Osteopathy is a type of manual therapy. It is a gentle, natural and holistic form of treatment. A manual osteopath uses their hands to treat patients. We don’t use any tools or medications, we simply adjust the body’s structures to alleviate pain, improve function, and allow the body to have an improved capacity to heal. Osteopathic treatment seeks to work with the body rather than imposing treatment on it in an invasive way.
The core philosophy of osteopathy is that the body is one unit, and all its component parts are interconnected and interrelated. This means that if someone comes in complaining of pain in the neck, the problem is not merely in their neck. A manual osteopath will assess the entire body to find out what interconnected parts are contributing to your pain in the neck. Life can knock us out of balance, and osteopathic treatment seeks to bring the body back into balance. Finding and correcting the root of the problem and bringing the body’s structures into a healthier alignment can improve the body’s ability to heal and function optimally.
Another core tenet of osteopathy is that structure and function are interrelated in the body. This means that restoring proper alignment and balance to the physical body can improve all the functions that your body must carry out to be healthy. For example, imagine the flow of water from a garden hose stops – the gardener will work their way back along the path of the hose to investigate where the blockage is and remove any bend or twist in the hose to restore the function of the hose.
Our bodies are incredible. They can be vulnerable to injury and dysfunction, but they are also incredibly resilient. Much like the garden hose – when we can identify and correct the restriction, the water can flow as it should and the body can restore itself to better functioning if given the chance.
In this way, a manual osteopath listens to the body and investigates where the root of the problem may be, and then they act as a facilitator to create the conditions that allow the body to heal and restore function.