Osteopathy In The Cranial Field
What is a Cranial Osteopath?
A Cranial Osteopath is first and foremost an Osteopath. All osteopaths train for 4 years or more at one of the undergraduate colleges acquiring a BSc or an MSc and the requirements to register with the General Osteopathic Council. A Cranial Osteopath has acquired a further specialist skill through post graduate training and experience.
Osteopaths search for health in motion. The aim of all osteopaths is to recognise where motion is absent and use their technical skill to restore motion. Motion promotes healthy fluid dynamics ensuring the constant supply of nutrients and oxygen to an area as well as the removal of all waste products. Without motion there is poor irrigation and the potential for disease. If disease is already present, it is very difficult for the body to repair itself if motion is absent.
An osteopath trained to undergraduate level focuses on gross mechanical motion which is governed by muscles acting on bones creating leverage. A cranial osteopath focuses on a far more subtle motion which is a form of respiration occurring through all the tissues. It does not require muscles acting on bones for the movement and so the focus of the cranial osteopath moves away from just the muscles, skeleton and joints. It takes a lot of time and a lot of patience for a practitioner to gain the ability to palpate this motion but once experienced this motion is clearly evident as an indicator of health and its absence as an indicator of disease. The aim of a cranial osteopath is to help the body to restore this subtle motion so that the body is able to repair itself. This applies to any part of the body and from the smallest to the largest of areas.
Why are Cranial Osteopaths called Cranial when they treat all areas of the body?
There are two reasons for this.
William Garner Sutherland discovered this very subtle motion in the early 20th century by examining the sutures (joint lines) of the skull. Contrary to popular belief that the skull is a fused a solid structure these sutures rarely fuse over, even in an octogenarian and therefore they must permit some form of motion. Sutherland studied the design of the different sutures and realised that together they permitted a very subtle shape change of the skull which represents this respiratory motion that cranial osteopaths talk about. It is a rhythmic shape change and it was first discovered in the head but in fact it occurs everywhere in the body.
Because this motion occurs in all tissues of the body cranial osteopaths do not have to limit their examination to just muscles acting on joints. A cranial osteopath has gone on to study the detailed anatomy of the cranium and its contents through post graduate training and can now add the head area along with the rest of the body to their osteopathic assessment and treatment of the patient.
What do Osteopaths in the Cranial field treat?
Osteopaths in the cranial field should not claim to treat specific conditions. The aim of an osteopathic treatment is specifically to remove any hindrance to the body healing itself. What the body heals is frankly beyond the control or influence of the practitioner. The body has its own drug store, an army of antibodies, white blood cells and inflammatory agents just aching to get to a diseased or damaged area but if there is no motion these agents cannot get to the relevant area and do their job. The aim of the osteopath is not to cure a disease but to restore motion where absent and ensure healthy fluid dynamics so that the body is able to heal itself.
Is osteopathy only for babies and children?
l Osteopathy in the cranial field is best known for treating babies and children but it is important that people realise that all ages can benefit from this treatment.
Babies and Children
In babies and children an osteopath will focus on their development and the potential for growth. The aim is that as the child grows he/she will not have to compensate or adapt around the legacy of an old injury that can in fact be resolved with a little help or the appropriate advice.
A famous quote from WG Sutherland is “As the twig is bent so the tree doth grow”.
This quote is helpful in understanding why cranial osteopath would, in theory, like to check over all babies a few weeks after their birth. The newborn skulls are soft and not fully ossified ( hardened to solid bone). Strain patterns absorbed by the softer cartilage that may have evolved either slowly through the late stages of pregnancy due to an awkward lie or lack of space in the womb, or suddenly during a traumatic birth may have led to unresolved traumas that can be identified and supported towards their self correction. It is a gentle but significant intervention aimed to set the baby up for healthy growth. As a bi-product of this treatment it is not uncommon that those babies that are restless, unsettled, poor feeders, suffering from colic or other discomforting conditions will settle and subsequently thrive.
All osteopaths treat children and are keen to promote the best possible development of their musculoskeletal system. As well as treating injuries osteopaths keep a look out for the development of unusual spinal curves and developmental conditions that can affect the more peripheral joints of the hips, knees, feet.
An osteopath working in the cranial field will extend this approach to watching over the development of the face in particular. They will consider the proportion of the upper, middle and lower faces which bears much relevance to breathing mechanics and dental occlusion both of which have a dramatic effect on long term health. This intervention may have some influence on chronic ear nose and throat problems, headaches and sinusitis although the osteopath does not specifically set out to treat these conditions. Again, the aim is to restore balance and motion so that the patient can potentially heal himself.
