Spring 2009    Volume 1, Number 1  www.councilforhealing.org

Welcome to the Council for Healing News

We are excited to introduce ourselves and our quarterly e-news. This first issue is about the Council itself. Future newsletters will focus on breaking news, research, education, Council activities and other items of interest related to the topic of Healing

Thank you for your interest. Please share this with others you know will be interested. Enjoy our website and feel free to contact us.  If you would like to open a pdf version of the newsletter click here.

Rebecca Good and Mary Frost, Coordinators

 Newsletter Action Initiative Group

Mary Frost                                Rebecca Good

Debra Howard                          Christine Steele

Cay Randall-May

In This Issue:

·         About the Council for Healing

·         Wholistic Healing

·         American Holistic Nurses Association

·         Therapeutic Touch International Association

·         Education - Topics in Healing

·         Awakening the Heart Through Group Prayer

·         Healing Touch International

·         Association for Network Care

·         American Organization for Bodywork Therapies of Asia

About the Council for Healing

The Council for Healing (CfH) is a 501(c) (3), not-for-profit organization, founded in 1999. The CfH has brought together 10 representatives of organizations, modalities and specialties which focus on healing:  the American Holistic Nurses Association (AHNA), American Organization for Bodywork Therapies of Asia (AOBTA®), Healing Touch International, Inc. (HTI), Medical Intuition, Network Spinal Analysis, Noetic Field Therapy (NFT), Prayer Workers (Prayer Healing), Therapeutic Touch International Association (TTIA) – (formerly Nurse-Healers Professional Associates International (NH-PAI)), Wholistic Healing, and Education.

The Council has monthly contact by conference call, an annual face-to-face meeting, hosts Healing Summits, and uses the consensus model for decision making.  Our Advisory Board includes researchers, lawyers, healers and bioenergy specialists from a wide range of modalities.   Our website contains a full list of Council Board and Advisory Board members. 

The Council for Healing serves the United States of America and has international connections with like-minded groups.  We are available to anyone interested through our website and through personalized consultations. The Council was created to enable all healers and healing organizations to exchange research and other information between individuals and organizations. We have made presentations at various conferences, formulated a Healer's Code of Ethics (work in progress), and consulted to the President’s White House Commission on Complementary and Alternative Medicine (CAM). Please see further details on our website  http://councilforhealing.org/

Wholistic Healing

•  Spirit – offering spiritual healing and introducing care seekers to ways of connecting with their own spiritual awareness and healing;
  
• Relationships – dealing with issues of care seekers with other people and with the environment;
•  Mind – inviting new ways of understanding self and developing creative ways to relate to the world;
•  Emotions – developing ways to identify emotional blocks and excesses from current and past situations and to deal with them constructively;
•  Body – learning to listen to what the body is saying, then dealing with stressors mechanisms.

Wholistic Healing can be a part of most therapies. Ideally, it can be extended to include conventional medical and nursing treatments as Integrative Care. 

Daniel J. Benor, MD, ABIHM, represents and advocates for Wholistic Healing on the Council. He finds that each level of a person's being is intimately connected with every other level. He uses experiential learning to help people connect with their personal awareness of each level within themselves and to integrate them for wholistic self-healing. For more on Wholistic Healing, see http://www.wholistichealingresearch.com/srmeb.html and www.wholistichhealingresearch.com.

 American Holistic Nurses Association (AHNA)

 The American Holistic Nurses Association is growing in numbers and in their capacity to influence the practice of nursing and the evolution of more holistic care for Americans.  We are pleased to announce that the American Nurses Association has deemed holistic nursing a specialty. In concert with this, The Standards and Scope of Practice (2007), was published, which is a comprehensive update compendium of guidelines for, and ethics of, holistic nursing practice.

 Members recently exceeded 4000 nurses and other professionals. Numerous projects are coming to fruition which support AHNA‘s mission to foster and develop holistic nursing. The new web site includes links to more resources and discussion forums. A web resource library is being created and ten continuing education certificate programs are endorsed and monitored by AHNA. A theme for a research agenda has been chosen: Healing through Holistic Nursing. Research e-news was recently developed to keep members informed of new research findings and a research mentorship program is in development.

