Dr. Barbara Newlon, Pediatric Osteopathy

Dr. Barbara Newlon, Osteopathic Physician specializing in Pediatric Osteopathy

At What Age Can You Treat Babies With Osteopathy ?

Technique

pediatric cranial sacral osteopathy session

Dr. Newlon utilizes a technique called myofacial release and cranial/sacral work to treat all of her patients. Similar in feeling to acupressure, it is extremely gentle for babies, including newborns. There is just enough resistance given to the tissue for it to respond and change.

Training

Years of practice are required to enable a practitioner to feel and respond to a newborn’s tissue. I advise parents to seek out Doctors of Osteopathy and not craniosacral therapists because this profession (Osteopathy) is where the work originated and the training is in depth and requires many hours of certified/tested time.

How Soon After Birth Can A Newborn Receive Osteopathic Treatment ?

Profound change can occur that enables your baby to grow to its full potential. I have named several situations in this website that can be helped and/or alleviated. The general rule is that the sooner you treat compromised tissue the better, because compressed tissue becomes hard like scar tissue, when the body’s fluids don’t move through it, and it will take longer to see results, and sometimes the results are not as complete if you were to wait. Also, there are ossification (hardening) centers in the skull and sacrum that occur at different time intervals. The first in the skull occurs at three months. The next major ossification occurs at three years. More complete change can occur with cartilage than with bone. Hypoxia (lack of oxygen) to the tissue is happening in compressed tissue to some degree, another reason to begin treatment as soon as possible. I have treated newborns as early as two days old. They can be treated on the first day of their life. I strongly recommend that treatment begin within the first month of life. I offer parents of newborn to one-year-old babies the first osteopathic evaluation and treatment free of charge because I feel that early treatment is so beneficial.