about us
What is Osteopathy?
Osteopathy is a form of manual therapy that uses a combination of joint mobilization and soft tissue techniques to help the body heal following injury or chronic dysfunction. Manual osteopaths improve the bodies ability to function, remove restrictions in order to optimize movement, and allow you to get back to doing the things you love.
Why choose osteopathy?
The main idea behind osteopathic care is that our practitioners treat the body as one unit, rather than looking at the body as made up of a number of separate structures. Instead of just treating the location of your pain, we seek to find the reason behind your pain by taking a whole-body approach to our treatment.
At Union Osteopathy, one of the major principles behind how we assess and treat musculoskeletal pain is that structure and function are interrelated and must be treated together. This means that if you come to us with pain and restricted movement in your shoulder, our practitioners will assess the shoulder joint and all of the joints around it to ensure they’re in the correct position. If the structure of the body is incorrect, then function will invariably suffer and pain and chronic dysfunction will follow.
In short, we treat the structure of the body in order to return its ability to physiologically function. In the shoulder example, we return the shoulder and surrounding joints to the right position (structure) in order to treat pain and allow the shoulder to be used for throwing and lifting (physiological function).
The Osteopathic healing process follows three steps:
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Assessment of body dysfunctions and identification of behaviors contributing to the dysfunction pattern (posture, sleeping position, work/ sport demands)
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Treatment using Osteopathic Manipulative therapy
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Exercises and stretches designed to help engage the bodies ability to heal and self-regulate