What is Osteopathy?
Traditional osteopathy is a form of manual medicine that focuses on total body health. It is a safe and gentle therapy that includes craniosacral, myofascial release and visceral techniques. It was developed by an American medical doctor, Andrew Taylor Still, in 1874.
Osteopathy's gentle and holistic approach has spread throughout the world, although it is not well known in the US.
Osteopathic treatment helps all the systems of the body function better together for whole-body health.
These systems include the musculoskeletal, nervous, circulatory, digestive, respiratory and immune systems.
Some Commonly Used Osteopathic Techniques Are:
Joint & spinal mobilization
Visceral mobilization
Craniosacral therapy
Myofascial release
Muscle energy technique
Positional release
The 4 Key Principles of Osteopathy:
The body is one unit. Every part of the body impacts the whole organism. For example, a symptom in the knee may be due to the ribcage being shifted.
Optimal functioning is dependent upon proper structural alignment. To continue the previous example, if your ribcage is shifted, the weight of the body will pass through the body to the knee joint in an imbalanced way. This may lead to knee arthritis and pain.
The body has inherent healing mechanisms which can be facilitated by the removal of restrictions. The beautiful thing about the body is that it is designed to heal itself. It can even grow back a broken bone! But for new bone to grow, there has to be good blood flow to the bone. The nerves that go to the arteries and the bone must be conducting smoothly. If there are tight structures getting in the way of blood flow or nerve conduction, the body will have a harder time healing. Removal of restrictions through manual therapies, such as Osteopathy, can help to facilitate this healing.
The free movement of the fluids of the body is essential for health. The body is 60-70% fluid. These include blood, lymph, cerebrospinal fluid and digestive juices. Tissue healing occurs though good circulation of all these fluids.
