Are we training too many osteopaths?

Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Andy Cotton on October 6, 2008 at 9:16pm

Mary,
you don't need to jump to the conclusion that we are "under .. illusions".
Why is it that people take a quick view of a craft which intelligent and thoughtful individuals have spent a lifetime working every day on, and imagine they see through?
Why should the idea of a biomechanical plane to human function be so unlikely?
We are pipework (which gets blocked or closed), structure (which gets disorganised), control systems (which take sensory feeds from structure), wiring (which has it's own power supply modulated by structure). Etc etc etc. All of these enable cellular function and integration, or "health"
Rolfing or KMI is an excellent example of doing "to".
Other levels are other levels. Systems theory tells us that we only arbitrarily divide whole organisms into discrete systems, but we as Osteopaths do this using a kind of game theory, because thinking X is Y gives rise to desired outcome Ω. If all systems interconnect, where best to adjust them?
Can you see self loathing?
Can you see !5% thyroid hypofunction?
Can you see an accident twenty years ago?
You can see it in the bones if you know how to look, bones are visible and modulable markers in a sea of invisible function. Bones give you expression of function and access to change.
As Mr Wernham said, a patient must be visibly and palpably improved by a treatment. Structure and function.
However, an Osteopath might equally join systems on a vibratory level, share feelings and both evolve a-la complexity theory. Like cellular automata. No need for any cognitive input at all. An Osteopath will see no conflicts here, sliding between approaches according to a unique set of circumstances. We have a lot of loosely connected views, not neccessarily mutually consistent except by results. Some very explicitly one way (even if, on another level, one way is impossible). All theories in various degrees of development and test. A perfect example of scientific bootstrapping really. And don't get me started on transference.
You must know all this Mary.
Are you testing osteopathy?
Why?
;-)

▶ Reply to This

Permalink Reply by Donald Scott on October 8, 2008 at 6:30pm

Hi Andy,
Mary may well be testing osteopathy as she is unsure as to where its, and her own boundaries lie. Probably only she knows the reasoning behind her questioning, but I do this self-analysis frequently myself.

This is both an entirely natural process and allows the individual to evolve to where they're heading. Brilliant... isn't it ?

She may also be testing you and I and everyone else in the forum ?

Regarding your comments on John Wernham..."Mr Wernham said, a patient must be visibly and palpably improved by a treatment. Structure and function." This observation he made is worthy of its own discussion as its underlying assumptions underpin the whole issue of evidence based medicine.

There are none so blind as those who will not see. Or is it cannot see ?

Kind regards,

Donald

▶ Reply to This

Permalink Reply by Andy Cotton on October 8, 2008 at 9:04pm

Hi Donald!
Sorry about being a bit dim, I don't quite follow the last bit. Cannot and will not see, isn't that always true of everybody, to an unknowable degree?. i think that's what you are saying?
One of the reasons I like sacral musings is that it draws in non-osteopaths. Very healthy. Insurance against us being self-referenced. Hence Mary cannot see but nor can I.
Will's overarching power no doubt can*, but that's another story.


*see
potency discussion,
"Because it involves surrender to the intelligence and love of the Divine, that made us and therefore knows exactly what needs to done to heal"

▶ Reply to This

Permalink Reply by Donald Scott on October 8, 2008 at 10:41pm

HI there Andy,

It's probably me who's dim under the circumstances!

John Wernham's statement can be interpreted in so many ways depending on what position you already hold. For example I remember a discussion on treatment reactions and what should be interpreted a good response to a treatment. Some may expect a full blown healing crisis with a good deal of inflammatory response and ANS recoil. That however may be regarded as the patients solicitor as a manifestation of the claim for assault which the patient alleges!

Information derived from palpation assessment is in many non-osteopathic individuals eyes too subjective to be sustainable. They would claim that for example the existence of the IVM is delusional... I know several osteopaths let alone other healthcare professional who would also feel uncomfortable providing the vocabulary to intelligently and concisely define what they are doing and feeling and trying to change within the patient. Some say its a subtle science, others a soft science, others pure fiction....

I can see no reason for those professing to work in the field to try to provide a delicate and precise language to express what we are doing. Maybe resorting to something poetic on occasion to describe what is being observed!

Perhaps that's what Will's chosen to do, though I profess to being largely agnostic when it comes to divine anything.

Kind regards,

Donald

▶ Reply to This

Permalink Reply by Andy Cotton on October 8, 2008 at 10:54pm

Donald,
After my discussion with Will* I ran a little experiment re. the loving power in the room phenomenon.
Very interesting, actually fascinating outcome. I'll have more time after the weekend, I'll give an account of what transpired.

