“Harmony with Nature’s Truths: Coherence in Osteopathic Medicine’s Philosophical Roots”
Mark Lambert, Des Moines University, West Des Moines, IA
Is God an architect? If so why not be governed by the plan, specification, building and engineering of that Architect in our work as healers? When we conform to and work by the laws and specifications of this Architect, we get the results required. This is the foundation stone on which osteopathy stands and has stood for thirty-five years. – Andrew Taylor Still
Unless they live in a rural area where primary care physicians often hold D.O. degrees, many Americans have little understanding of the differences between osteopathic and allopathic medicine. Although for decades the American Medical Association (AMA) denounced osteopathy as a cult, today osteopathy and allopathy are accounted as parallel, equally reputable approaches to treating the sick. However, in the face of our current epidemic of divisiveness, I suggest that the philosophical distinctiveness of osteopathy, particularly in its historical roots on the American frontier, offers a constructive response to Wendell Berry’s plea for a great coherence. Specifically, I argue osteopathy’s founder, Andrew Taylor Still (1828-1917) reformed his own allopathic training with an eclectic mix of Native American (Shawnee) medicine, spiritualism, and reverence for nature. His approach held that healing in the patient was achieved through the harmonious interrelationship of body, mind, spirit, and environment. Still’s vision represents an enduring encapsulation of what Dr. Daniel Sulmasy has termed a “biopsychosocial-spiritual model of health care” (Sulmasy, Rebirth of the Clinic, 121-46).
In my paper, I begin with a basic introduction to osteopathic medicine. As a generalization, allopathic medicine has traditionally focused on alleviating the symptoms of disease, whereas osteopathic medicine emphasizes treating the whole patient. Osteopathy tends to be more embracing of holistic and preventive medicine, approaching the patient as a unit of body, mind, and spirit capable of self-healing. With a name that means “bone suffering,” osteopathy is perhaps best known for its system of manual medicine—osteopathic manipulative treatment or medicine (OMM), but it never intended to be a mere treatment. Rather osteopathy’s founding principle: that the human body possesses all necessary agency for its own healing, represented a paradigm shift and repudiation of allopathic medicine’s then-emphasis on often ineffective (and outright toxic) drugs. Almost like a Wendell Berry fever-dream, osteopathic medicine emerged as an attempt to harmonize religion, science, and the midwestern frontier.
Next, I offer a historical account of Andrew Taylor Still’s influences and philosophical origins of osteopathy. A.T. Still learned medicine both through self-education and in apprenticeship to his father, a Methodist minister and (allopathic) physician. But his views on health and healing radically changed when his family relocated to a Shawnee Indian reservation in Kansas. There, Still became proficient in the Shawnee language and enamored with their medical epistemology: one premised on seeing the material and spiritual in harmonious interrelationship. He eventually abandoned Methodism for spiritualism and allopathy for a radical new approach. Still opens his Philosophy and Mechanical Principles of Osteopathy with the succinct assertion that, “I quote no authors but God and experience” (9). According to Still, all true medical knowledge could be learned through careful study of the book of Nature since God made all organisms perfect. His medical writings are replete with references to the divine as the “Grand Architect and Builder of the Universe,” “First Great Master Mechanic,” “All-Wise Chemist,” “Nature,” and more. I cannot overemphasize how osteopathy—one of the prevailing medical frameworks today—was founded on a commitment to spirituality and Native American therapeutics.
I then detail Still’s enduring focus on “harmony” in his art of healing. For Still, the study of Nature could teach the osteopath how to better facilitate healing simply by enhancing the natural, inherent harmonious functions of the human body. Still was proposing a more capacious, relational approach to illness. Much like his Shawnee teachers, Still understood the human form as sacred and intended for harmonious interrelationship: “Osteopathy is to me a very sacred science. It is sacred because it is a healing power through all nature” (Osteopathy: Research and Practice, 6). Health for the patient meant harmony of body, mind, spirit, and environment: “To obtain good results, we must blend ourselves with and travel in harmony with Nature’s truths” (Philosophy and Mechanical Principles, 17). Were I to exchange Still’s “harmony” with Berry’s “coherence” I suggest we would find the two speaking the same language. Finally, in turning to modern paradigms like Sulmasy’s that conceives of sickness as a disruption of right relationships, I leave the audience with ways that Still can become a generative conversation partner for reframing the art of medicine.
