Casey Allied Health

Osteopathy

Osteopathy is whole body, manual treatment. It is based on strengthening and balancing the musculoskeletal framework (including spine, muscles and joints). The treatment does not just focus on one isolated area. If one area of the body is in pain or restricted, it will impact the rest of the body. Osteopathic treatment works on restoring balance to all the systems of the body, for overall health and wellbeing, with positive effects on not only the musculoskeletal system but also the lymphatic, nervous and circulatory systems.

The technique is non-invasive and does not use drugs. The primary goal is minimising pain and reducing body stress. From there, osteopathy aims to provide a person with greater mobility so the body can begin to heal itself.

What you can expect from an Osteopathy session

Your Osteopathy session will begin with the practitioner asking you questions about your current state and also your medical and physical history. They may ask you to remove some outer layers of clothing and request that you do some simple movements so they can observe how your body is moving and where any stiffness and difficulties are occurring.

The treatment itself will involve gentle hands-on techniques including mobilisation and manipulation of joints, soft tissue stretching and deep tactile pressure.

Your osteopath may refer you for blood tests or X-rays to assist with or confirm diagnosis. They may also refer you to another health professional (GP, or other allied health professional) if your condition required further assistance.

The first session takes around 45 minutes and your osteopath will discuss your diagnosis with you and suggest a treatment program. Positive impacts of osteopathy can include:

• Relief from chronic and acute pain
• Better and more restful sleep
• Improved appetite and digestion
• Increased energy and vitality levels
• Better overall health

Relationship with your Osteopath

Your osteopath is interested in your whole person. Treatment in the session will focus on relieving pain, stiffness and discomfort. It is likely your osteopath will also talk with you about other aspects of your lifestyle including: diet, exercise, work demands, daily habits, stresses.

You may be given some simple and manageable exercises to do at home, in your own time. You may also have some discussions around other lifestyle choices. Osteopathic will go a long way to helping you feel better and function better, but the best results will always come when you also take steps to care for your body and your whole self in daily life.

This might include things such as:

• Posture awareness
• Ergonomic work stations
• Proper lifting techniques
• Increased energy and vitality levels
• How to avoid injuries

Osteopaths are government registered allied health professionals who adhere to strict regulatory standards of practice and confidentiality.

Back Pain

Sports Podiatry is the treatment of foot, ankle, knee and lower limb injuries by altering and improving lower limb function. Some people require orthoses in the management and prevention of these injuries.

• Is it serious?
• Will it get better?
• What can I do to help it get better?
• Does this mean I will have pain for life?

Let’s start with the first worry. Is it serious? Well this is a difficult one to determine without having an osteopath check you out but 95/100 it isn’t serious but that doesn’t mean it isn’t incredibly painful! The most common cause of back pain is a simple joint or ligament injury which causes the muscles in the surrounding area to go into spasm making moving around, sitting and bending over excruciatingly painful. However, although it is hard to determine exactly what is going on without a full examination if you have any of the following symptoms alongside your back pain please take yourself to your GP straight away.

• A fever of 38˚C (100.4˚F) or above
• Inability to pass urine or loss of bladder control
• Loss of bowel control
• Numbness around your genitals, buttocks or back passage
• Unexplained weight loss
• Pain began after a high impact injury or trauma, such as a car accident
• You have any previous history of cancer, TB or rheumatological conditions or your general health has deteriorated since your back pain started (especially if you have weight loss, night sweats, nausea or vomiting)

If you haven’t any of these symptoms it is likely you are in the majority and have a non-serious cause to your back pain. But this is definitely not the end of the story. So what next? Well, the quickest route to resolving your pain is to have it looked at by an osteopath so they can diagnose what is going on, refer you for more testing such as X-Rays or MRIs or simply start treating you using a range of manual therapy techniques from joint manipulation and articulation to muscle release and fascial chain stretching. Definitely get yourself checked if you have any of the following:

