Alan Stoddard (1915 - 1 November 2002) was a British osteopath and vegetarianism activist.
Stoddard was born in Hale, Cheshire.[1] He was educated at the British School of Osteopathy and qualified in 1935. He set up his own practice at Herne Hill.[1] He studied medicine at King's College London where he qualified MD in 1942 and joined the Royal Navy as a merchant ship doctor in Middlesbrough.[1]
Stoddard became a teacher at the British School of Osteopathy and one of several doctors in the United Kingdom with dual qualifications.[1] He was an appointed consultant at Brook Green Hospital. He offered his patients a mixture of conventional and osteopathic treatment which was unusual at the time. He worked for the National Health Service for 30 years and in private practice at Harley Street.[1] He authored his MD thesis on osteochondrosis of the spine but it was never submitted he had lost it on a train. He authored two textbooks on osteopathy and his book The Back: Relief from Pain was translated into eight languages. He has been cited as playing a major role in the growth of osteopathy in the 20th century.[1]
Stoddard was chairman of the Osteopathic Medical Association.[2] In 1969, Stoddard's book Manual Of Osteopathic Practice was criticized by D. A. H. Yates in The British Medical Journal for inaccuracies relating to physiology.[3]
Stoddard was a lifelong vegetarian and was invited to travel to India by the Vegetarian Society in the 1950s.[1] He attended the 18th World Vegetarian Congress in 1965 and was a speaker at the 25th World Vegetarian Congress in 1979.[4][5] He was chairman of Plantmilk Ltd, a society that was founded to produce plant milk alternatives to dairy.[6]