 The theme for the 29th Annual conference in June of ‘09 is “Reflective Practice: Creating Sacred Space”. The conference will feature keynote speakers Naomi Remen, MD and author of, Kitchen Table Wisdom, Christopher Johns RN, PhD, PACT, of the United Kingdom and author of, Becoming a Reflective Practitioner and Transforming Nursing Through Reflective Practice, and Carla Mariano, RN, EdD, AHN-BC, FAAIM, immediate past president, developer of the first advanced holistic nursing program and part of the White House Commission on Integrative Healthcare. Contact information www.AHNA.org and conference@ahna.org

Rothlyn (Rorry) Zahourek, PhD, PMHCNS- BC, AHN-BC is a certified clinical nurse specialist in psychiatric mental health nursing and a certified advanced practice Holistic Nurse. She is coordinator of research for the American Holistic Nurses Association and represents that organization on the Council for Healing. Rorry can be contacted at rorryz@aol.com

 Therapeutic Touch International Association (TTIA)

The First International Congress on Therapeutic Touch was April 23-27, 2009 featuring an outstanding roster of keynote speakers including our founder, Dolores Krieger, RN, PhD, and Dr. Serena Roney-Dougal from the United Kingdom. The concurrent sessions, poster presentations and International panel were a wonderful mix of presenters from Europe, Australia, North America, Africa, South America, the Middle East and Asia. 

  The conference was in Boston. Go to www.therapeutic-touch.org for more information.

  New Name Nurse Healers-Professional Associates International (NH-PAI) will now be known as Therapeutic Touch International Association (TTIA).  NH-PAI will remain as the credentialing body.

  Therapeutic Touch Research Feature for April  Research on Therapeutic Touch supported by Grants from the NIH at the University of Connecticut Health Center has demonstrated that Therapeutic Touch stimulates proliferation of a variety of normal human cells in contrast to cells from tumors.

  Therapeutic Touch Stimulates the Proliferation of Human Cells in Culture,” Gloria A Gronowicz, PhD; Ankor Jhaveri, BA; Libbe Clark, RN, TTP; Michael S. Aronow, MD; Theresa H. Smith, PhD. Journal of Complementary and Alternative Medicine, Volume 14, Number 3, 2008

Address reprints to Gloria Gronowicz, PhD
Department of Surgery MC 3105

University of Connecticut Health Center

Farmington, CT 06030-3105

email gronowicz@nsol.edu

Gloria presented her research at the TTIA International Congress on Therapeutic Touch in April.

Rebecca Good, MA, RNC, ACRN, LPC, QTTT is a Therapeutic Touch Teacher, lecturer and consultant and the Council for Healing Representative for TTIA. She can be can be reached at rmgood@att.net

 

Education  - Topics in Healing

The various member professions of the Council for Healing have pioneered innovative health education and practice for decades. Our efforts are coming to maturity, improving practice in both complementary and conventional medicine. A Summit on Integrative Medicine and the Health of the Public was convened from February 24-27, 2009, by the Institute of Medicine at the National Academy of Sciences, in Washington, DC.  Among the commissioned papers for the Summit was, “Health Professions Education and Integrative Health Care,” by Mary Jo Kreitzer, PhD., RN, Benjamin Kligler, MD, MPH; and William C. Meeker, DC, MPH.

 Kreitzer is Director of the Center for Spirituality & Healing at the University of Minnesota. Kligler is Vice Chair of the Department of Integrative Medicine at Beth Israel Medical Center. Meeker is a leading researcher on chiropractic care.

 These authors recommend movement away from the current U.S. medical system that is sporadic, reactive, disease-oriented, and physician-centric to a system that fosters an emphasis on health, wellness, patient empowerment, and a focus on the full range of physical, mental and social support needed to improve health. Among the recommendations especially congenial to the Council for Healing is access to integrative health options throughout the continuum of care, and team-based care that integrates conventional and alternative health practitioners.

Berney Williams represents Education on the Council for Healing. Dr. Williams currently serves as Dean of Graduate Studies at Energy Medicine University www.energymedicineuniversity.org, and President of Holos University Graduate Seminary www.holosuniversity.org

Awakening the Heart Through Group Prayer

Unresolved traumas add up in an individual over time and emotions can become progressively more shut down.  Our society tends to ignore this condition of blunted emotions, so that many people live in an emotional monotone without being able to satisfactorily connect with others.  Over more than 23 years as a prayer group facilitator and spiritual healer, I have observed many instances of how solitary and group prayer can assist in normalizing emotional well-being, often when other approaches have failed.

In her book, Living Through Personal Crisis, (1984, Ballantine, New York) Ann Kaiser Stearns points out, “Our losses change us and change the course of our lives.  The reality is simply that one can never be the same.” Prayerful support of others can soothe us because we can keep our feelings private while turning them over to a healing force greater than ourselves.  Members of most prayer groups are cautioned not to give unsolicited personal advice or to try to change the unchangeable.

