Chiropractic & Osteopathy at the Crossroads

I have entitled my address 'CHIROPRACTIC AND OSTEOPATHY AT THE CROSSROADS' for reasons that will, I hope, become clear. But first let me briefly outline my own credentials for undertaking this task and the basis presumably on which the organisers consider me to be an informed observer of the chiropractic and osteopathy scene in this country. I am by profession an academic; a sociologist employed currently by Latrobe University and convenor of a group of researchers known as the Health Sociology Research Group within the School of Social Sciences at the university. Now all academics have areas of study in which they are experts; both broader fields of knowledge, and beyond that increasingly specialised research interests until ultimately they come to their super specialties; those usually tiny but complex areas of knowledge about which they claim to know as much as anyone. [If you're short of a dinner party conversation topic with an academic ask them what their super speciality is, and then see if you can shut them up!]