Osteopathy

Osteopathy is a type of alternative medicine that emphasizes massage and other physical manipulation of muscle tissue and bones. Its name derives from Ancient Greek "bone" () and "sensitive to" or "responding to" ().

In the United States, osteopathic physicians are trained and are certified to practice medicine. They represent a branch of medicine called Osteopathic Medicine. Osteopaths trained elsewhere are trained only in manual osteopathic treatment, generally to relieve muscular and skeletal conditions, and are referred to as osteopathic practitioners. They are not allowed to call themselves Osteopaths in the United States to avoid confusion with certified physicians. In the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Australia and New Zealand osteopaths are registered and regulated by law as therapists but may not practice medicine (although Germany, like Canada, allows US-trained osteopathic physicians to practice).

Thus Britain's National Health Service advises that, while there is "good" evidence for osteopathy as a treatment for low back pain and "limited evidence to suggest it may be effective for some types of neck, shoulder or lower limb pain and recovery after hip or knee operations", there is no, or insufficient, evidence that osteopathy is effective as a treatment for health conditions "unrelated" to the bones and muscles, "such as headaches, migraines, painful periods, digestive disorders, depression and excessive crying in babies (colic)"; an explicit reference to the claims of osteopathic manipulative medicine. A 2011 systematic review on osteopathic style manipulation, "failed to produce compelling evidence" for efficacy in treating musculoskeletal pain. Osteopaths are not certified for medical practice in Britain, while European osteopaths are not allowed to practice in the USA lest they be mistaken for physicians who are still commonly called osteopaths there. Hence studies prepared in different countries must be applied with care in reference to one another.

The practice of osteopathy began in the United States in 1874. The term "osteopathy" was coined by Andrew Taylor Still, MD, DO. Still was a physician and surgeon, Kansas state and territorial legislator, a free state leader, and one of the founders of Baker University, who lived near Baldwin City, Kansas at the time of the American Civil War. In Baldwin, he developed the practice of osteopathy.

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