Massage Therapy Body of Knowledge

Comment

Comment by Noel Norwick on November 9, 2009 at 9:41am

Carl: Re: "Gloria brought up the issue of drugs and massage elsewhere. I believe that we need a list of drugs that are either use to treat or have side effects that cause conditions that contraindicate certain forms of massage or require special precautions."

Such a list could start with the book that Lippincott Williams & Wilkins published in 2005 written by Jean Wible and entitled Pharmacology For Massage Therapy.

Comment by Carl W. Brown on November 8, 2009 at 10:05pm

Keith, you have a point. The book lists classes of drugs that apply to diseases that there is no consensus that they are contraindicated. I guess we need to do the research first. No you can’t get AIDS from massage. Many people with peripheral neuropathy are not on drugs and come to us because they can’t get help form traditional medicine. Most people feel that massage does not cause cancer spread.

Comment by Keith Eric Grant on November 8, 2009 at 7:21pm

Bert,

Yes I agree about DVD's (which are snail-mail distance media). You also make the essential point that, for hands-on techniques, one has to first learn the necessary "kinesthetic vocabulary" via in-class (or mentored) instruction before being able to apply such a vocabulary in remote learning.

Much the same is true in folk-dancing or Scottish fiddling and learning new tunes. In the latter, what is written in musical notation differs from what is actually played. But if you already know the form of playing, you can easily learn new tunes from a variety of different musical notations. Similarly, with Scottish Country Dancing, the great variety of dances are different ways of chaining together a finite number of "vocabulary blocks". Learning the basic blocks and how they chain is a lot of in-class practice. Once that is down, any number of dances can be learned from diagrams and visualization (I've done it with a number of ball programs).

Comment by Keith Eric Grant on November 8, 2009 at 7:09pm

A good starting point for a consideration on massage and medications was written by Randal Persad and published by Curties-Overzet several years back.

Other considerations would be the research basis and the dose dependency of effects.

Comment by Carl W. Brown on November 8, 2009 at 6:40pm

Gloria brought up the issue of drugs and massage elsewhere. I believe that we need a list of drugs that are either use to treat or have side effects that cause conditions that contraindicate certain forms of massage or require special precautions.

It makes sense that we task a single standards body to compose and maintain a single list of drugs, herbs and homeopathic medicines that affect the body in way that affect our work and precautions we need to take. It seems to me that the MTBOK would be an ideal group to put together such a list as part of item 591. The list could be incorporated with our intake forms.

Comment by Bert Davich on November 7, 2009 at 3:59pm

Hi Carl,
Apologies about the link. See the below links posted by Keith. That was the reference.

Keith,
I agree with your position on distance learning, however I believe that for continuing education, home study with the advent of quality DVD teaching is as good, if not better than live classroom or 'webnar' distance learning. As I have stated before, It is possible to watch a DVD as many times as necessary, and they can be reviewed anytime for work on specific cases that are not all that common.
Classroom "live" experience with a qualified instructor is necessary to guide a novice to the point that they are able to make proper use of DVD & distance learning, particularly when it comes to initial clinical experience.

Initial licensing requirements and continuing education requirements are different animals.

Comment by Keith Eric Grant on November 7, 2009 at 2:17pm

Bert,

Ralph also had some pertinent things, relative to a BOK, to say in his follow-up to Scope It Out, Where It's Been, Where It's Going.

I tend to differ from Ralph's perspective on Career Colleges, seeing them as a natural progression to our having moved into licensing and explicit entry requirements -- literally a feedback to regulation and growth. Career Colleges will tend to teach to the specific requirements we define. If they successfully do that and we don't like the results, then we need to reexamine our requirements, not whine about the result. I also just see distance education as another tool, which with current technology, can provide a significant experience and possibilities of interaction. I think Ralph has gotten stuck in a 1970's stasis field on this item.

One reason I'm so adamant about defining outcomes, by the way, is that I view an outcome-based orientation as the "antidote" to the hours and degrees educational arms race. By forcing the profession into defining outcomes of training we can much more effectively discuss both need and effectiveness. We are also much more respectful of prospective students' time and finances by ensuring that what we require is well-defined, serves a specific need, and is implemented in a cost-effective manner. And yes, what one hears from me a lot is a business/industrial/military perspective on competency management -- i.e. lessons learned on managing competency where the results count.

It's the difference between "tuna" with good taste and "tuna" that tastes good.

Comment by Carl W. Brown on November 7, 2009 at 2:11pm

Bert, could not find Ralph Stevens link

Comment by Bert Davich on November 7, 2009 at 1:06pm

I have a partial retraction; the national organization advocated only 500 hours, but DID want a monopoly on educational certification which they did not get due to the efforts of the therapist's involved.

Comment by Bert Davich on November 7, 2009 at 12:50pm

Wow Keith,
That Ralph Stephens article (below link) is a real eye opener. I thought those kind of things were to be of concern, I just was not aware they are happening to the extent that Ralph's article makes apparent since those issues are not happening in Missouri. I do know there was a big fight years ago with the original licensing adoption requirements in MO regarding educational requirements and scope of practice and that the one of the BOK sponsors was involved. I also know some of the therapists who were instrumental in the final result, which yielded an implied scope of practice "A licensee shall practice within the scope of their education and training....) rather than a specifically stated (limited) scope. These therapists claim to have fought to keep one national organization from getting a monopoly on educational certification and imposing requirements much higher than the 500 required today for initial licensing.

This sounds like something we should be concerned about during the process of creating this MTBOK

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