bowen technique for cyclists

[David Martin]

Is it any good for cyclists or just wishful thnking?

[simonp]

The Second Sight: Bowen Therapy 1: An Introduction

save your money.

[Clare]

People's view on Bowen Therapy tended to fall into either of two camps:

1) It's brilliant

2) It's bunkum

Have had BT on a knee problem I am firmly in the second camp. The practitioner did her stuff then said

"You should be feeling a tingling sensation now."

"Erm, no!"

"Well not everybody does," bit more treatment "how about now?"

"Nothing."

Bit more treatment;

"There you go, you'll be fine when you're riding tomorrow."

No I wasn't, but a bike fitting session a week later sorted me completely.


On the other hand she also treated another person who had a bad back, he did feel the "tingling sensation" and said he felt much better after his treatment.
I have no idea how he was the next day, we didn't see him to ask.

[Regulator]

Bowen Technique does have some basis for the claims (and is formally recognised in some states) but is not subject to regulation in the UK.

I'd rather see a chiropractor or osteopath.

[toontra]

Didn't work for me - I got a second consultation "cheap" because I said I wasn't cured.  Result? - I still wasn't cured.

[clarion]

I'd rather see a chiropractor or osteopath.

I'm not impressed by those two, either.

[Greenbank]

These types of things really don't help themselves when they have "magic" such as "A key feature of The Bowen Technique is that of the therapist leaving the room in between certain moves in order to allow the work to take effect." as being fundamental to the technique (text taken from simonp's link).

Can't they go to the far corner of the room or are my muscles/ligaments aware of the structure of the building I'm in and can't get to work fixing themselves until there's a door in between them and the practitioner.

Ben Goldacre's Bad Science discusses the science, or lack of it, behind many of the alternative therapies and how many have some genuine scientific basis (except homeopathy) but then spoil it by piling on the hokum and quackery (i.e. succussion). The book also goes into why it looks like many of the hokum methods do work and, to an extent, why their practice isn't always harmful (i.e. the parallels with religion).

[juliet]

I'd rather see a chiropractor or osteopath.

I'm not impressed by those two, either.

Really?  My experience of osteopathy has been overwhelmingly positive.  Unfortunately I keep failing to do the exercises they give me and/or continuing to sit with crap posture in front of a monitor, and therefore have to get re-fixed every 4 months or so, but that isn't the fault of the practitioner!  (When I do do the exercises they do work.)

Having said that for my back issues I really need a decent massage as *well* once the joints are back where they oughta.  (One of the weirdest sensations going: feeling your entire spine realign itself after one joint gets moved.)   Which doesn't really fit into a 50 min osteo session, and again I tend not to get around to going to a proper massage therapist after :-/

[clarion]

Osteopathy and chiropractic do both have a degree of success, but are wrapped around in cosmic woo, and make unacceptable claims.  See Goldacre op cit inter alia for more details.

[Regulator]

Osteopathy and chiropractic do both have a degree of success, but are wrapped around in cosmic woo, and make unacceptable claims.  See Goldacre op cit inter alia for more details.

Although I would agree with you to a certain extent, Goldacre's claims must also be treated with due caution.

[clarion]

As should all.  But his logic follows pretty well.  And some of the claims he cites are simply ridiculous.

Edit: I am with Simon Singh here.  I know you have in the past suggested that there is something amiss with his co-author Edzard Ernst's status, but you didn't back that up.

The point is that, however effective the treatments may be in a limited number of circumstances, the claims of unproven cures for other conditions are misleading at best

[juliet]

In my experience of osteopaths, I've only run into one who made any cosmic-woo-type claims (& to be fair, she didn't do that for the osteopathy bit, just for something else she also practised which I have now forgotten, mostly because I just went 'uh-huh' & ignored it).  The people at the British School of Osteopathy, and Lovely Tom who I saw in Oxford, were straightforwardly about "this is the way in which your musculoskeletal structure is misaligned; this is what we're going to do about it; this is what *you* need to do to prevent it from happening again". 

I did have a *fantastic* massage therapist (not osteo) in Sydney who also talked a bit about "energy work" of some variety.  But I could care less about whatever his theory in the "energy work" line was, because he was straightforwardly *really really good* at doing very painful things to my muscles until they relaxed again. 

[David Martin]

The Second Sight: Bowen Therapy 1: An Introduction

save your money.

Amazing what google brings up - a blog post where someone has decided it is woo and seeks to deride it based on critical text analysis of one website.. 

The background for this is one of my colleagues who is a Bowen therapist and who is interested in evaluating whether it is effective in improving performance in people active in sport. 

She isn't a 'woo' practitioner but is in fact quite level headed. It does appear to be a very gentle form of massage.

I was wondering whether anyone had actually experienced it rather than being a google based keyboard critic.

..d

[Greenbank]

The background for this is one of my colleagues who is a Bowen therapist and who is interested in evaluating whether it is effective in improving performance in people active in sport. 

She isn't a 'woo' practitioner but is in fact quite level headed. It does appear to be a very gentle form of massage.

The point is, if she's not performing the bits that get called 'woo' then, in the eyes of the originators of Bowen, she's not performing Bowen properly.

