How does a good osteopath work?
In the office, I am often asked how I work, what kind of techniques I use, etc. I answer the patient with this question: do you ask your plumber or craftsman what tool he brings to work? Because in reality, a good osteopath must master all osteopathic techniques and choose the best tool to treat his patient.
Osteopathy has known many trends in recent years and the difficulties of regulation of the profession have not facilitated its understanding by the general public.
In the osteopathic schools recognized by the Ministry of Health and Sports, the different osteopathic techniques are taught, even if it is true that some schools insist, wrongly, more on one type of technique or another. Not mastering all of them means reducing your field of competence and action!
It is possible to turn a Phillips screw with a flat screwdriver
but it is easier and more efficient to use the right tool directly.
Some techniques are less easy to master and require much more training. Some are much less tiring for the practitioner than others and are therefore preferred by many osteopaths, which is a pity...
The different osteopathic techniques
Structural osteopathy
It is the technique in osteopathy that we hear the most about, it is the one that sometimes makes "crack".
But not only! Structural osteopathy also includes joint work through mobilization in the different parameters of mobility.
We do not measure the effectiveness of an osteopathic technique
to its number of decibels!
Many patients want to be "cracked". I manipulate by cracking every day but not to everyone. Indeed, some structural osteopathy techniques may be contraindicated in some patients. For example, we do not crack the joint of a 90 year old granny who is completely osteoporotic... Don't worry, your osteopath is trained to detect contraindications thanks to a medical questioning and precise tests. In case of doubt, the osteopath will always apply a precautionary principle.
Structural osteopathy is inseparable from the other techniques! It is normally unthinkable for an osteopath to treat digestive disorders without working on the patient's belly with visceral osteopathy and without working on the back or lumbar vertebrae with structural osteopathy.
Visceral osteopathy
Visceral osteopathy aims to act on all the viscera of the body and not only those of the belly:
- Visceral neck sheath
- Viscera of the thorax: lungs, heart, esophagus
- Viscera of the abdomen: stomach, liver, duodenum, small intestine, colon, gallbladder, pancreas, kidneys, adrenals, etc.
- Viscera of the small pelvis: uterus, bladder, etc.
I would like to specify that visceral osteopathy acts on these structures with soft techniques of mobilization, traction, etc. but the osteopath can only work in projection of certain organs and obviously cannot seize them in his hands!
The osteopath's role is to treat all the tensions, which he feels in his hands, likely to disturb the functioning of the structure in question.
The structure governs the function and the function governs the structure.
Cranial osteopathy
Cranial osteopathy as such does not exist, we should rather speak of cranial techniques, as for the other approaches of osteopathy.
At the present time, science still has a lot of work to do in order to demonstrate the results that patients feel after cranial techniques. The osteopath acts on the projection of the different structures of the skull but also on the sutures of the skull. Of course, in adulthood the skull is ossified, but the cranial techniques are no less effective.
Cranial osteopathy is also well known in babies with overlapping skull bones or flattening of the skull.
Functional osteopathy - fascia
A fascia is a membrane made of connective tissue that envelops muscles, viscera, etc. All fasciae in the body are connected to each other.
Functional osteopathy is based on the principle that if we "tie a knot" or "crumple" one of these fascia membranes, it will affect the others. It is an interconnected support system, we speak of tensegrity!
The osteopath will work on these fascias with various specific techniques in order to induce a tissue reaction that would rebalance the system.
After 4 seconds, the skin under the hand undergoes a tissue reaction, even without the hand moving...
General Osteopathic Treatment TOG
The general osteopathic treatment (TOG or TGO) is the basic treatment of osteopathy, it is a concept of treatment, established by Andrew Taylor Still.
The TOG includes a set of techniques (pumping, stretching, joint adjustment...).
The objective of TOG is to restore homeostasis, i.e. the balance of the body through the understanding of the vegetative nervous system.
This type of treatment is not performed in case of an acute crisis.
Marie Messager
Osteopath D.O
in Versailles Chantiers
78 - Yvelies
