what’s the difference between chiropractic and osteopathy (and which is more medically valid)?
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It depends where you are. Both are different forms of quackery, the difference is more about how much the practioners actually believe in it
In the USA, Doctors of osteopathic (DOs) are closer to a historic anomaly. Osteophathy itself is essential pseudoscientific spiritualism, but their schools are essentially regular medical schools with a small side course in bullshit.
Almost everyone going to DO school knows it is bullshit and they’re just tolerating it to get the medical education, because after DO school
Why do people put up with it? Because after you do residency there is essentially no difference between a DO and an MD, a heart surgeon who did their DO first before their residency training is the same as a heart surgeon who did their MD before residency training. There *is* a stigma because DO schools are easier to get into, therefore people can usually safely assume your undergraduate grades or MCAT scores were weaker than your peers, but by the time you’re a 40-something practicing physician no one cares
Why are there still DO schools if everyone, including the teachers, understand that the little side course is bullshit? I don’t know, historical momentum? I do know that their numbers have been dropping as more DO schools have dropped the BS and become MD schools
Outside the USA it’s a different story, osteopaths don’t have a medical degree, they *only* peddle the pseudoscientific spiritualism stuff. Almost the opposite of a DO in that aspect
For Chiropractors – it’s a mixed bag. Most traditional chiropracty is pseudoscience and sometimes potentially dangerous. The stuff that actually works they have adopted from physiotherapy sciences.
Many “soft touch” chiropractors are essentially physiotherapists that want to be called a doctor and charge more, while traditional chiropractors operate under a similar level of pseudoscience as osteopaths
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