I stuck my neck out and tweeted about #OsteopathyWorks to two celebrity TV Doctors and got rather lambasted for my cheek!
It all began because of an idea to start a movement, a mission and a campaign to get Osteopathy better known across the world. I wanted to start something positive and something that we could all get behind and that required no funding.
It began as a thought whilst on holiday, as I read a conversation in a Facebook group about the unwinnable fight with skeptics who try to decry Osteopaths as charlatans. I got a bit rattled and idly wondered if we could come at this from a different angle.
And I came up with a campaign – #OsteopathyWorks
So last week I set up a closed Facebook group for worldwide Osteopaths so that we can inspire each other and share ideas. We can also notify each other of World Days, National Days or Weeks etc which we could also harness to promote Osteopathic treatment. In less than a week we’ve had over 300 global Osteopaths excited to join in and we’re cracking on! I’ve recorded some simple training and created lots of images you can download and use to genuinely and clearly promote Osteopathy.
There’s lots of debate about the BBC programme ‘The Doctor who gave up drugs’ aired last week with Dr Chris Van Tulleken. So I decided to tweet to him about Osteopathy being an alternative treatment to long term medication. I basically asked what if we could open our minds to humans treating humans; no drugs – what could that mean? I added in Dr Christian as I’ve followed him for a while.
Nothing happened.
Then late last night Dr Christian replied with ‘That a lot of people will die? And humans do treat humans… They are called doctors.”
Then a few more people piled in and it all got a bit crazy! Of course there were the usual references to Physios and lack of evidence, blah, blah, blah! Luckily Osteo Freya jumped in and rescued me from the onslaught with some great points that she enunciated properly. And the conversation has continued this morning with a few well delivered right hooks!
It’s not in my nature to be confrontational but it felt good that there was some debate; albeit only 140 characters at a time! But arguing will solve nothing ultimately and evidence will takes years to permeate through to the medical profession and general public.
Mistakenly, I thought that this public figure would be open to ideas of treatment which do not involve drugs. I won’t be making that error again and I won’t be troubling him again either!
So how can we get our point across positively?
- Use the hashtag as often as possible on your social media posts on Facebook and Twitter etc #OsteopathyWorks
- Perhaps you could pop a poster up in your Clinic saying something like “If you have benefited from Osteopathic treatment today, please post about it on your social media pages and add #OsteopathyWorks”
- If you share a post mentioning your successful treatment of a patient or retweet one, add #OsteopathyWorks
- Next time you print any marketing materials, business or appointment cards add the hashtag #OsteopathyWorks
- If you do manage to get an opportunity to talk to local GP’s about how you can augment their work, come into the Facebook group #OsteopathyWorks and ask for advice as there are several who have done this successfully.
- Maybe you could even get it embroidered on your jacket or polo top?