Unless they live in a rural area where primary care physicians often hold D.O. degrees, many Americans have little understanding of the differences between osteopathic and allopathic medicine. Although for decades the American Medical Association (AMA) denounced osteopathy as a cult, today osteopathy and allopathy are accounted as parallel, equally reputable approaches to treating the sick. However, in the face of our current epidemic of divisiveness, I suggest that the philosophical distinctiveness of osteopathy, particularly in its historical roots on the American frontier, offers a constructive response to Wendell Berry’s plea for a great coherence. Specifically, I argue osteopathy’s founder, Andrew Taylor Still (1828-1917) reformed his own allopathic training with an eclectic mix of Native American (Shawnee) medicine, spiritualism, and reverence for nature. His approach held that healing in the patient was achieved through the harmonious interrelationship of body, mind, spirit, and environment. Still’s vision represents an enduring encapsulation of what Dr. Daniel Sulmasy has termed a “biopsychosocial-spiritual model of health care” (Sulmasy, Rebirth of the Clinic, 121-46).
In my paper, I begin with a basic introduction to osteopathic medicine. As a generalization, allopathic medicine has traditionally focused on alleviating the symptoms of disease, whereas osteopathic medicine emphasizes treating the whole patient. Osteopathy tends to be more embracing of holistic and preventive medicine, approaching the patient as a unit of body, mind, and spirit capable of self-healing. With a name that means “bone suffering,” osteopathy is perhaps best known for its system of manual medicine—osteopathic manipulative treatment or medicine (OMM), but it never intended to be a mere treatment. Rather osteopathy’s founding principle: that the human body possesses all necessary agency for its own healing, represented a paradigm shift and repudiation of allopathic medicine’s then-emphasis on often ineffective (and outright toxic) drugs. Almost like a Wendell Berry fever-dream, osteopathic medicine emerged as an attempt to harmonize religion, science, and the midwestern frontier.
Next, I offer a historical account of Andrew Taylor Still’s influences and philosophical origins of osteopathy. A.T. Still learned medicine both through self-education and in apprenticeship to his father, a Methodist minister and (allopathic) physician. But his views on health and healing radically changed when his family relocated to a Shawnee Indian reservation in Kansas. There, Still became proficient in the Shawnee language and enamored with their medical epistemology: one premised on seeing the material and spiritual in harmonious interrelationship. He eventually abandoned Methodism for spiritualism and allopathy for a radical new approach. Still opens his Philosophy and Mechanical Principles of Osteopathy with the succinct assertion that, “I quote no authors but God and experience” (9). According to Still, all true medical knowledge could be learned through careful study of the book of Nature since God made all organisms perfect. His medical writings are replete with references to the divine as the “Grand Architect and Builder of the Universe,” “First Great Master Mechanic,” “All-Wise Chemist,” “Nature,” and more. I cannot overemphasize how osteopathy—one of the prevailing medical frameworks today—was founded on a commitment to spirituality and Native American therapeutics.
I then detail Still’s enduring focus on “harmony” in his art of healing. For Still, the study of Nature could teach the osteopath how to better facilitate healing simply by enhancing the natural, inherent harmonious functions of the human body. Still was proposing a more capacious, relational approach to illness. Much like his Shawnee teachers, Still understood the human form as sacred and intended for harmonious interrelationship: “Osteopathy is to me a very sacred science. It is sacred because it is a healing power through all nature” (Osteopathy: Research and Practice, 6). Health for the patient meant harmony of body, mind, spirit, and environment: “To obtain good results, we must blend ourselves with and travel in harmony with Nature’s truths” (Philosophy and Mechanical Principles, 17). Were I to exchange Still’s “harmony” with Berry’s “coherence” I suggest we would find the two speaking the same language. Finally, in turning to modern paradigms like Sulmasy’s that conceives of sickness as a disruption of right relationships, I leave the audience with ways that Still can become a generative conversation partner for reframing the art of medicine.