Adults
In adults development and growth is over but we look to restore and maintain the best possible balance and motion and these two factors combined promote the ability to self heal and subsequently maintain health. Patients come with a huge variety of complaints, not just spinal pain and mechanical injuries, in the hope that osteopathy can help them.
Although we do not claim to treat specific conditions the symptoms that our patients present with determines to some extent which areas we focus on. In patients complaining of symptoms affecting the head we will examine the cranium in relation to the rest of the body. In patient complaining of symptoms affecting the limbs we will play close attention to the limb itself but in relation to the rest of the body. Pelvic conditions are often complex and remain unresolved, undiagnosed for years. Again we will pay close attention to restoring healthy fluid dynamics to the pelvis and its contents with a specific aim, as always, to promote self healing to this area. We will consider the dynamics of the pelvis in relation to the rest of the body.
A cranial osteopath does not always have a precise diagnosis in allopathic terms or even a precise understanding of what is going on. He does have highly tuned palpatory skills however and, as most will understand, transferring feelings into words is not always easy. He has excellent skills at restoring motion where absent and recognising when he has achieved this. He has a clear understanding of how to influence a body so that it is “set to heal”.
NB: The undergraduate training has already provided all osteopaths with a thorough understanding of yellow and red flag symptoms and signs which serve as a warning of patients unsuitable for osteopathic treatment who need to be referred on for a conventional medical opinion.
How does Cranial Osteopathy work?
Cranial Osteopaths have the unfortunate disadvantage of appearing to do very little and giving the impression that they are performing some sort of healing miracle. They appear very passive and still while they work.
The sequence of events is as follows.
1. The first stage of the treatment is to ‘listen’ to the patient’s body to try and understand where the subtle motion is present and where it is absent. This guides the hands of the practitioner to where he needs to provide his initial contact.
2. A patient’s body is always trying to heal itself and one of the ways it does this from a mechanical perspective is through the pulling/pushing of the fascia. The fascia is the membrane that wraps everything up in a cling film type covering. It is responsive, supportive and connective. By placing his hands on an area in distress it is possible for the osteopath to feel this pulling and pushing and to support or emphasize this. The practitioner is effectively providing a fulcrum around which this system can work and magnify its effects.
3. With the help of the practitioner the membrane system of the patient will eventually find a point or a place where it can reset its own tension. It can reorganise. This is a point of balance. The patient will recognise this point himself as it creates an enormously relaxing sensation.
4. At this point the practitioner will retain contact but allow the membrane system to perform its own corrections. Through its connectivity these corrections may be far reaching.
5. The final skill of the practitioner lies in his ability to recognise when to take his hands away. The sign is the restoration of this subtle rhythmic motion that he searches for as representative of health.
I hope this explains why the practitioner appears so passive. The osteopathic treatment goes through different phases: palpating, listening, synchronising, getting involved, recognising when to sit back and support and recognising when to take his hands away. It is a difficult skill to acquire but to an observer it is very unimpressive to watch!
The healing is not performed by the practitioner. The healing comes from the patient himself. You only have to witness a scab form over a graze to understand the capacity of a body to heal itself – there no magic forces. The practitioner just initiates the process. The healing process itself then takes time and occurs away from the practice.
How long does the healing process take?
The healing process can take a few hours, or a few days or it may take weeks or months and need some help along the way.
How many treatments will it take?
It is impossible to generalise but the best time to try and answer this question is on the second visit when the patient has had time to respond to the first treatment.
Does an Osteopath working in the cranial field only treat physical conditions?
No. The treatment aims to influence the mechanics of the cranial bones and the tension of the cranial membranes. As such the osteopath is potentially influencing the housing of the central nervous system (the brain). In theory, better housing will lead to better function.
It is this practitioner’s belief that we should have osteopaths trained in the cranial field working in all mental institutions and all prisons. Mechanical/physical factors are rarely, if ever, considered as contributing to mental illness and altered behaviour. A lot of research is needed and so far unavailable to support these beliefs.
How do I know if my osteopath is has received post graduate training in the cranial field?
Unfortunately in the UK there is no validation criteria for training standards in cranial osteopathy beyond our initial undergraduate training. As it is not a demonstrative art it can be easily copied by those who lack extensive training and have no experience.
The best way to check is to ask a practitioner if they have attended any post graduate courses in cranial osteopathy since they qualified, how many courses (more than one!) and how long they have been using osteopathy in the cranial field in their work.
