This document is one in a series designed to provide basic information about mainline health professions and the Premedical Office at Xavier University of Louisiana.

There are TWO Kinds of Medical Degrees Recognized in the United States: There are two basic kinds of medical degrees offered in the United States. The most common is the M.D. (Doctor of Medicine) degree, offered by the nation's 138 allopathic medical schools. The second is the D.O. (Doctor of Osteopathy), offered by 29 osteopathic medical schools in the U.S. Both types of physicians are legally recognized to be equivalent in every state in the United States. However, because there are so many more allopathic medical schools, most Americans think of "allopathic medicine" as "medicine" and are not aware that osteopathic physicians exist. As a result, the osteopathic physicians generally have more presence in the areas where most are located--in California, in the central United States (Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas, Missouri, Iowa, and Illinois), and along the Great Lakes to the Northeast (Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania, New York, etc.).

What is Osteopathic Medicine? Osteopathic medicine, like allopathic medicine, is one of the healing arts and offers complete health service. Unlike allopathic medicine, however, osteopathic medicine does not merely treat symptoms but rather stresses a "holistic" approach which recognizes that health is a matter of the entire body--i.e. that the various bodily systems are interdependent on one another. Thus, osteopathic medicine pays more attention to the interaction between body structure and function than does allopathic medicine. In addition, osteopathic physicians are trained to use manipulative therapy upon muscular and skeletal systems to assist in treating and preventing disease and injury. Another hallmark of osteopathic medicine is its focus on preventive medicine.

What Kind of Services do Osteopathic Physicians Provide? Osteopathic physicians (D.O.'s) can gain full licensure in all fifty states to use all of the diagnostic and therapeutic techniques, including prescribing drugs and performing surgery, used by allopathic physicians (M.D.'s). In addition, the osteopathic physician has received special training to help him/her understand the relationship between structure and organ functions and he/she is specially trained to use manipulative therapy to correct structural problems. Although osteopathic medicine has traditionally emphasized family, community, and preventive medicine and D.O.'s practice in these fields, modern osteopathic physicians can enter many of the same specialities available to allopathic physicians including: anesthesiology, dermatology, general practice, internal medicine, neurology and psychiatry, ophthalmology, otorhinolaryngology, orthopedic surgery, pathology, pediatrics, proctology, radiology, rehabilitation medicine, and surgery.

What Kind of Education Does an Osteopathic Physician Receive? The education of an osteopathic physician is very similar to that of an allopathic physician. The osteopathic physician must first complete a set of basic requirements at an undergraduate college (general biology, general chemistry, organic chemistry, physics, etc.), take the MCAT, and (normally) obtain a college degree; students should review the American Association of Colleges of Osteopathic Medicine (AACOM) Osteopathic Medical College Information Book for any school-specific additional requirements. He/she then enters a four-year training program which (usually) is devoted to study in the basic sciences (anatomy, physiology, biochemistry, pathology, bacteriology, embryology, and pharmacology) during the first two years and do clinical training during the last two. The osteopathic physician then takes the licensure exam and enters a residency program in which he/she gains additional training under the close supervision of a practicing physician. The primary difference between the training of an osteopathic physician from that of an allopathic physician is that the osteopathic physician also completes special courses which make it possible to recognize structure problems and learns the art of osteopathic manipulative medicine (OMM) to aid in structural diagnosis. Almost all of the basic information from Info6 regarding allopathic medicine also applies to osteopathic medicine, with the exception of OMM.

To What Degree Do Allopathic and Osteopathic Physicians Interact? Until recent years, the allopathic medical establishment openly discouraged interaction between osteopathic and allopathic physicians and attempted to prevent osteopathic physicians from gaining licensure and practicing whenever possible. Most of the open antagonism has now ceased because the federal government recognizes the D.O. degree to be equivalent to the M.D. degree and allows either type of physician full practice. In some states, there is a common licensure board for both type of physicians. In others, there are separate boards. The main impetus for the federal government's decision to recognize D.O.'s as equivalent to M.D.'s was osteopathic medicine's traditional commitment to community, family, and preventive medicine as contrasted to the increasing specialization of M.D.'s and the corresponding decrease in the number of rural, poor, and minority Americans who had access to basic medical services.

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