The safety of manipulative treatment: review of the literature from 1925 to 1993.

Many osteopathic medical students and physicians have an inherent fear of injuring patients when they perform osteopathic manipulative treatment (OMT). Based on the estimated several hundred million treatments performed each year in the United States as well as a review of the literature over the past six decades, only 185 reports of injury were found. However, besides good training in these techniques, the key to the safety of OMT is the taking of a thorough patient history and performing a thorough physical examination before the application of any manipulative procedure.