Jo Wildy is a biologist and an osteopath trained in the cranial field with a special interest, developed over 30 years of clinical practice,  in the link between head trauma and mental health.  Over those decades she has come to realise that the skull and underlying dural membrane system - living structures that have evolved to protect the brain by absorbing physical impact - can hold the unresolved legacy of often forgotten head impacts during the patient’s life.  Jo Wildy proposes that such impacts can lead to mental health issues and, overtime, brain disease.

As shown in the illustration below the brain [A] sits in a bag [B] -the dura - which sits in a box [C]- the skull.  The skull and dura  form the physical environment of the brain and if  distorted by the absorption of a physical impact or impacts  that environment is potentially disturbed.

Jo Wildy has applied the term ‘Membrain Disorder’ to such a distrubance and explains how it can affect the behaviour of the brain (resulting in a mood disorder) and over longer periods threaten the long-health of the brain manifesting in early onset brain degeneration in the form of eg. Dementia, Parkinson’s, Motor Neurone Disease (MND) and Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy (CTE). 

Wildy suggests that Membrain Disorder is a significant contributory factor to mental health problems in certain patients and this is often linked to historical head trauma.  A skilled cranial osteopath can identify whether Membrain Disorder is or is not present by their unique skill of palpation, or feeling, of the head. Head traumas can take many forms from a sudden strong impact, low grade repetitive knocks (eg. in contact sports) or chronic sustained trauma (eg. from orthodontics and retainers).  Unresolved head traumas can exist in layers from birth to recent times.

Importantly Membrain Disorder can be diagnosed and successfully treated by a suitably trained practitioner.  Cranial osteopathic treatment may both resolve mental health issues caused by Membrain Diosrder and restore the brain’s environment in an effort to prevent or slow down brain disease.  

Membrain Disorder is not always the only cause of a mood disorder.  There may be other contributory factors to a patient’s mental health state. However if Membrain Disorder exists and is not recognised and therefore not treated Wildy proposes that the patient cannot fully recover.  Talking therapies, psychotropic drugs and all manner of self-help measures may have some beneficial effect  but they are not addressing the biomechanical problem - Membrain Disorder. Understanding the existence of Membrain Disorder and the link with mental health has so far been simply absent from global consciousness.

Jo Wildy has come to recognise through her clinical experience that Membrain Disorder exists and if treated can have a hugely beneficial impact on a patient’s mental health.

She can only propose that her treatment may be having an impact on the long term health of the brain.  However this makes sense when one considers the irrigation systems of the cranial cavity and how this hand on approach aims to open up the channels through which blood, lymph and cerebrospinal fluid all flow affecting the immediate environment of the brain.

Since writing her book Mind and Membrain the beneficial impact of this work has become even more obvious as patients have travelled from far and wide to seek treatment from Jo Wildy.  She has now moved from treating individual patients in her own clinic to train existing osteopaths in this field.  She recognises how many patients there are throughout the world that need this treatment approach  Her emphasis now is on training other practitioners and making  this work known – so that the understanding of Membrain Health versus Membrain Disorder reaches global consciousness!