Qualifications
- Osteopathic Manual Practitioner (DOMP) (3270 hours), 2025
- Bodywork Therapy Diploma (700 hours), 2025
- First Aid & CPR Certified, 2025
- Diploma in Kinesiology, 2020
- Personal Trainer Level 4, 2004
- Bachelor of Arts (Honours), University of Lincolnshire, 1998
A proud and happy resident of Coquitlam and Port Moody since 2022. When not doing manual osteopathy and therapeutic bodywork, I can be found hiking the beautiful mountains of BC with my wife, and practicing yoga and circuit training. I spend a lot of my spare time in that ‘third space’ exploring mind-body-spirit to see how I can help myself and others live more stress-free, purposeful and self-aligned lives. Also, my other passion is classic cars!
My Journey to Osteopathy
After leaving university in 1998, I spent my early career working in various business roles before realising that my true passion had always been health and wellness. In 2004, I did a complete 180-turn and trained as a personal trainer and group exercise teacher. For the following decade, I developed a personal training business and gained management experience at exclusive health clubs in West End London.
While I enjoyed these roles, I wanted to delve more into deeper aspects of health and wellness. During this time, I discovered osteopathy which treated my chronic neck, shoulder and back pain. I was so impressed with the method that I was determined to study it professionally. Not only did it ease my pain quite quickly and easily, but it also created relaxation in my body.
Fast forward to 2022 with over 15 years as a personal trainer and now a Kinesiology Diploma under my belt, I fulfilled a lifelong dream of living in the Canadian mountains when I emigrated to Vancouver with my wife. Soon after, I was able to fulfil my other dream when I received my Diploma in Osteopathic Manual Practitioner (3270 hours) from the National Academy of Osteopathy. In December 2025 I will graduate from the Vancouver School of Healing Arts with a Diploma in Bodywork Therapy (700 hours), which will add skills in Shiatsu, Reflexology, Ayurvedic Head Massage, Myofascial Release, Deep Tissue, Swedish Massage, Aromatherapy, Hydrotherapy, Sports Massage, and Hot Stone Massage to my approach. After decades of training clients physically and working in the health and wellness sector, I am excited to help more people by sharing what I’ve learned about relaxation and easing tensions in the body through osteopathic and bodywork methods.
My Approach
I am passionate about helping people relax, reduce stress and release bodily pains and tensions. The overall sense of wellness and ease is what osteopathy has done for me and is why I am so passionate about it. Not only has osteopathy realigned my body and improved my physical health, but it has also calmed and reset my nervous system many times over. The world can be a high-pressure place for all of us, and I feel driven to help as many people as possible gain inner tranquility and improved wellness. Osteopathy is the main tool I use to achieve that but I also continue to learn more methods for helping the body.
Why did I choose Osteopathy as a profession?
Throughout my life, I have attained the most satisfaction from helping people and from a pursuit of all things health related. Long before graduating with a B.A in Literature & History, I had always been obsessed with anything exercise related. That’s probably the result of a 1980’s childhood watching too many Arnold Schwarzenegger, Sylvester Stallone and Jean-Claude Van Dam films!
However, living an extremely physically active life had taken its toll on my body by my mid-thirties. Decades of over-training with heavy weightlifting, karate, mountain biking, fell walking, endurance cardiovascular workouts (and a very active dancer in the UK nightlife scene I might add!) had all contributed to joint misalignments, muscle imbalances, and enough knots in those muscles to build a rope ladder! I was masking and ignoring chronic aches and pains and ploughing through just hoping for the best. Yoga and stretching helped somewhat, but the aches, pains and stiffness still lingered in the background. That’s when somebody suggested that I visit an Osteopath in London, UK.
After just one session, my chronic neck and shoulder pain felt so much better, my lower back aches reduced significantly, and I felt like my range of motion had improved. This was after years of suffering. Other physical therapies had helped temporarily, but the pain always returned due to my high exercise volume. With osteopathy the major issues were virtually corrected in just a few treatments (sometimes even in just one session, depending on the issue). The positive results from techniques that felt so gentle absolutely blew my mind.
Having worked in health and fitness for most of my adult life, I had always been leaning towards more holistic methods of looking after myself and my clients. So, when I discovered how effective osteopathy is and researched its philosophy on alignment and all systems working together as one unit, I was hooked. I knew this was the right direction for me. The concepts of personal alignment and systemic unity, which I also found in yoga and Tai Chi, was something I began to explore and become passionate about. And not just physical alignment but emotional, mindful and spiritual too.
I love to help people alleviate their aches, pains and illnesses and to feel more relaxed, balanced, unified and whole, and more in control of their health. This contributes immeasurably towards being happy. Also, because osteopathy works on all the body’s systems it encompasses a mind-emotion-body-spirit approach that offers great tools and techniques for my clients, and myself, to really achieve a sense of equilibrium. Ever since I experienced the remarkable effects of osteopathic treatment, I have been a strong advocate for it as a wonderful body and mind therapy and have recommended it to everyone I meet. To help spread that ‘feeling good’ state is for me one of the main reasons I chose to go into osteopathy as my profession.
MAX’S LOCATIONS FOR MANUAL OSTEOPATHY & THERAPEUTIC BODYWORK
COQUITLAM
DOVIRA CARE INTEGRATIVE HEALTH CLINIC
3020 Lincoln Ave, 109, Coquitlam, BC, V3B 6B4
Bookings https://dovira.janeapp.com
GREATER VANCOUVER – TRI-CITIES
MOBILE IN-HOUSE / AT-WORK SERVICE – OSTEO ON THE GO!
Bookings https://ithaca.noterro.com
If you have any questions about bookings or Manual Osteopathy & Therapeutic Bodywork please email Max at ithacawellnesscanada@gmail.com or call 778-929-6143
Member of British Columbia Association of Osteopathic Manual Practitioners (BCAOMP)
We would like to respectfully acknowledge that Ithaca Wellness operates on the traditional, ancestral, and unceded shared territories of the kʷikʷəƛ̓əm (Kwikwetlem), sq̓əc̓iy̓aɁɬ təməxʷ (Katzie), səlilwətaɬ (Tsleil-Waututh), xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam), Sḵwx̱wú7mesh (Squamish), and Stó:lō (Sto:lo) First Nations. We give thanks to these nations who continue to live on and care for these lands and waters, and for their wisdom towards wildlife.