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Osteopathy is a manual and holistic branch of medicine. It aims to diagnose and treat functional disorders. 
One of the essential principles of osteopathy is maintaining the movement and mobility of the body's tissues as a whole. Our bodies are balancing all vital functions in constant interaction with one another. 
The capability of individual body structures to move can be limited due to variety of causes, which impairs their normal functioning. Over the course of months or years, entire chains of tension can build up in the body. Our organisms often react to these changes with adjustments and compensations over time. If no appropriate and sufficient balance is possible anymore, people get ill and respond with pain, limited freedom of movement, and functional disorders. 
Osteopathy aims to find and treat the issues. With their trained hands, the osteopaths feel functional disorders, relieve them, and help the body to activate its self-healing capabilities. Osteopathy serving as a holistic branch of medicine can complement traditional medicine but does not replace it. 
Moreover, it can be performed to support and complement other medical treatments or be the first therapeutic measure. In general, cooperation with other fields of medicine is preferred for patients to get a goal-oriented treatment tailored to their needs. 

Each osteopathic treatment starts with a detailed anamnesis. Not only does it include an overview and history of complaints and other coexisting diseases, but also lifestyle-related topics such as exercise and nutrition. 
The osteopathic treatment is performed with special osteopathic techniques where the osteopath uses their hands. They perform diagnosis by palpating the body and using function-specific movement tests and then treat the body with targeted mobilisations and manipulations. The predisposition for this is a long and intensive training of the sense of touch. 
The actual course of treatment and number of sessions are always determined on a case-by-case basis since every osteopathic therapy session is tailored to the individual patient. 
Osteopathy is an individual, holistic medical approach that focuses on each individual at a given point in time and does not follow a standardised treatment scheme. It does not treat symptoms but individuals.Generally speaking, one osteopathic therapy session lasts 45-60 minutes for adults and about 40 to 45 minutes for babies and children.