The History of Osteopathy

“To find health should be the object of the doctor. Anyone can find disease”

(A.T. Still, DO, 1908)

Dr. Andrew Taylor Still (1828-1917) was an American frontier doctor. In 1864, he became discouraged with allopathic medicine when he lost three of his own children to meningitis. He spent the next 10 years studying anatomy, health and disease, searching for a drugless, more natural, hands on approach to medicine.

In 1892, Dr. Still founded the American School of Osteopathy (ASO) in Kirksville, U.S.A. American trained osteopaths are called osteopathic physicians because they are medical physicians. The first class had 12 male students and 3 female students. Allowing women to participate was revolutionary at the time. By 1902, three hundred students graduated from the ASO, some traveling to Canada and Europe to practice there.

In 1918, Dr. Martin Littlejohn, a student of A.T. Still’s founded the British School of Osteopathy in London, England. Graduates were (and still are) restricted to practicing manual osteopathy only and are not physicians. The U.K. government has officially recognized osteopathy since the passage of the Osteopaths Act in 1993.

Osteopathy spread to other countries in Europe. In each country, osteopaths have worked to gain official recognition. There are both manual osteopaths and osteopathic physicians in Canada and Europe today.