Massage Therapy Body of Knowledge

Comment

Comment by Mike Hinkle on October 6, 2009 at 9:44pm

The reasons you sighted are reasons A&P will remain. Massage & Bodywork is a fantastic learning instrument.

Certification aspects are presently being considered by NCB. They want advanced certifications. That's the issue Laura Allen is trying to get everyone to speak out about. BOK is not certifying. Look towards others for that part of the equation.

Feel may not be present with entry level students working on meridians. But they need to be learned and if desired mastered through CE.

Ok, state "Title Acts" do exactly what you say. But are needed for legal purposes. Portability depends on it.

Will this change some things, I hope so. One set of guidelines will have a better chance to be understood. It will improve things for a lot more people than it will affect adversely. And therapists can always change the BOK.

Comment by Bert Davich on October 6, 2009 at 7:59pm

Mike,
Your comment regarding a.... "well-rounded therapists that can take James Waslaski's class and keep up? is music to my ears. Myself and several therapists in St Louis that get together and watch DVD's and then practice on each other. James Waslaski and Art Riggs are among those we study. We have the working understanding of anatomy and physiology needed to keep up. I just hope that is the ultimate result is what you seem to believe. I feel that I should not have to take off work and travel hundreds of miles to get 'certified' to help a client because someone wants to monopolize education/certification. I also have learned incredible stuff from periodical articles published in Massage & Bodywork. I can honestly say that if I had to take a class for everything I have learned, it would have taken 8 years to learn what I have learned in the last 3 years.

Carl.... You make some good points, but in the end it looks to me like your BOK for each modality could result in a worse pigeonhole for our profession and a licensing nightmare.

Also how can we 'test' for a practitioners ability to 'feel' a meridian or create a quantifiable standard for an art that is not quantifiable?

Regarding 'Title Acts', they are little more than a single state monopoly of words describing an advertised service and I cannot see how that would be of benefit to our profession.

Comment by Mike Hinkle on October 6, 2009 at 7:11pm

Carl,
Meridians are fantastic. I am so glad they will be taught and expand minds!

Students will get "practical" experience as well. Some will even begin to understand Chi. Testing will happen, some will pass and some won't and life will go on.

We know you want to focus on one BOK modality at a time... ain't gonna happen!!!! Divide and conquer won't work here. Put that mantle down. It don't work!

We will figure ways of certifing energy workers. How do I know? It is being done already by instructors all over the country.

Let's see what their next draft says and then decide.... you know the first issue was a wish list!

Comment by Mike Hinkle on October 6, 2009 at 6:25pm

Carl, You can repeat this nonsense until you are blue in the face.

The BOK does NOT certify. There will be a Model Practice Act and Standards Act. Again you are trying to pigeon-hole this BOK. They are not going to seperate this into a Swedish BOK or any specific modality.

Therapists need to know A & P. Muscles and bones, attachments and every aspect of it. Why? Because as students, they usuallly don't know the exact area they will go into. Do you really want them to go back and learn just specific parts each time they approach massage. Or do you want a well-rounded therapists that can take James Waslaski's class and keep up?

We have seen only the first draft. Right after Christmas, we should see round two. You aren't giving them the chance to change what they got feedback on.

If we do away with the patchwork mess that exist now and legislators use this material to help the profession, the paper these documents are written on, are gold. I want portability. I'm tired of hearing state boards say, "Get organized and we'll support it." And then industry leaders doing nothing to make it happen.

This effort, if the end product is "right" will be supported. Trying to confuse this issue will not work. You may not think this is worthwhile, but if states let therapists go between states easier and costs less, then I'm in!

Comment by Carl W. Brown on October 6, 2009 at 6:19pm

Mike, I don’t mean to bad mouth merdians. But I think that if you are going to use them you need to be able to do more that just name them. You have to feel them and learn that water is not just H2O but something that symbolizes an aspect of energy that does not quite fit into words. Then you have to take these constructs and assemble a different view of the body. You have to feel the chi and what it does when it is flowing properly and the effects of improper flow.

