Your Pain - Advice From Osteopathic Consultancy

Pain is a warning sign that something’s not quite right. It’s an alert that tells you to stop damaging your body. Pain is not always local; it could be referred from elsewhere. There can also be a combination of factors that can lead to local damage. These are vast and varied.

Did you know you don’t have to have just one problem? Most of us have a few issues. Here at Osteopathic Consultancy we strive to find out the complete picture. We look at all your problems. (Well as many as you can remember). We look at how they may relate to your presenting issue/s.

A founding principle of Osteopathy is that structure and function are reciprocally interrelated. What a mouthful! Well it is very easy. You are what you do and what you do is what you are. So if you train to do something then your body adapts to the requirement. If you do it a lot you can over use areas of your body. If you don’t do enough the muscles get smaller. If you sit at a desk your leg muscles become unbalanced. If you broke your leg or strained a ligament then the structure is now changed. Then it may not function as optimally as it did before.

Example – Twisted Ankle

Imagine having a twisted ankle. Then think about how you might be limping. The ankle heals and you feel better (hopefully). Did you do any rehabilitation? Are the leg muscles back to a good tension? The body remembers the damage and can protect you against it the future. The only thing is you don’t twist your ankle all the time. The muscles remain tighter than normal and it can lead to your leg working inefficiently. The loss of co ordination and increase in muscle tension is compensated for in other ways.

Hopefully you are feeling OK. Or are you already struggling? Then you are busy and you lose fitness. You had muscles holding it all together. They have got smaller. Now your opposite knee is finding it hard to keep taking 55% of the load. So your opposite ankle seems OK, but now you have knee pain? This can go on.

You do some stretching to your knee and get back to the gym and slowly your knee settles down. You are coping again. Let’s go out for a nice long walk this weekend. You are a bit stiff, but you loosen up as you walk and all seems fine. The only thing is the spine is now trying to cope with an unstable ankle and a sore knee. After you walk your low back spasms. Idea! I need my back sorting.

Should we treat the back to make you feel better? If we make a few changes to the spine it can help you cope. It gets you back on your feet and back to life. But it isn’t really going to help in the longer term. We need to find out WHY you are in pain. We need to treat the ankle, settle the knee down and get you functioning better. Then you can get back to normal function. This leads to improved structure. (Remember they are related). This is the point where your quality of life starts to improve.

Patients can be a lot more or less complicated than the above. At Osteopathic Consultancy we are always looking at you and how we can optimise your body and function. You are an individual. We Treat, We Care, We Succeed.