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Osteopathen/innen und Ärzte/innen - ein Spannungsfeld ?
(Osteopaths and Physicians - An area of conflict?)
Lammer, M. [1]

Journal: Unpublished MSc thesis Wiener Schule für Osteopathie, Date: 2008/09, Pages: 72, type of study: cross sectional study

Free full text   (https://www.osteopathicresearch.org/s/orw/item/3020)

Keywords:

professional identity [29]
cross sectional study [597]
Austria [27]
osteopathic profession [57]
osteopaths [138]
physician [381]
WSO [433]

Abstract:

Study Design Quantitative Social Research Outline/Problem Definition The researcher has decided to take a closer look at the cooperation of osteopaths and medical doctors for her recent study.Her being interested in this very special topic has its origin in a number of aspects. For once there is the permanent desire for cooperation with doctors, second, the interest in how the collegues handle it and think about it. From the point of view of the researcher the central questions have so far been left unanswered: • Is there something such as cooperation between doctors and osteopaths and what is it like? • How crucial is the educational background? • What is the actual state of cooperation? • Is there a difference between females and males concerning cooperation? Speaking of osteopaths, there is no explicit legal regulation in Austria so far. Practising as an osteopath is only possible under the “guise” of one’s primary profession. Since the researcher has been working as a physiotherapist, she knows that basically cooperation is limited to the writing of letters of referral, which physiotherapists need to justify their work on the patient. ( They have to get an allotment) Research Question & Objective Cooperation between osteopaths and medical doctors Hypothesis • Cooperation exists primarily in the form of getting allotments. • There is no clear picture how cooperation should work to be desirable. Relevance for the Patients There are only few homepages and folders as a source of information. There is no real representation on the market. This seems due to a lack of professionalism and a lack of effort to act in favour of our profession. Many osteopaths do without advertising, because they already have enough patients. The fact that due to this lack of information patients have difficulty to find an osteopath near their home is not taken into consideration. Let alone that many patients don’t even know when to seek an osteopath, as they don’t know anything about osteopathy. In the course of a successful cooperation the patient is lead to the best therapy much more quickly. Relevance for Osteopathy The position of osteopathy within the medical field should be improved or rather established. Therefore osteopaths should care more about cooperation and initiate it more often. The results of this research could also be of help for younger collegues: how to start and keep up a good cooperation. Methodology For this research a questionnaire was designed. The researcher decided to use the computer to send the questionnaires and also for the analysis of data. It is the easiest way of transmission, avoiding waste paper. The WSO agreed to send the questionnaires via e-mail to 269 osteopaths and students in their 6th year. A computer specialist placed the questionnaire in the web. As mentioned before, 269 questionnaires were sent off, including a letter of information, giving instructions and explaining the purpose of the study. After that the questionnaires were analysed. Also homepages and brochures/folders of collegues were used as an additional source of information and were evaluated as well. Results The percentage of returns was only 37,5%, which indicates that the topic is of only little interest to the osteopathic collegues. But on the other hand out of 101 osteopaths 84% stated a cooperation with medical doctors. There is no relevant difference according to the original job training. Osteopaths most frequently work together with general practitioners, orthopaedists and case surgeons. Those osteopaths who were physiotherapists first, and here again more women than men, are mostly interested in being covered legally and therefore seek cooperation. The grade of contentment with cooperations is higher in men than women and also in osteopaths who finished their education between 01 and 04. Osteopaths who work under the denotation of osteopath only cooperate less often with medical doctors. Generally it turned out that comunication should take place during personal conversation or at least over the phone. Repeatedly it was stated that doctors should be better informed about osteopathy, possibly osteopathy should be already introduced during the study of medicine. In order to achieve a successful cooperation, mutual interest and commitment are necessary. Critical Reflection/Perspectives/Conclusions The low number of returns (37,5%) raises the question if this is a representative result for Austrian osteopaths. The gender related differences could be analysed in more detail, by inserting more specific questions in the questionnaire, and possibly evaluating it psychologically. As far as the researcher is concerned it is alarming that osteopaths who denote themselves osteopaths only are less interested in a cooperation. This aspect would certainly call for a further study. Nevertheless there remains the hope that this study prompted some of the collegues to think about how they could form and maintain cooperations with medical doctors. Most of all the researcher hopes that they realize the necessity of such cooperations for the benefit of the patients.

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