Therefore, it's either all bunkum (I don't think anyone here is saying that, and it's certainly not my viewpoint) or, that the actual physical manipulation does work. In which case it loses considerable credibility (in my opinion) when the unnecessary 'woo' is piled on top.

It seems that many of these therapies have the same scientifically valid basis but then reinvent themselves by piling different 'woo' on top and giving themselves a new name and a new range of courses that people can go on to get themselves 'qualified' to practice these "new" techniques.

Most of this is an opinion shared by a friend similarly uninterested in the 'woo' aspect of these treatments. She's a qualified Kinesiologist as well as qualified in Alexander Technique and Bowen Technique. She also takes it all seriously enough to attend a week long full body dissection course at a hospital in order to study (in great detail) human anatomy. She doesn't believe in the 'woo' but does it as it what she's expected to do as a practicioner of the technique.

[clarion]

There is almost certainly a role for ritual in healthcare, and it has a significant psychological (placebo?) effect.  But the layers of 'woo' are just alienating bullshit, and disengage the patient from being responsible for/able to take an active part in the resolution of their problems.

Juliet, I am glad that the pratitioners you consulted helped you with your problem.

I think Greenbank makes a valid point: There is enough 'real' benefit to be had in a lot of these systems, and the rest of the fluff just brings the practice into disrepute.

For example, I believe that osteopathy can have a positive effect on many musculo-skeletal problems, but I do not believe that cranial osteopathy can cure asthma, as I have been told several times.  That sort of bunkum can lead parents to feel guilty that they are not doing hte best for their child, and thus the child's ailments/disability are somehow the parents' fault, unless...

Unless they spend lots of $$$$ on the latest Snake Oil, investing time and effort, often at no small cost in terms of anxiety on the child's part.

Sick and wrong.

[Greenbank]

I should add that the definition of 'woo' is a tricky one.

A technique that requires electrical lights to be turned off and the treatment room to be lit by a single candle may sound a bit dodgy, especially if it's dressed up with some pseudo-science claiming that electrical lights emit an as yet undetected special form of radiation that upsets your inner penguin. In reality it may help by just making the patient relax more by making them feel more at ease and less like they're in a hospital like atmosphere, this certainly could have a real beneficial effect.

This is why I'll take back some of what I said about the Bowen practitioner leaving the room. It may aid the treatment in some secondary way such as added relaxation. Just not when it's sold as magic/woo with inner penguins.

[David Martin]

So, back to the question.

Has anyone any experience with Bowen technique (or at least the non-woo parts therof) and does it do anything at all?

..d

[simonp]

The Second Sight: Bowen Therapy 1: An Introduction

save your money.

Amazing what google brings up - a blog post where someone has decided it is woo and seeks to deride it based on critical text analysis of one website.. 

The background for this is one of my colleagues who is a Bowen therapist and who is interested in evaluating whether it is effective in improving performance in people active in sport. 

She isn't a 'woo' practitioner but is in fact quite level headed. It does appear to be a very gentle form of massage.

I was wondering whether anyone had actually experienced it rather than being a google based keyboard critic.

..d

I'm naturally sceptical about such things and that page was the one that best summed up my feelings about what I read about it from other sites trying to push the woo stuff.

I'd be much happier as with Greenbank without all this dressing up.  Though maybe it's necessary to amplify the placebo effect.

[Greenbank]

Though maybe it's necessary to amplify the placebo effect.

Indeed. That's why Goldacre's book is an interesting read, even for the chapter(s) on the placebo effect itself.

Double blind trials, placebos, real drugs, control groups, rigorous methods and analysis, repeatable studies with (statistically) consistent results and what has been discovered is:-

Tell people to take a pill to reduce a symptom and, even the placebo will work quite well in a certain percentage of the group.

Tell them to take two pills (half strength of the original medicine) or two neutral placebo pills and it will work in a greater percentage of the group, despite being the same dose.

Put the pills (again, both the real drugs or placebos) in a bland white box and it'll "work" in fewer cases than the pills supplied in flashier packaging.

Some colour pills "work" better than others, despite having the same active (or placebo) composition.

[clarion]

And different colour pills work better on different symptoms.

[mattc]

What is the effect of the Daily Mail reviewing a pill?

[Greenbank]

What is the effect of the Daily Mail reviewing a pill?

Kill or cure.

[toontra]

So, back to the question.

Has anyone any experience with Bowen technique (or at least the non-woo parts therof) and does it do anything at all?

See my post on page 1.  Both practitioners were extremely nice people and I had a relaxing and enjoyable experience at each session.  Unfortunately neither solved (or even helped) the problems of my sore neck and dodgy knee.

[Zoidburg]

I judge any "alternative" treatment on the grounds of "would it actually save your life in an emergency"

<a href="http://www.youtube.com/v/HMGIbOGu8q0&rel=1" target="_blank">http://www.youtube.com/v/HMGIbOGu8q0&rel=1</a>

[clifftaylor]

I was really hoping this was going to be about Mick Bowen, president of the Oxonian CC, and a very fast rider in his time, via the "brute force" school of cycling. Politically somewhere to the right of Genghis Khan, but there you go.
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