What is a Cranial Osteopath?
A Cranial Osteopath is first and foremost an Osteopath. All osteopaths train for 4 years or more at one of the undergraduate colleges acquiring a BSc or an MSc and the requirements to register with the General Osteopathic Council. A Cranial Osteopath has acquired a further specialist skill through post graduate training and experience.
Osteopaths search for health in motion. The aim of all osteopaths is to recognise where motion is absent and use their technical skill to restore motion. Motion promotes healthy fluid dynamics ensuring the constant supply of nutrients and oxygen to an area as well as the removal of all waste products. Without motion there is poor irrigation and the potential for disease. If disease is already present, it is very difficult for the body to repair itself if motion is absent.
An osteopath trained to undergraduate level focuses on gross mechanical motion which is governed by muscles acting on bones creating leverage. A cranial osteopath focuses on a far more subtle motion which is a form of respiration occurring through all the tissues. It does not require muscles acting on bones for the movement and so the focus of the cranial osteopath moves away from just the muscles, skeleton and joints. It takes a lot of time and a lot of patience for a practitioner to gain the ability to palpate this motion but once experienced this motion is clearly evident as an indicator of health and its absence as an indicator of disease. The aim of a cranial osteopath is to help the body to restore this subtle motion so that the body is able to repair itself. This applies to any part of the body and from the smallest to the largest of areas.
Why are Cranial Osteopaths called Cranial when they treat all areas of the body?
There are two reasons for this.
William Garner Sutherland discovered this very subtle motion in the early 20th century by examining the sutures (joint lines) of the skull. Contrary to popular belief that the skull is a fused a solid structure these sutures rarely fuse over, even in an octogenarian and therefore they must permit some form of motion. Sutherland studied the design of the different sutures and realised that together they permitted a very subtle shape change of the skull which represents this respiratory motion that cranial osteopaths talk about. It is a rhythmic shape change and it was first discovered in the head but in fact it occurs everywhere in the body.
Because this motion occurs in all tissues of the body cranial osteopaths do not have to limit their examination to just muscles acting on joints. A cranial osteopath has gone on to study the detailed anatomy of the cranium and its contents through post graduate training and can now add the head area along with the rest of the body to their osteopathic assessment and treatment of the patient.
What do Osteopaths in the Cranial field treat?
Osteopaths in the cranial field should not claim to treat specific conditions. The aim of an osteopathic treatment is specifically to remove any hindrance to the body healing itself. What the body heals is frankly beyond the control or influence of the practitioner. The body has its own drug store, an army of antibodies, white blood cells and inflammatory agents just aching to get to a diseased or damaged area but if there is no motion these agents cannot get to the relevant area and do their job. The aim of the osteopath is not to cure a disease but to restore motion where absent and ensure healthy fluid dynamics so that the body is able to heal itself.
Is osteopathy only for babies and children?
l Osteopathy in the cranial field is best known for treating babies and children but it is important that people realise that all ages can benefit from this treatment.
Babies and Children
In babies and children an osteopath will focus on their development and the potential for growth. The aim is that as the child grows he/she will not have to compensate or adapt around the legacy of an old injury that can in fact be resolved with a little help or the appropriate advice.
A famous quote from WG Sutherland is “As the twig is bent so the tree doth grow”.
This quote is helpful in understanding why cranial osteopath would, in theory, like to check over all babies a few weeks after their birth. The newborn skulls are soft and not fully ossified ( hardened to solid bone). Strain patterns absorbed by the softer cartilage that may have evolved either slowly through the late stages of pregnancy due to an awkward lie or lack of space in the womb, or suddenly during a traumatic birth may have led to unresolved traumas that can be identified and supported towards their self correction. It is a gentle but significant intervention aimed to set the baby up for healthy growth. As a bi-product of this treatment it is not uncommon that those babies that are restless, unsettled, poor feeders, suffering from colic or other discomforting conditions will settle and subsequently thrive.
All osteopaths treat children and are keen to promote the best possible development of their musculoskeletal system. As well as treating injuries osteopaths keep a look out for the development of unusual spinal curves and developmental conditions that can affect the more peripheral joints of the hips, knees, feet.
An osteopath working in the cranial field will extend this approach to watching over the development of the face in particular. They will consider the proportion of the upper, middle and lower faces which bears much relevance to breathing mechanics and dental occlusion both of which have a dramatic effect on long term health. This intervention may have some influence on chronic ear nose and throat problems, headaches and sinusitis although the osteopath does not specifically set out to treat these conditions. Again, the aim is to restore balance and motion so that the patient can potentially heal himself.