 Crisis can happen to anyone at any time.  I have observed that participation in a prayer group can reduce the emotional toll of trauma by:Healing Touch, a gentle, heart-centered touch therapy, focuses on treating the whole person as well as balancing and harmonizing the subtle energy system of the recipient.  Because it does not use any equipment, is gentle, and is very effective, this energy medicine therapy is becoming popular worldwide.  Classes have now been taught in many countries and are recently becoming popular in such countries as Japan, India and South Africa in addition to Germany, The Netherlands, Finland, Sweden, Australia, New Zealand, Peru and many South American countries. The basic curriculum is taught in Levels 1-5 and leads to a board certification. In February 2009, Mary Frost, Certified Healing Touch Practitioner and Instructor, taught the first Level 4 class ever held in Cape Town, South Africa. She also taught Level 1 and 2, and introductory classes there.  A clinic was organized and held for elders to receive treatments in Nyanga Township in the Western Cape.

-  Providing a consistent, positive attitude;

-  mentoring individuals to follow higher guidance;

-  engaging each other appropriately in a non-threatening manner;

-   supporting each participant in their own process of personal discovery and growth;

-  bringing participants into contact with others who have healed or been otherwise benefited through prayer;

-  sharing that inner peace can be attained even under devastating circumstances

-  providing opportunity for participants to serve others by praying with and for them.

The Egyptian Blue Lily (or Lotus), Nymphaea caerulea, has been valued for its sedative and calmative properties since ancient times. The Egyptians considered it sacred and often depicted its blooms in their hieroglyphics and jewelry. Painting by Cay Randall-May  

(2009, acrylic on canvas.. 16" x  20").

 Healing Touch International (HTI) - Perspectives in Healing

Healing Touch International announces its 13th Annual Healing Energy Conference, “Creating Flow: Healing Globally”. This exciting gathering will be held September 3-6, 2009 at Loews Ventana Canyon Resort in Tucson, Arizona and will include a variety of dynamic keynote speakers and educational workshops.  Check the website  for updates and details as they unfold.

 Ongoing research is being conducted in many locations on the efficacy of Healing Touch applications for varied conditions. This cently published study, “Healing Touch as a Supportive Intervention for Adult Acute Leukemia Patients: A pilot investigation of effects on distress and symptoms,” appeared in the Journal of the Society for Integrative Oncology, Volume 6, number 3 (summer), pp. 89-97, S. Dauhauer, J. Tooze, D. Larrimore, K. Kemper, et al.  Positive findings were found related to fatigue, nausea, reported distress and pain, and relaxation in patients studied.

Mary J. Frost, RN, MS, HN-BC, CHTP/I, is the Healing Touch International representative to the Council for Healing and may be contacted at Tothealt@aol.com. For information on Healing Touch, Classes, Research & more, please visit: www.HealingTouchInternational.org

Association for Network Care - Network Spinal Analysis was recently featured in the December 2008 issue of Martha Stewart's publication, Whole Living Body + Soul.  Read the article online at:
   http://www.wiseworldseminars.com/nsa/articles/wholeliving.html

 Dan Lemberger, DC, is the Council representative for the Association for Network Care. Contact Dan at dan@wiseworldseminars.com   

For more about the association visit www.associationfornetworkcare.com

  American Organization for Bodywork Therapies of Asia (AOBTA®)

  Providing relief for individuals with fibromyalgia is just one example of the many ways that Asian Bodywork Therapy can help.  To learn more and to find the Asian Bodywork Therapist closest to you, go to aobta.org or call 856.782.1616. 

  Based on Chinese Medical principles for assessing and evaluating the body's energetic system, ABT is one of the three main branches of Chinese Medicine. AOBTA defines ABT as the treatment of the human body/mind/spirit, including the electromagnetic or energetic field that surrounds, infuses and brings that body to life.  The goal of Asian Bodywork Therapists primarily is to affect and balance the body’s energetic system for the promotion, maintenance and restoration of health. From a Chinese medicine perspective, smooth flow of Qi – our vital life force – is a sure sign of good health. At its most basic level, ABT is an excellent way to help keep our Qi flowing during life changes and to live at our deepest potential.

  One current project of the AOBTA is a national initiative to research the benefits of Asian Bodywork Therapy for individuals diagnosed with fibromyalgia. A debilitating chronic pain condition, fibromyalgia is often difficult to treat with Western therapeutic measures. For many of these patients, ABT is their first opportunity to experience a touch therapy that is relaxing and non-invasive. Scientists at the Northwestern University School of Medicine in Chicago have provided the research tools, methods and publication support. This study is the first to involve the participation of individuals and educational institutions nationwide, through the AOBTA research committee. For more information contact Steve Rogne, AOBTA Research Committee at 847.864.1130 or info@zenshiatsuchicago.org.

Debra C. Howard, LMT, AOBTA®-Certified Instructor, Dipl. ABT (NCCAOM), is the representative on the Council for AOBTA. She is an experienced practitioner and instructor of ABT. Debra can be reached at jingluo@charter.net