Atrium Osteopathy Whole Hearted Health

Osteopathy for the whole Family

The dedicated team of therapists at Atrium Osteopathy care about the health of all the family. We diagnose and treat the whole person and with the family unit in mind, our focus is the phase of the young family, through pregnancy and the early childhood years. Although when we educate one family member about the importance of correct breathing biomechanics, posture or general self care; you’ll find that we ask them to educate other family members young and old. Grandparents benefit from good biomechanical awareness as much as any family member.

The founder of Osteopathy, Dr Andrew Taylor Still described osteopathy as a science that analyses the man and finds that he partakes of divine intelligence. (Autobiography 1897) He must’ve been an amazing person because after experiencing the suffering of losing his wife and children to meningitis he began dissecting the body to learn more about its biomechanical structure. He was a trained Doctor at the time, but his refined knowledge of anatomy enabled him to then develop a new form of health care. He theorised that he could allow health in the whole person via the application of osteopathic manual therapy. He was able to start a University and form a system of health care that has spread across the world.

There are stories of him treating his own headaches at age 10 by resting the back of his neck on his rope swing and another of him treating his body aches when he had the flu by rolling his back on a log the way a mule might roll in a paddock. Don’t worry, you’ll find the manual therapy techniques used at Atrium Osteopathy are much more refined than Dr Still’s original ones. A man who lived through the American Civil war, disapproved of slavery, spent time with the American Indians and didn’t discriminate race, sex or class. He was also known to say “To find health should be the object of the doctor. Anyone can find disease” (The Philosophy and Mechanical Principles of Osteopathy 1892) This should be the aim of every osteopath practicing today.

In the last decade the osteopaths in Australia have attempted to define our profession to enable an ease of marketing. However, I feel the fact it isn’t easy to define, is a positive for our profession. Osteopathy is taught as a science degree but is based on a philosophy and thus, to define it purely for ease of description would limit it. I’d rather educate people to its complexities than risk losing its fundamental basis. One of Dr Still’s final statements on the topic in late 1915 was “ I hope the faithful will rally around the (osteopathic) flag and we will build an International school that will offer no compromise unless it is the golden truth.

You’ll find the osteopaths at Atrium Osteopathy to be passionate in our delivery, still searching to understand exactly what Dr Still was trying to teach us and committed to journey with you along the road to better understanding the complex system that is the human body.