Andy

*see potency discussion

Permalink Reply by Colin on October 14, 2008 at 3:51pm

Hi Andy,

I enjoyed your discussion with Will on potency, and would be very interested to read your account of the experiment you carried out on the "loving power in the room phenomenon".

Thanks,

Colin

▶ Reply to This

Permalink Reply by Andy Cotton on October 16, 2008 at 5:36pm

I'm working on it. Will post asap.

A

Permalink Reply by Clement Rhein on October 8, 2008 at 9:20pm

I like your post Andy.


There is a general misperception of what osteopathy can do isn't there?
My question is, why don't patient come and see their osteopath about their dis-ease rather than their GP?
Why don't they know that we can help them for life, rather than taking a course of drugs that will only make them worse?

I cannot think that it is because of BOA or GOsC with their not so good raising awareness skills. I think it is because too many osteopaths advertise themselves as musculoskeletal workers, and not "people" (yeah, the whole thing) workers. Simply because they actually do think they are musculoskeletal workers. Why do they think that? perhaps because of schooling? We do get some lectures teaching us how to treat the whole organism, but compared to the time put into diagnosing the tissue that is causing pain in someone's lumbar spine...
I do think there is something wrong at the undergraduate level that will make osteopath have the view that their therapy is really appropriate to musculoskeletal symptoms, but other symptoms: "well lets try something out perhaps, that might help").

The more practitioners think like that, the more patients will think that as well. Isn't the basis of a clinic's patient list word of mouth? So what we tell our patients about what we do, how it works... is crucial stuff, as they will spread this understanding around them - nationally. Me, I always find an appropriate time to educate patients as to what osteopathy can treat (or perhaps what I can treat?). Next time a friend or relative of that patient has a chest infection (or whatever non-musculo) then they will come to who they think will help them best - the osteopath! Rather than thinking, "na, osteopaths just treat backs, lets just go to the good old Gp and get some drugs".

In brief, our patients are the ambassadors of osteopathy. So I suggest making them well educated ambassadors! But this would therefore start in osteopathic colleges. (???)

▶ Reply to This

Permalink Reply by Andy Cotton on October 8, 2008 at 10:39pm

Well Clement.
This is tricky as Kuno pointed out elsewhere*. The schools are departments of Universities which absolutely regulate standards (ie. low), or no degree.
And the final clinical competence test, absolutely controlled by the regulator, is mostly a medicine test. Any modern school teaches to exams and students (bless 'em) prioritise, understandably, work to pass the exams. Low standards medicine.
Given this it's hard to see what can be done at undergraduate level. A previous generation have made this bed, and now we are lying in it. Perhaps it was for the best, or we would have been desperately vulnerable to medical power, as they are today in France for example.
Read The Turning Point (Capra)?. All excursions from a historical median sow seeds for their overthrow. I guess that is what we are saying. But revolutions come when the masses arise, and I see no sign of that yet.

Andy

*From potency discussion,
"...and whether the University of Bedfordshire will be upset when the patient with jaundice is given coffee enemas; the proud parent is told at all costs not to vaccinate; the athlete has his 500quid orthotics taken away and is told to give up sport; the angina patient is advised against statins; the man with gangrene is offered footbaths in epsom salts; the neck patient has neck untouched, and all of them are told to stay away from hospitals."

▶ Reply to This

Permalink Reply by david rodway on October 9, 2008 at 12:14am

I seem to have read recently in osteopathy today or the osteopath that a survey of osteopaths showed that the average number of pts seen each week was 40. I'd be bankrupt if that were all i saw per week. As it is an average, some must be seeing even fewer. I was speaking to a dentist pt of mine the other day and apparently there are about 8 or so dental colleges in the UK qualifying about 70 students a year. Thats not much less than the number of osteopaths being churned out a year - and they are an established profession with no one else serving the same patient base. Its not just the total number of osteopaths that we need to think of, but the huge rate of expansion. I feel really sorry for new graduates and would not advise my , or anyone elses, children to consider entering the profession at the present time.
David

▶ Reply to This

Permalink Reply by Clement Rhein on October 9, 2008 at 8:33pm

I would advise "anyone" to become an osteopath, even now. The rewards of doing that job are far too great.

UK is big enough and isn't the only place were we can practice osteopathy.

I'm feeling a bit skeptic about this shortage of work as I don't have any osteo friends that can't find work...

▶ Reply to This

Permalink Reply by Andy Cotton on October 9, 2008 at 9:51pm

I agree.
if you do it they will come.

▶ Reply to This

• 1
• 2