Osteopathy
Cranial osteopathy
Osteopathy for babies & children
Sports massage
Deep tissue massage
Kinesiology taping
What is osteopathy?
Osteopathy is a form of manual therapy much like physiotherapy & chiropractic. Our job is to promote your body’s health and speed up the natural healing process to put things right.
As osteopaths we are trained to diagnose, treat and prevent problems with your moving parts; musculoskeletal disorders. What sets osteopaths apart, is we perform a thorough assessment to find the root cause of the problem, this might not be where you are experiencing symptoms. By treating the cause, we help you get better faster with a minimal number of treatments and reduce the likelihood of your problem reoccurring.
Osteopaths also understand that your moving parts are all connected, and if something hasn’t been working as it should, this can have an impact on the body. This is why osteopaths treat and assess the whole body, not just the symptoms. This effective approach to can be applied to a range of different symptoms in adults, babies & children. Osteopathy is suitable for anyone of any age. It could be for something new, or something you’ve had for a long time or a reoccurring problem. See if we can get you feeling better.
Some of the things we may be able to help
- Low back pain & sciatica
- Arthritic pain
- Neck pain
- Joint pain (e.g. shoulder, elbow, hip, knee pain...)
- Ligament or tendon damage
- Repetitive strain
- Pain during / after pregnancy
- Sports injury
- Muscle spasm
- Headache
- Cramp
Osteopathic Treatment
Osteopaths give you real, hands on treatment for real issues that can affect your health and well-being. Treatment can help restore your body to the way it wants to be – pain free, symptom free and feeling great.
The treatment is targeted at releasing areas of tension to create space for the body to facilitate it’s own healing mechanisms. There is no magic or voodoo, it’s based on science and the fundamental principals of anatomy. You can expect massage to release muscle tension, gentle moving and stretching of joints to get the fluids moving and yes, sometimes we will ask you if it’s OK to gently crack a joint. We also offer very gentle cranial treatment for adults and babies.
There is nothing to be worried about, just looking forward to feeling great!
Cranial Osteopathy
Cranial osteopathy follows the same principals as manual osteopathic treatment and diagnosis but cranial osteopaths use a highly developed sense of touch to feel subtle changes of tension and tissue quality in the whole body to diagnose areas of strain or dysfunction.
Cranial osteopaths feel for movement and, more importantly, lack of movement in these deeper layers of the body. A lack of movement, or a distorted movement indicates an area of tension. The treatment tries to remove these areas of tension and restore a natural state of balance. Cranial techniques are extremely gentle and you most likely won’t feel anything at all during a treatment, just wonderful afterwards.
Osteopathy for your family
No matter whether your child is 3 days, 3 months or 3 years we recognise how precious they are and we view it as a privilege to be allowed to assess and treat your little one.
We understand that you might be a little unsure or nervous, but you have nothing to worry about.
Osteopathy for babies is nothing scary. There is no cracking, no deep massage, in fact, assessment and treatment is so gentle it looks like your osteopath is hardly doing anything at all (but trust us, they really are!). If you want to know what your osteopath is doing, we encourage you to ask questions at any point, but hopefully they’ll be talking you through what they are doing and why.
We use gentle, subtle techniques to assess areas of tension in your child. These tensions might be muscular, in the fascia, tissues, membranes, connective tissue or in the body’s natural fluids and if tension is present it may have different effects on your baby. The treatment works to gently undo these tensions and restore their little to body to how it wants to be, feeling wonderful.
It’s nothing to be worried about, we’ve had mums arrive in tears and leave with smiles after watching the tension released from their little one.
Qualifications & professional standards
Osteopath is a protected title. To become an osteopath requires 4 years of training at masters level at an accredited educational institution. During this training osteopaths undertake over 1500 hours of hands on clinical experience with the patients. An osteopathic degree is similar to a medical degree but with a greater focus on anatomy & musculoskeletal medicine.
Osteopaths are regulated by the General Osteopathic Council (GOsC). This body sets and maintains UK standards for osteopathy. By law all practising osteopaths must register with GOsC annually. Registration requires a minimum for 40 hours CDP activities, to have insurance and be in good health. You can check if your osteopath is registered by following this link.
![Melanie Dalby I'm Registered Mark 9527[10838]](https://www.valleyosteopaths.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/Melanie-Dalby-Im-Registered-Mark-952710838.jpg "Melanie Dalby I’m Registered Mark 9527[10838]")
