Have you been told “It’s just your age”? Don’t believe them!
You bend down to tie your shoelaces and your knees sound like bubble wrap. You stand up and your hips click like a metronome. Welcome to the glamorous world of arthritis, where your joints audition for a role in Stomp every morning.
Jokes aside, living with arthritic pains can be exhausting. Stiffness, swelling, and that slow, grinding ache can really take the joy out of simple things like walking the dog, opening jars, or showing your grandkids how to floss (the dance, not the dental thing, although that too, if you’re keen).
That’s where osteopathy comes in.
Osteopaths are trained to understand how your joints, muscles, and skeleton all work together. When arthritis makes movement painful, osteopaths can help you move better and hurt less—without relying solely on medication.
Treatment often includes gentle joint mobilisation, soft tissue massage, and advice on how to move without aggravating inflammation. It’s all about helping your body adapt and stay strong, so you don’t have to hobble through the rest of your week.
In fact, research supports this: a study in the Journal of Rheumatology found that manual therapy, including osteopathic techniques, improved pain and mobility in people with osteoarthritis of the knee (Deyle et al., 2000).
Osteopathic treatment for arthritic pains is not painful itself, it’s respectful of your limits, and sometimes surprisingly relaxing. Many patients say they feel looser, lighter, and less irritable after a session.
So, if you’re creaking more than your front gate and you’d like to feel a bit more like you again, an osteopath might just be your new best friend.
More information about osteoarthritis can be found here: osteoarthritis.