Mr. Mark Oliver

Mark Oliver is a New Zealand and Australian qualified Manipulative Physiotherapist with a long-standing special interest and expertise in complex pelvic and orofacial pain problems. In 2010, he relocated from a busy multidisciplinary practice in Perth to the beautiful coastal town of Busselton, Western Australia.

Mark is an internationally recognised clinical educator with 30 years of clinical experience and 25 years of teaching experience. He was a lecturer on the Graduate Diploma in Manipulative Therapy and Graduate Diploma in Sports Physiotherapy courses at Curtin University has presented more than 200 clinical workshops and lectures, is a keynote speaker at conferences, and has written chapters in textbooks and published in scientific journals. Mark is Australia’s most experienced Mulligan Concept teacher and practitioner.

Born in New Zealand, Mark completed a Diploma in Physiotherapy at Auckland Technical Institute in 1979, and was awarded a Diploma in Manipulative Therapy by the New Zealand Manipulative Therapists Association in 1983. With encouragement from Brian Mulligan, Mark Laslett and Lance Twomey, Mark moved to Perth, Western Australia and completed a Graduate Diploma in Manipulative Physiotherapy in 1984 and a Master of Applied Science by research in 1990.

Mark’s master's thesis investigated the biomechanics of lumbar spine extension and the effect of ageing on extension behaviour in order to better understand the passive extension in the lying manoeuvre described by Robin McKenzie. Parameters examined included load - displacement, extension creep - hysteresis and sagittal plane centrode behaviour.

Mark has worked as a research assistant for Professor Lance Twomey and Professor Jim Taylor on studies of spinal pathology presented training courses on spinal examination for medical practitioners for Sports Medicine Australia and been on the advisory committee for the Physiotherapy program at Notre Dame University in Fremantle. For a number of years, he was director of physiotherapy services at the Perth Pain Management Centre.

Mark has developed new methods of evaluating and treating sacroiliac joint (SIJ), pubic symphysis and temporomandibular joint (TMJ) disorders using the Mulligan Concept of mobilisation with movement and regularly conducts lectures and clinical workshops on these subjects internationally.

Since 1990, Mark has conducted many Brian Mulligan mobilisation with movement clinical workshops and many courses on normal muscle dysfunction and active exercise rehabilitation. Mark has presented lectures on advanced musculoskeletal clinical examination, spinal biomechanics and pathology, spinal “instability”, spinal combined movements, and orofacial pain to medical practitioners, sports medicine physicians, dentists, physiotherapists, chiropractors and osteopaths.

In 2009, Mark was presented with the inaugural Australian Physiotherapy Association (WA) award for contribution to physiotherapy education "An award presented to an APA member who has made an outstanding contribution to physiotherapy education".

You can find out more about Mark here.