The mission of DO-Touch.NET is to advance the science of osteopathy.  There are great opportunities and challenges achieving this mission.  One challenge is to assure that what we do, what we say we do, and why we do these approaches are comparable. 

We make assumptions every time we talk with each other about our work, that when I say “I do this for this condition or that dysfunction,” your understanding of what I say I do, how it is done and the characteristics of the condition I am treating means the same thing to you.  Science can tolerate a certain amount of assumptions for a period, but science over time wants to avoid assumptions and have observations demonstrating that the data we collect is valid.  Up to now, we have made the assumption that we can compare the interventions that we report.  The Technique of the Month (TOM) allows us to assess that assumption.  We have several hypotheses about what we will find through this process, and anticipate that it will be valuable in improving the integrity of the data we report.  TOM is not a venue for learning new techniques, although that may happen.  TOM is a venue for us to critically evaluate what we do and how we classify our treatments.  I strongly encourage all members to commit to participating in TOM each month.  The time commitment is small and infrequent, but over time, your participation in TOM will have a powerful influence on the accuracy of our research and understanding about what we do as osteopathic clinicians.