It is just that I think we need to focus on a BOK for one modality at a time. I also don’t think written tests will work for energy modalities. But in many cases I can feel when a person works energetically so there might be ways of testing.

Comment by Carl W. Brown on October 6, 2009 at 5:56pm

Bert, “So, since you started this discussion, would you please clarify your position on the BOK, what should it should include and in what sequence should steps occur?”

I think learning this profession is like becoming an artist. You can learn oil, sketching, watercolors etc. While you don’t have to learn them all you should start with one media until you reach a certain level of comfort. If you scatter you training you probably one learn any of them. But there comes a point in learning that it all starts to come together and you can actually start to produce. Once you master one you can move on to others. You can also start mixing different trainings and start to develop your own style but that does not happen until you have become proficient in one.

I believe that we need a standard that says that a person has reached a specific competency. Like the engineering example competency for a chemical engineer is different from an electrical engineer. No one standard can cover all engineering fields because the BOKs are different. The KSAs a different and the competency levels for each KSA vary.

The only commonality between different types of massage and bodywork is the act of touching. I think that we might as well and politics because it involves had shaking.

If we want a tool that we can use then we need to limit it to a consistent modality where we can establish a set of KSAs and competency level and test them against actual performance. Unless the BOK is validated in practice is it like a scientific hypothesis that until proven is worthless.

For example part of my training involved muscles that one probably does not deal with in Swedish massage. My Swedish training did not deal with muscles like the popliteus much less the puborectalis. So I do not expect to see such muscles as people part of a Swedish competence test any more that naming mederians.

The point of the BOK is not only certification but self assessment, curriculum development and to guide legislation. I a person meet these tests they have sufficient minimal training to do a reasonable job. With the document as it is in the first draft they have no idea what it pertinent to do some form of massage or what is considered competency. It also make it impossible to validate the model against the real world. Without validation I believe that the BOK is worthless. It is just so much rhetoric.

I think the experience of developing a Swedish BOK will give us insight as to where to go from there. Swedish is a good place to start because it as a very popular for of massage and easier that most to say what is or is not Swedish. Of all the modalities it is probably one of the easier to develop objective tests for much of the knowledge. One can easily isolate the more subjective components such as the body dynamics. However it is far easier than dealing with energy biased modalities.

I think that the draft could be converted to a Swedish BOK by dropping all things that were outside of the scope of basic Swedish and adding competencies to each of the KSAs. Then take it out to the field and test it against actual practitioners. If good therapists do not know the KSA but still do good massage then it obviously is not necessary. But if you find the bad practitioners need that specific knowledge then make sure that it is in the BOK.

It is part of testing theory. You them develop tests and independently correlate the scores with independent assessment of the test takers. If the scores correlate the test is valid. If not then you need to anal size the test and if it accurately matches the BOK change the BOK to reflect the competencies needed.

Untested tests or tests based of untested BOKs are not worth the paper they are written on.

Comment by Mike Hinkle on October 5, 2009 at 9:29pm

Hi Bert,

I know your fears about anything detrimental to this profession. I love it more than you can imagine. I would never agree to anything that I think would harm it. I am watching it all. This is the first draft. I am keeping a list of what people have mentioned and will see if changes have been made to express the professions wishes. And then I will really weigh in, along with hundreds of others if needed.

This process is needed but it needs to be done right. And I'm with you, .... Carl "So, since you started this discussion, would you please clarify your position on the BOK, what should it should include and in what sequence should steps occur?"

Comment by Bert Davich on October 5, 2009 at 9:03pm

Mike, I believe we are more in agreement than it may seem. My concern is that this BOK will be used for political purposes to justify legislation or certification that will be detrimental and/or limiting to our profession and be taken advantage of by those who want a certification/education monopoly on some "modality" name that is a compilation of techniques borrowed from past knowledge. (which covers most of them) There is nothing new in most "modalities" other than the approach to application. I do recognize the approach is what makes these modalities valuable. The problem is an approach cannot be quantified. (also true of energy work) I do agree with Carl that the meaning of anything in the BOK should be clearly spelled. I believe if this is not spelled out, the BOK will become a quagmire, dividing our community and damaging our respect to the public, serving no one.

