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NeighborsWelden Loerke, doctor“I have people who’ve never been to a medical doctor, Loerke says. I can do everything a medical doctor can do, plus (use) my manipulation.”By “manipulation,” he means physio-therapy applied to the body as an adjunct to medication. Getting physical therapy from a therapist at hospital Isn’t quite the same, he said, “because therapists aren’t doctors.”Loerke, who’s 76, was recently honored with a special award from the Iowa Society of Osteopathic Physicians and Surgeons for 50 years of practice in Iowa But this isn’t another article about a retiring doctor In Ottumwa.Loerke still squeezes in about 35 patients a day between 6:30 a.m. and noon at his office on North Sheridan and wants to continue his general practice at least another year.He also wants to live long enough to witness two events his grandson’s graduation next year from an osteopathic medical school In Tulsa, Okla., and the return of Haley’s Comet in 1985. He remembers seeing the comet in Nebraska in 1910 when he was 4 years old “It was brilliant. I’ll never forget it. We could see it off in the western sky. We’d go out and see night after night .” he said. “It had a long tail just like in the pictures you see Loerke came to Ottumwa in 1931 at the height of the Depression, after practicing for three years in Stanton, Neb His first office was upstairs in a building where Revco Drug now sits on East Main. And from 1943 to 1967 he and his brother, Gerd, also an osteopath, ran the Loerke Hospital on Marion Street.The two doctors handled many maternity cases, delivering almost 250 babies a year — 3,000 in all — before they quit inthe late-1940s.“I can see why doctors give it up,” he says “It’s demanding. You have to be on call all the time.”More recently most of his cases have been injuries to the back and neck, for example, and well as bums and infections including the flu, sore throats and ear problems.Over the past few weeks he said he’s treated more cases of poison ivy than he can ever recall seeing in his long career One morning, 25 victims visited his office. He calls it “mushroom ivy” because most of his patients had been hunting for mushrooms.One change in medicine that Loerke, like all longtime doctors, has experienced is the end of house calls, although he still makes three or four a week. There have also been times when patients brought their ailments to his home for treatment Some he unwittingly steered away from his home Late one night, many years ago, Loerke's telephone rang. “I was half asleep,” he said, and someone on the other end asked, ‘Do you see anybody at your house?’ ”Loerke told the caller to hold on a minute as he went to look out the window and checked outside He found nothing, told the caller “no” and hung up It wasn't until later that he realized the caller was really asking whether he accepted patients at his home.Loerke laughs as he tells the story and says he never found out who called.Incidentally, one wonders whether fascination with osteopathic medicine is hereditary in the Loerke family Welden s two brothers were osteopaths, his son In Tulsa is one; and, before long, so will his grandson take up the practiceBy BOB BERG Courier staff writerEvery so often, Dr. Welden Loerke is still asked how an osteopath is different from a chiropractor. He’ll explain that the only similarity Is we both use our hands” to treat patients.It consists of four years of pre-medical school, four years at a school of osteopathy and a year of internship. “We use some of the same textbooks” used in other medical schools, he added.Chiropractors can’t prescribe medicines or perform surgery or deliver babies or sign death certificates, but an osteopath can, he says.“We’re physicians,” he emphasizes, “and we do the same things as medical doctors. ”After practicing for 53 years — 50 of them in Ottumwa — Loerke says there’s still a lot of prejudice against osteopaths and observes, “People don’t understand what we do.”His profession, in fact, was once considered to be a cult because its members closely followed the ideas and philosophy of Dr. Andrew Taylor. But things have changed a great deal as osteopathic medicine become much more modern in its techniques. Now the work of doctors like Loerke is more widely accepted.“Little by little, we’re getting more prestigious,” he says. His field of medicine is recognized by the state and Insurance companies, which at one time refused to accept examinations done by osteopaths, now recognize their claims universally, he said.If there are still doubts about the qualifications of osteopaths, Loerke — who recently completed 23 hours of continuing medical education at a conference in Des Moines — said the training required Is virtually identical to that of MDs.(Courier phono by Bob Bor#)Welden Loerke
Newspaper Details
Ottumwa Courier
Ottumwa, Iowa, US
Sat, May 23, 1981
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USA 23 Jan 2025
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