The Gold Series

Osteopathic medicine was founded by a self-taught frontier physician whose personal tragedy and Civil War despondence led to a rejection of modern medicine and a leap into a new one. Despite a long fight for mainstream recognition, a quarter of all American med students now study osteopathic medicine.

When Dr. Jeremy Polman attended medical school as a young DO student, he found limited resources for learning osteopathic manipulative medicine. As a fellow, he got to work figuring out how to understand it better. With help from OnlineMedEd, that journey has led to a new book that could change how OMM is understood.

Through the learning of osteopathic manipulative medicine, DO students have been attempting to understand how to get patients’ bodies into …

Comedian Hasan Minhaj explained the difference between MDs and DOs on late night television recently. “An MD is Coca Cola and a DO is RC Cola,” he said. Though ill-informed, Minhaj’s comments are an example of enduring public misconceptions around osteopathic physicians and their skill set.