Services
What we treat
Six conditions make up most of what walks through the door.
Osteopath, physiotherapist or chiropractor?
All three treat musculoskeletal pain, all three are university trained and registered with AHPRA, and there is more overlap than difference. Here is an honest account.
Osteopathy
Five years of university training. Tends to look at how the whole body is moving rather than only the painful part, and typically uses a broad mix of hands-on work in one appointment: soft tissue, stretching, articulation and manipulation where it suits.
Appointments are usually longer. Ours run 45 minutes for a first visit and 30 after that.
Physiotherapy
Four to five years of university training, with a strong grounding in exercise prescription, rehabilitation and post-surgical care. Usually the discipline most embedded in hospitals and sporting clubs.
If your problem is mainly a strength or loading deficit, or you are rehabilitating after surgery, a physiotherapist may be the better fit.
Chiropractic
Five years of university training, with a particular focus on the spine and on joint manipulation. Appointments are often shorter and more frequent.
If you know manipulation suits you and you want it regularly, that is a reasonable choice.
The awkward question
Do I need to keep coming back?
For a lot of people, no. You finish an episode of care and we do not see you again until something new happens. When you are at that point we will tell you, and we will mean it.
A large number of our patients are not in that group, and it would be dishonest to pretend otherwise. Desk work, driving, trades, a sport played the same way every week, long-standing arthritic change: lifestyles that load the same tissue in the same direction keep reproducing the same problem. For them the useful question is not whether to come back but when.
Where that applies we work out the interval that actually suits you, and then schedule treatment for the point you would be starting to feel it rather than the point it has already flared. Standing appointments exist for exactly this, and plenty of people prefer having the date already in the calendar.
What we will not do is put you on a schedule you did not ask for, or keep an interval running once it has stopped earning its place. The interval gets reviewed like everything else, and it can stretch out as readily as it comes in.
Workplaces and clubs
We come to you
Workplace assessments. On site or by video, for desks, vans and workshops. Frequently funded by the employer.
Sporting clubs. Pre-season screening nights and in-season support for local clubs.
Ring 03 9870 1855 or email info@fisherdemirov.com.au and ask for George.
The honest version. What matters is getting an accurate diagnosis, being seen by someone who explains what they are doing, and doing the between-visit work.
There is one thing no trial measures, and we would put it above all of it: you have to feel comfortable with the person treating you. Comfortable enough to say what is actually going on, to ask the question you think is stupid, and to say no to a technique. If you do not feel that with us, the right move is to find someone you do feel it with, and we will help you do it.
Where we think an osteopath is the sensible first call: you want a longer appointment and a whole-body look rather than a focus on one joint, the problem is not clearly post-surgical, and you would rather try hands-on treatment alongside exercise than exercise alone. Where we would send you elsewhere is on our .
Servicing you
Treatment is only half of it
Health is easier to keep than to get back, and the most useful part of an appointment is often what you take away from it. Every plan here includes a small number of exercises and, where it is relevant, a look at the desk, the seat or the training load that is producing the problem in the first place.
New
Body map & exercise library
Point at the part that hurts and see what is in there, what tends to go wrong with it, and the exercises we prescribe for it, with the dose, not just the name.
Open the body mapAlso available
Workplace and ergonomic assessment. On site or by video, for desks, vans and workshops. Commonly funded by the employer.
WorkCover, TAC and DVA. We are registered providers. Gap fees are on the price list.
Return-to-sport planning. Staged loading rather than a date plucked out of the air.
Post-surgical rehabilitation. In coordination with your surgeon's protocol, not instead of it.