Cancer Patient Perceptions of the Osteopathy Treatment: a Qualitative Study

For more than seven years an osteopath has been working in the palliative care unit (PCU) and in both palliative care mobile team (PCMT) as a member of the multidisciplinary team. The patients referred to the osteopath by the palliative care physicians present pains related to cancer, but also to the treatment, in particular to surgery or radiotherapy. The osteopath can help with other symptoms such as constipation or dyspnoea. As this approach is provided in complement of the medicinal approach, it is not considered as an alternative medicine but as a complementary medicine associated to a conventional care. It seemed relevant to the investigators to ask the cancer patients undergoing osteopathic sessions for pain how they saw this complementary therapy.