Adults
In adults development and growth is over but we look to restore and maintain the best possible balance and motion and these two factors combined promote the ability to self heal and subsequently maintain health. Patients come with a huge variety of complaints, not just spinal pain and mechanical injuries, in the hope that osteopathy can help them.
Although we do not claim to treat specific conditions the symptoms that our patients present with determines to some extent which areas we focus on. In patients complaining of symptoms affecting the head we will examine the cranium in relation to the rest of the body. In patient complaining of symptoms affecting the limbs we will play close attention to the limb itself but in relation to the rest of the body. Pelvic conditions are often complex and remain unresolved, undiagnosed for years. Again we will pay close attention to restoring healthy fluid dynamics to the pelvis and its contents with a specific aim, as always, to promote self healing to this area. We will consider the dynamics of the pelvis in relation to the rest of the body.
A cranial osteopath does not always have a precise diagnosis in allopathic terms or even a precise understanding of what is going on. He does have highly tuned palpatory skills however and, as most will understand, transferring feelings into words is not always easy. He has excellent skills at restoring motion where absent and recognising when he has achieved this. He has a clear understanding of how to influence a body so that it is “set to heal”.
NB: The undergraduate training has already provided all osteopaths with a thorough understanding of yellow and red flag symptoms and signs which serve as a warning of patients unsuitable for osteopathic treatment who need to be referred on for a conventional medical opinion.
How does Cranial Osteopathy work?
Cranial Osteopaths have the unfortunate disadvantage of appearing to do very little and giving the impression that they are performing some sort of healing miracle. They appear very passive and still while they work.
The sequence of events is as follows.
1. The first stage of the treatment is to ‘listen’ to the patient’s body to try and understand where the subtle motion is present and where it is absent. This guides the hands of the practitioner to where he needs to provide his initial contact.
2. A patient’s body is always trying to heal itself and one of the ways it does this from a mechanical perspective is through the pulling/pushing of the fascia. The fascia is the membrane that wraps everything up in a cling film type covering. It is responsive, supportive and connective. By placing his hands on an area in distress it is possible for the osteopath to feel this pulling and pushing and to support or emphasize this. The practitioner is effectively providing a fulcrum around which this system can work and magnify its effects.
3. With the help of the practitioner the membrane system of the patient will eventually find a point or a place where it can reset its own tension. It can reorganise. This is a point of balance. The patient will recognise this point himself as it creates an enormously relaxing sensation.
4. At this point the practitioner will retain contact but allow the membrane system to perform its own corrections. Through its connectivity these corrections may be far reaching.
5. The final skill of the practitioner lies in his ability to recognise when to take his hands away. The sign is the restoration of this subtle rhythmic motion that he searches for as representative of health.
I hope this explains why the practitioner appears so passive. The osteopathic treatment goes through different phases: palpating, listening, synchronising, getting involved, recognising when to sit back and support and recognising when to take his hands away. It is a difficult skill to acquire but to an observer it is very unimpressive to watch!
The healing is not performed by the practitioner. The healing comes from the patient himself. You only have to witness a scab form over a graze to understand the capacity of a body to heal itself – there no magic forces. The practitioner just initiates the process. The healing process itself then takes time and occurs away from the practice.
How long does the healing process take?
The healing process can take a few hours, or a few days or it may take weeks or months and need some help along the way.
How many treatments will it take?
It is impossible to generalise but the best time to try and answer this question is on the second visit when the patient has had time to respond to the first treatment.
Does an Osteopath working in the cranial field only treat physical conditions?
No. The treatment aims to influence the mechanics of the cranial bones and the tension of the cranial membranes. As such the osteopath is potentially influencing the housing of the central nervous system (the brain). In theory, better housing will lead to better function.
It is this practitioner’s belief that we should have osteopaths trained in the cranial field working in all mental institutions and all prisons. Mechanical/physical factors are rarely, if ever, considered as contributing to mental illness and altered behaviour. A lot of research is needed and so far unavailable to support these beliefs.
How do I know if my osteopath is has received post graduate training in the cranial field?
Unfortunately in the UK there is no validation criteria for training standards in cranial osteopathy beyond our initial undergraduate training. As it is not a demonstrative art it can be easily copied by those who lack extensive training and have no experience.
The best way to check is to ask a practitioner if they have attended any post graduate courses in cranial osteopathy since they qualified, how many courses (more than one!) and how long they have been using osteopathy in the cranial field in their work.