w0mbat said:
While most medical professionals respect osteopathic physicians, most also view OMM as being on about the level of homeopathy and voodoo in terms of validity.
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Well this is the whole basis of my question.
I was/am interested in getting into osteopathy, but have been in two minds since discovering the ,what some people would term, pseudoscience behind it.
I think the whole idea of treating the individual in a holistic manner appeals to me, treating the root cause as opposed to the symptoms which is more of the allopathic route.
Now being a 4year course, one obvoiusly has researched it thouroughly before jumping in. As you stated in the quote, there are camps of people who say that the philosophies used are akin to practices such as homeopathy and various other complementary therapies, And that the basis is formed on psedoscience. I was also a little shocked to find that this is also true for chiropractic.
The phiosophies are essentially based on the fact that the body has a propensity to heal itself and general wear and tear, misalignments in our biomechanic setup give rise to illnesses which can bascically be rectified by palpation (manual therapy)
The main beef that arises from the opposing camp is that the very things they treat "osteopathic lesions" cannot be proved with any scientific certainty.
Hence the reason for my first question. I wondered if anyone had any first hand experience with such therapies and their thoughts on the experience!