AbstractsBiology & Animal Science

The purpose of the study is to identify osteopaths’ therapeutic approaches in the situation of assisting mother and baby dyads with breastfeeding difficulties. More specifically, it seeks to explicate the processes involved when paediatric osteopaths apply osteopathic holistic principles and manual therapy for the baby to promote breastfeeding. This qualitative study involves observations of osteopaths treating babies with breastfeeding difficulties, in their clinics throughout metropolitan Melbourne. Information is gathered from clinical observations and in-depth audio-recorded interviews with the osteopaths and mothers involved in the treatment sessions. The study uses Corbin and Strauss’s (2008) grounded theory methodological approach to inform the methods of concurrent data collection and analysis. This methodology provides the analytical tools for exploring the interactive processes that take place during the osteopathic treatment session, and with increasing levels of abstraction, to ultimately generate a theoretical framework of paediatric osteopathic practice in the situation of treating mother-baby dyads with breastfeeding difficulties.