Here I’d like to make very clear that I am not a “Doctor” of Osteopathy — a D.O.– also known as an “Osteopathic Physician”. I am am a non-physician osteopathic clinician/practitioner, which is a different category of Osteopath. I feel like I need to clarify this only because this setting is the U.S.A.
The U.S. is the birthplace of Osteopathy, and the person who “discovered” Osteopathy, Andrew Taylor Still, MD, founded the originial school of Osteopathy in 1892 in Kirksville, Missouri.
Osteopathy has a very interesting history, and I won’t go into much of it right here, except to say that in the U.S., Osteopathic schools include subjects such as pharmacology and obstetrics, and graduates are on par with MD’s, and DO’s can be found all over the US, mostly in hospital settings, as opposed to private practices. This kind of DO however, usually/typically/commonly does not practice what is called “traditional” osteopathy, i.e., osteopathy as it was originally concieved, taught, and practiced, and are very often, practically speaking, indistinguishable from MD’s. in the way they think and practice, whereas originally, Osteopathy was meant to be a true alternative to conventional medical practice. True-blue Osteopaths are actually very uncommon amongst the ranks of American D.O.’s
Not that long after Dr. Still founded the first Osteopathic school, one of the first instructors he hired to teach at the school, JM Littlejohn MD, a doctor from England who was educated there (at that time the best medical schools were in Europe), ended up going back to England and founded the first Osteopathic school outside the U.S., the British School of Osteopathy, in 1915.
So, although Osteopathy has a uniquely American origin from a real frontier/pioneer MD, as a science and profession Osteopathy was quickly exported to Europe, which continued to spread, and now there are many Osteopathic schools all over the world and in many countries. The point I am trying to make here is that everywhere in the world apart from the U.S., osteopathic schools teach a more traditionally oriented “non-medical” brand of Osteopathy, and it is only in the U.S. that the Osteopathic schools are “Medical” schools where graduates — Doctors of Osteopathy (D.O.’s) — have full medical licenses to practice “medicine” on the same par as MD’s. I hope I haven’t beaten this distinction into the ground by now.
So, my formal education in Osteopathy has not been in an Osteopathic “medical school” here in the U.S. I have taken many courses and trainings in osteopathic techniques and attended an Osteopathic College in Canada for a while, but my primary training has been with apprenticeship and preceptorship with U.S. educated D.O.’s in private practice who are traditionally-oriented, and recognized my genuine interest in and passion for Osteopathy and who generously took me under their wing. To all of my teachers and mentors, living and dead and in spirit, I give a deep bow of gratitude.
Some more about that in the “About Will” area of the Menu.
