How osteopathy supports reproductive health

Safe, gentle, and entirely natural, osteopathy has been shown to support reproductive health. In fact, scientific studies show that women have gone on to start pregnancy within months of their last osteopathic treatment session and deliver at full-term.

Osteopathy is a manual, non-invasive therapy that focuses on realigning and rebalancing your entire body. This is important because reproductive health can be affected by any number of issues in women and men: some more obvious and others hidden.

Even after obvious reproductive blocks are treated by doctors, couples still struggle to get pregnant. Other times, doctors go through a checklist and can’t determine why a couple is having problems – with no insight into potential hidden factors, they conclude the causes are unknown.

Osteopathy does not focus on one isolated area of concern or symptom; it focusses on your whole body. This way, osteopathy finds and addresses any underlying factors affecting reproductive health. After all, your whole body is an interconnected system: your anatomy, physiology, and biochemical systems do not function in silo – they directly impact and influence each other. If one body system is out of balance, other body systems will inevitably fall out of balance too. Osteopaths treat the entire body and its individual systems to restore complete balance and function, thus addressing health issues and creating an optimal environment for pregnancy.

Reproductive health can be affected by structural, physiological, emotional and energetic issues – all of which an osteopath focuses on, in sequence, during treatment.

Structural

At IMI, our osteopaths begin by treating structural blockages or misalignments in the body that may be impacting the reproductive system. Muscular and fascial restrictions, and sacral and pelvic misalignment can be caused by current or prior trauma like a former car accident, fall, chronic back pain or athletic injury. These can limit mobility of the reproductive organs in both men and women. Scar tissue adhesions and lymphatic congestion can impact reproductive health too.

Your osteopath can realign and rebalance structural issues using a variety of  techniques. These include visceral manipulation, soft tissue and myofascial techniques, gentle joint manipulation, stretching, and trigger-point therapy. They can help with uterus ante or retroversion too.

Physiological

Structural dysfunctions alter how the nervous and circulatory systems communicate with the pelvic organs. These dysfunctions can cause an abnormal blood flow, which can impair the flow of hormones and nutrients necessary to regulate the function of nerves and reproductive organs.

Additionally, your gut health may be impacting your sex organs, pressing on your uterus or testicles, for example. Your osteopath will treat structural dysfunctions and, partnering with an IMI naturopath, improve gut health, which in turn, supports reproductive health.

Emotional and energetic

Stress levels in Hong Kong and around the world are at an all-time high. But even past traumatic life events or inner emotional blockages can affect your nervous system, its impact on hormonal balance, and subsequent effect on reproductive health.

The vagus nerve is the longest nerve in the body and it’s responsible for transmitting signals from the brain to the internal organs and back again. In a calm state, your vagus nerve signals to your body to rest and recharge, but if it becomes dysregulated through chronic stress and trauma, it may constantly send signals to your body to go into stress mode, which inhibits reproductive health.

Through craniosacral therapy and with a focus on the vagus nerve pathways, your osteopath can help improve and lower an aroused sympathetic nervous system. They can release emotional stress and trauma, and realign the body to a calm state, which is supportive to a healthy pregnancy.

Osteopathy for reproductive health: a case study

Here’s an example of a client who came to IMI for osteopathic treatment. At the time, Jane (name changed) was 30 years old. Her struggles with heavy periods were impacting her life and work. During an initial in-depth consultation, it came to light that Jane had a history of hip injury – she had fallen down the stairs in her early 20s. Using trigger point therapy and visceral techniques, we treated her ilium, sacrum bones and her pelvic floor muscle, and addressed mechanical restrictions in her uterus. This, in turn, helped to improve the blood circulation to her hips and pelvis.

During a session – in a safe and trusted space – Jane shared she feared her menstrual health issues would impact her reproductive health. Through fascia techniques on her uterus and sacrum, we were able to alleviate her injury trauma at the tissular level. We also helped her to direct her breathing to her hips, lowering her stress and restoring a sense of calm. Jane’s menstrual cycles became more manageable and after five months, she became pregnant and is now overjoyed to be a mother.

References

Kramp, Mary Ellen. “Combined Manual Therapy Techniques for the Treatment of Women with Infertility: A Case Series” Journal of Osteopathic Medicine, vol 112, no 10, 2012, pp 680-684