Carl, you seem to contradict yourself: to answer your comment "Bert, I cannot imagine a BOK that tries to define all bodywork"

I never advocated a BOK that "defines" all bodywork. I advocated a "standards of practice" that could be applied to all touch therapy be the first order of business. That would establish a framework that any 'modality' must conform to.

Your statement to mike is contradictory to your above statement.... (quote) "Mike “There are parameters that affect all therapists.” That is an alternate approach. You can build a BOK that contains only the essentials that all bodyworkers need to know. Thouse things like business practices, ethics and universal precautions....."

I am also amazed that your first massage (quote).. ("My first massage involved freeing a stuck placenta") included work that I would clearly consider outside of the standards of practice for touch therapy. (at least in Missouri).

So, since you started this discussion, would you pleasr clarify your position on the BOK, what should it should include and in what sequence should steps occur?

FYI: Within the MD/Medical community (most states) any licensed MD can hang a shingle stating they are an OB/GYN, face lifts/plastic surgeon? kidney specialist/nephrologist?. There is a certification that designates the MD as board certified, but that does not stop any MD from hanging a shingle and practicing that 'speciality', it only recognizes the required prerequisites to be 'board certified' have been met.

Comment by Mike Hinkle on October 5, 2009 at 7:15pm

Carl,

Most of the standards were actually written by therapists (many with little massage knowledge) themselves and taken to legislatures on bended knees. They wanted to get legislation in to try and gain acceptance from the medical profession and to do away with the negative aspects that we still fight today, because few law enforcement agencies will do away with them.

Now the profession, "who do know about massage" are trying to go back and "update and consolidate" and "do it right", so that it will be a living document. That puts the ultimate control of this document in about the safest hands it can be in... therapists.

Legislators, in this case, are "listening to our input". That's what the BOK is, our input. And I hope there will be follow up on studying and documenting harm caused by therapists.

The AMTA's big lie, as you put it, has shown without training how people can be harmed. You admitted it yourself that if someone comes in with to much fire, there can be harm, if the practioner is not trained. And someone had to step up for the profession to stop prostitution from always being the side bar.

Has AMTA made mistakes, "You betcha!" Will they make more? I'd bet they will. But the BOK is needed at this point in massage history. People will still work in their rooms how they will. Protocol is there for almost every modality, I have learned but even with that the teacher's will close with "make it your own!"

Now Carl, you are the student again. Meridians are not stupid. They will change your whole aspect again. You study these meridians and see how your life will change again. They are wonderful and will open you to new experiences.

Title Acts are also being looked at... one step at a time!

Comment by Carl W. Brown on October 5, 2009 at 6:46pm

Mike “when therapists graduate. They are not modality certified in anything. They are given a piece of paper that says they have completed what the state has set as prerequisite to test.”

Doesn’t it seem stupid to allow legislators who know nothing about massage to set the standards? If we are going follow the intent of licensing law and use licensing to protect the public from harm then we need to teach them about our profession by starting by studying and documenting that harm.

From what I can tell start licensing was instated to supercede a set of bad local laws that was hurting our profession. To get the states interested the AMTA intuited the “big lie” namely without proper training we are a dangerous group that need to be licensed.

This forces people to follow a specific arbitrary training rather than follow what they do best.

The problem was never about practicing massage but using the word massage to cover prostitution. We should have been pushing for title acts not practice acts. I still think we need to convince the legislative powers to be that we need title acts.

Title acts give us more training and career path flexibility. Unfortunately supposed title acts like in CA are actually practice acts. We might be able to convince the legislation to separate massage from bodywork if they understand that the two are different. Then you will only have to be certified if you want to call yourself a “Massage Therapist”. Now because the law specifically equates massage and bodywork all bodyworkers will have to get the certification to work in many cities. If we also separate the two the scope of what a person need to get licensed will be limited to the BOK. Now I have to study things like meridians to practice “muscle whispering”. Stupid.

• ‹ Previous
• 1
• …
• 43
• 44
• 45
• 46
• 47
• …
• 51
• Next ›
• Page