osteopractic physical therapy
An osteopractor is a physical therapist who has completed an evidence-based, post-graduate training program in the use of spinal and high-velocity low-amplitude thrust manipulation, dry needling, instrument-assisted manual therapies, and differential diagnostics for the management of neuromusculoskeletal conditions.
Osteopractic physical therapy is an approach to care, a sub-specialty within physical therapy, and more accurately describes the kind of physical therapy services (rather than simply “physical therapy”) offered so the public, potential patients and colleagues alike, can identify the appropriate practitioner of choice for the condition in question. When you break a bone, you look for an orthopedist, not just a general medical doctor. When your child needs medical care, you look for a pediatrician, not just a general medical doctor. Likewise, when you have neck pain, low back pain, headaches, tennis elbow, heel pain, carpal tunnel syndrome, knee osteoarthritis, plantar fasciitis, shoulder impingement, or joint pain etc., it makes sense to look for a specialist within physical therapy, that is specifically trained and has advanced post-graduate qualifications to treat neuromusculoskeletal conditions. One of these specialties is osteopractic physical therapy.
The term osteopractor has nothing to do with the chiropractic or osteopathic professions; that is, the osteopractic concept is firmly focused on the management of neuromusculoskeletal disorders in an evidence-based fashion, not the treatment of other organ systems as the profession of chiropractic has traditionally engaged. More specifically, Osteopractors do not subscribe to the theory of the “Vertebral Subluxation Complex” as the primary cause of “disease”. In short, Osteopractic Physical Therapists do not diagnose or treat all 10-organ systems as chiropractors are trained and licensed to do, and they do not utilize medicine or surgery as osteopathic physicians are trained and licensed to do. Lastly, spinal manipulation and dry needling are shared procedures between many healthcare professions (i.e. no one profession owns these procedures, e.g. 2012 Supreme Court Ruling: Alabama State Board of Chiropractic vs. James Dunning); however, the philosophy, the clinical reasoning, and the conditions treated with these procedures dramatically differs between professions.