• A fever of 38˚C (100.4˚F) or above
• Inability to pass urine or loss of bladder control
• Loss of bowel control
• Numbness around your genitals, buttocks or back passage
• Unexplained weight loss
• Pain began after a high impact injury or trauma, such as a car accident
• You have any previous history of cancer, TB or rheumatological conditions or your general health has deteriorated since your back pain started (especially if you have weight loss, night sweats, nausea or vomiting)

Before you see your osteopath (i.e. us!), however, there is plenty that you can do to help relieve the pain you are in.Firstly, get yourself an ice pack or frozen peas (just don’t try to eat the peas afterwards!), wrap in some paper towel or tea towel and place onto the part of your back or neck that hurts. Leave it there for 5-10minutes and repeat every 20minutes. If your skin goes red you have left the pack on too long but not to worry, your body heat will bring everything back up to the right temperature. If you can avoid using heat in the first 72hours of your injury this will prevent any swelling from being exacerbated and the pain being prolonged.

The next thing to do is to keep moving! Historically you GP would advise painkillers and rest but this has since been proven to lengthen the time it takes for you to get better so get up and about and do gentle, slow, steady movement. The best example of this is just walking, cycling slowly, swimming or hugging your knees to your chest. Pelvic floor exercises can also help too.

Headaches

The first thing about your headache you need to know is: What kind of headache is it?

If you know your headache type, you can treat it correctly, otherwise you can go around in circles which is frustrating and can also give you a headache!

1. Tension headaches, the most common type, feel like a constant ache or pressure around the head, especially at the temples or back of the head and neck. Not as severe as migraines, they don’t usually cause nausea or vomiting, and they rarely halt daily activities.

Over-the-counter painkillers, are usually sufficient to treat them. it is believed tension headaches may be caused by the contraction of neck and scalp muscles (including in response to stress), and possibly changes in brain chemicals. It is therefore logical that if you are suffering from recurrent headaches that some form of manual therapy can be effective in preventing them by loosening off the muscles at the top of the neck leading to the skull allowing for better blood flow and less pain!

2. Cluster headaches, which affect more men than women, are recurring headaches that occur in groups or cycles. They appear suddenly and are characterized by severe, debilitating pain on one side of the head, and are often accompanied by a watery eye and nasal congestion or a runny nose on the same side of the face.

During an attack, people often feel restless and unable to get comfortable; they are unlikely to lie down, as someone with a migraine might. The cause of cluster headaches is unknown and there is no cure, but some medication can help cut the frequency and duration of the headache.

3. Sinus Headaches, When a sinus becomes inflamed, often due to an infection, it can cause pain. It usually comes with a fever and can be diagnosed by symptoms or the presence of pus viewed through a fiber-optic scope. Headaches due to sinus infection can be treated with antibiotics, as well as antihistamines or decongestants. Sometimes osteopathy can help by using manual techniques to help drain the sinuses and reduce the pain associated with the pressure inside.

4. Migraine Headaches can run in families and are diagnosed using certain criteria.

• At least five previous episodes of headaches
• Lasting between 4–72 hours
• At least two out of these four: one-sided pain, throbbing pain, moderate-to-severe pain, and pain that interferes with, is worsened by, or prohibits routine activity
• At least one associated feature: nausea and/or vomiting, or, if those are not present, then sensitivity to light and sound

These types of headaches are caused by inflammation of the blood vessels and arteries that wrap around the brain. Your body’s nervous system responds with a high stress response making you feel nausea, slowed intestinal absorption, increased blood pressure and increased sensitivity to sensory stimuli (smell, taste, hearing, vision). Treatments for migraine is often based around avoiding the triggers for your headache but sometimes this isn’t sufficient and medication taken at the start of a migraine attack or as a preventative can help. Osteopathy can help the associated symptoms due to increased muscle and joint tension around the neck and shoulders.

