British Medical Association as ‘a discrete clinical discipline’ running along side – complementing – mainstream medicine.Millions of pounds are spent each year on clinical trials into the effectiveness of different back pain treatments, one of which is osteopathy. Numerous trials have shown it works well in treating acute back pain and related problems.What do mainstream doctors think about osteopathy?Osteopathy is probably one of the best known manipulative therapies. The 1993 Osteopaths Act provided practitioners with official recognition and by May 2000 all osteopaths will have to be on the official register if they want to call themselves ‘osteopath’. Although treatment on the NHS is limited at the moment, you are quite likely to be referred to an osteopath by your GP for private treatment. In fact, it is quite common to find osteopaths running clinics within community health centres alongside the usual GP services.
Osteopaths are now building trust with conventional medicine on the basis of the 1993 Act of Parliament and the establishment of the General Council of Osteopaths in 1996. The Council maintains high standards for its members and co-operates with the medical profession on research and practice. The Royal College of General Practitioners recommends that doctors consider osteopathy and chiropractic for back pain and other relevant problems. The introduction of statutory regulation has obviously given assurances to the medical profession that registered osteopaths are working to professional standards under a Code of Conduct.