Background 

An integration success:

As of 2005, KCOM has been incorporating OMM into all standardized patient encounters in the microbiology and infectious diseases courses.  For example, if a patient presents with genital herpes, reflex autonomic TART changes are assessed in the accompanying segments.  While the standardized patient will eventually hand the student a card with "expected findings" (if they palpate the correct region), students are encouraged to use actual diagnoses they find in their SOAP notes.   As the program advances (and with appropriate waivers), students may be able to treat the standardized patients for real dysfunction as well.  For more information, the director of the Micro Dept. is Neil Sargentini, PhD.  He can easily be contacted through the KCOM/ATSU switchboard.

Historic approach:

Dr. Still was treating infectious diseases Osteopathically at the time when the germ theory was being developed.  Although some of Dr. Still's ideas may seem antiquated, his thoughts may help you to think more osteopathically in your treatment of such diseases as tonsillitis, pneumonia, TB, croup, measles, whooping cough, diptheria, influenza, erysipelas, mumps, chickenpox, smallpox, cholera, malaria, scarlet fever, typhoid, typhus, bilious and yellow fever.  There are chapters on all of the above mentioned diseases in Osteopathy Research and Practice

Articles 

Effect of Osteopathic Manipulative Treatment on Immune Response to the Influenza Vaccine in Nursing Home Residents: A Pilot Study - Alternative Therapies, July/Aug 2004, Vol 10. No 4: 74-76

Revisiting Castlio and Ferris-Swift's experiments testing the effects of splenic pump in normal individuals - International Journal of Osteopathic Medicine 8 (2005) 124-130