Sports Injury

Whether you are a professional sportsperson, amateur or someone just looking to improve their workout efficiency, our sports injury clinic can help identify areas of increased tensions or reduced mobility to alleviate your problem allowing your body to reach maximum potential in movement, strength and efficiency.

Our osteopaths at the Black Swan Osteopathy Clinic specialise in helping you get to the best you can be as well as rehabilitation of injuries old and new. Working closely with personal trainers and pilates instructors we can provide exercises sheets and gym/training advice or refer you to the most suitable professional in order to bring about faster healing and better results.

• Back and neck pain
• Rotator cuff problems
• Tennis and golfers elbow and tendonitis
• Muscles and ligament strains and tears
• Skiing, Football, Rugby and other injuries
• Technique problems due to muscle imbalance

A combination of osteopathic techniques will be used at our sports injury clinic that are tailored to your problem including soft tissue work, neuromuscular balancing, joint manipulation, articulation and ultrasound therapy to bring about the best results for you.

Pregnancy

Low back, pelvic and pubic-symphystic pain during pregnancy – an osteopathic perspective

Our osteopaths treating the pregnant patient suffering with pelvic or low back pain by apply physiology and anatomy to a body in flux. Major weight increases, altered spinal curves and unique hormonal make up put a huge stress on the body over a short time. The inability to cope with these changes is often the cause of sacroiliac strains and pubic symphystic diastasis.

Unlike regular back pain, pregnant women have the extra consideration of an enlarged uterus whose strong uterosacral and round ligaments attach onto the sacrum and pubis putting extra stress through these structures. Combined with the production of a hormone relaxin in preparation for the birth, the pelvis ironically has to increase its weight-bearing capabilities whilst accommodating for softer supportive ligaments. This makes the pelvic girdle a more relaxed, vulnerable piece of architecture during pregnancy.

Orthodox medicine tends to classify mechanical back and pelvic pain during pregnancy into roughly 3-5 categories according to the location of symptoms; low back pain due to either joint or disc dysfunction, sacroiliac dysfunction either unilaterally or bilaterally, pubic symphystic pain or pain in all 3 pelvic joints.

From an osteopathic perspective all these conditions are variations on a theme, that is, they are all the result of poor accommodation to the increased physical demands put on the body during pregnancy. Symptoms are likely to occur at the weakest most vulnerable joint in the kinetic chain. The job of the osteopath is to assess the patient and make a structural osteopathic analysis or “diagnosis” to determine why the body is not adapting well to the changes. Furthermore, the osteopath must decide which structures are central to treatment in order for the body to adjust adequately and compensate during the transition.

Osteopathy does not encourage a protocol treatment and needless to say the osteopath should routinely check and treat each joint in the body, however, there are central structures that require extra attention. The sacrum, hips and perineum are the closest associated structures to the joints of the pelvis and they are expected to accommodate. Any excess tightness in any of these joints reduces their ability to absorb forces and strains the sacroiliac and pelvic joints.

The sacrum for example needs to nutate and counter-nutate (flex and extend) according to the movement of the spinal vertebrae superior to it. If the sacrum is unable to rock back and forth and twist on its vertical axis the illiolumber and pubic symphysis will be strained. Similarly, any tightness in the hip adductors, external or internal hip rotators mean the femur and ischium tend to function as one unit. Movement of the leg results in traction and stress of the pubic symphysis.

The muscles must also be considered. Any tightness in psoas, abdominal muscles, lumber erector spinae, diaphragm and quadratus lumborum will result in further spinal and pelvic instability.

Our osteopaths have an coordinated treatment approach directed at the hips, sacroiliac joints, spinal curves, lumber and abdominal muscles and uterine ligaments in order to treat the pregnant woman affectingly.

Our clinic is situated in the middle of Berwick with ample parking, which is quite easily accessible for all residents of Berwick, Narre Warren, Cranbourne and Hampton Park.