Osteopathy is a primary complementary health care discipline that treats the body holistically. This means an Osteopaths aim is to not only alleviate the symptoms of your condition, but to look for the underlying cause. This will help to prevent your problem from re-occurring in the future. An Osteopath will use “palpation” as one of the tools for diagnosing the problem. This is a very adapted sense of touch that the practitioner has developed to identify any structural impediments to your health. Once the Osteopath has formed a diagnosis, a treatment plan will be made that is specific to you.
A treatment plan will involve short term and long term goals. The short term aim is to alleviate the symptoms and work on the underlying cause of the problem by using a variety of techniques. We use a combination of structural, cranial and visceral (working on the abdomen) techniques. Some of theses techniques are; soft tissue and deep tissue ‘massage’ techniques to muscles, ligaments and tendons; mobilisation of joints, which involves rhythmic joint movements; and manipulations, which are high velocity thrust (when you hear that ‘click’).
The long term treatment aim is to stop the condition from re-occurring. This is achieved by giving advice on factors that are maintaining your problem, such as your posture and diet. Exercise, hydrotherapy and Naturopathic advice may also be given.
Following treatment, you may be slightly stiff and achy for a few days. This is your body going through its normal healing and adjustment process. We call this a treatment reaction and it occurs in many but not all patients.
If we are unable to treat your condition, we may need to write to your GP or refer you to a specialist for further investigations.