Osteopathy

An effective and safe manual therapy, osteopathy treats a large number of different muscle and joint conditions. If suffering from back pain, neck pain, shoulder pain, headaches, sciatica or sports injuries, then osteopathy could help you. It’s about improving the alignment of your body so you move more comfortably and efficiently and therefore achieve and maintain better health, immunity, absence of pain, well being – the list is endless.

“Addressing underlying causes such as postural problems or old injuries, osteopathy enables you to understand and then overcome many, seemingly unexplainable pain conditions”.

An initial one ­hour consultation, which includes a full examination with orthopaedic tests, assesses the nature and causes of your problem.
These are explained simply and form the basis of an agreed treatment plan. Treatment is included within your initial consultation. Follow­-up consultations usually last for thirty minutes.

The causes of many aches and pains are often found in your everyday life. Consequently, simple home­based postural exercises, and advice regarding work position and sports or leisure activities may be given during treatment. Where appropriate x­rays, scans and diagnostic tests can be arranged for you through your GP during a course of treatment.

This is how it works:

Osteopaths use their hands both to investigate the underlying causes of pain and to carry out treatment using a wide variety of manipulative techniques. These may include massage­ like techniques to relax muscles; articulation or passive repetitive joint stretching to improve the quality or range of movement of a joint and high velocity thrust techniques (this is the technique which produces a click) to improve the mobility and function of a joint. Gentle releasing techniques such as cranial osteopathy are often used, particularly when treating children or elderly patients.

“Osteopathic treatment is designed to improve blood circulation, lymphatic drainage and alleviate disruptive influences on the nervous system. Thereby improving health”.

It is not possible to list all the problems that osteopaths frequently treat.

The most common are:

• Back and Neck pain
• Whiplash injuries
• Repetitive Strain injuries
• Work strain
• Shoulder problems/Frozen shoulder
• Headaches
• Sports injuries
• Tennis Elbow / Golfer’s Elbow
• Postural problems
• Pregnancy care
• Infant ailments
• Strained muscles, joints or ligaments
• Limb pain
• Sciatica
• Trapped nerves