Back!

After a wonderful break taking care of the new baby, I'm back to seeing clients. Fishtown hours are Wednesdays 2pm - 8pm, and in Fairmount by appointment. Returning to work I love is a joy, and I'm looking forward to seeing all my wonderful clients again!

A break this summer

I will be on maternity leave starting June 23rd. I'll post here when I'm back at work, but feel free to contact me mid-August and afterward about appointments or any other questions.

Have a great summer until then!

Holiday Gift Certificates

The blustery weather has reminded me it's that time of year-- cold, darker days AND celebration and gift-giving! Many view the short days as a good time to slow down, reflect on the year past and focus on self-care and health to prepare for the year ahead. In that spirit, I'm offering gift certificates at a nice discount--for friends, family or even yourself. Single gift certificates are $65 for 60 minutes, 2 gift certificates are $100, 4 gift certificates are $180. I can mail certificates in a holiday card directly to the recipient if you wish. Offer good through December 31, 2009. See paypal options below, right.

Brain Is a Co-Conspirator in a Vicious Stress Loop

An interesting New York Times article today illustrates the relationships between chronic stress, brain function and how we behave. The classic "fight or flight" response can get thwarted into unproductive habits or passive inaction that likely brings more chronic stress.

Reporting earlier this summer in the journal Science, Nuno Sousa of the Life and Health Sciences Research Institute at the University of Minho in Portugal and his colleagues described experiments in which chronically stressed rats lost their elastic rat cunning and instead fell back on familiar routines and rote responses, like compulsively pressing a bar for food pellets they had no intention of eating.

Moreover, the rats’ behavioral perturbations were reflected by a pair of complementary changes in their underlying neural circuitry. On the one hand, regions of the brain associated with executive decision-making and goal-directed behaviors had shriveled, while, conversely, brain sectors linked to habit formation had bloomed.

In other words, the rodents were now cognitively predisposed to keep doing the same things over and over, to run laps in the same dead-ended rat race rather than seek a pipeline to greener sewers. “Behaviors become habitual faster in stressed animals than in the controls, and worse, the stressed animals can’t shift back to goal-directed behaviors when that would be the better approach,” Dr. Sousa said. “I call this a vicious circle.”

Robert Sapolsky, a neurobiologist who studies stress at Stanford University School of Medicine, said, “This is a great model for understanding why we end up in a rut, and then dig ourselves deeper and deeper into that rut.”

Makes one want to get out of the rat race. Hopefully those Portuguese rats are living stress-free these days. The article ends with sound advice for rodents and humans:

It’s still August. Time to relax, rewind and remodel the brain.

Additional location for massage appointments!

Beginning next week, I'll also see clients at Barefoot Doctor Community Acupuncture Clinic in the Fishtown neighborhood of Philadelphia, 618 East Girard Avenue. Appointments available Wednesdays 2-7pm. Please call or email me to schedule. The location is accessible by the #15 trolley along Girard Ave, and street parking is plentiful.
For wonderful acupuncture, see http://www.barefootclinic.com

Massage and Cancer

When I was in massage school 9 years ago, our instructors and textbooks wisely argued for a great deal of caution when cancer was present in a massage client, and many people with cancer were told to avoid all massage. Fear that massage could spread cancer around the body was still a strong concern. Currently, that fear is largely discounted and doctors and others working with cancer patients focus on figuring out the best ways to bring massage and people with cancer safely together.

Gayle MacDonald is a massage therapist bringing the massage and medical far worlds greatly closer with her passion for massage and deep understanding of the many needs of people with cancer. Her book Medicine Hands: Massage Therapy for People with Cancer, is the bible for any therapist interested in oncology massage training and she also offers intensive training programs which include hospital supervision. Medicine Hands is also a superb resource for people facing cancer and their family members. Reading the book, I wanted to jump on a plane and study with her immediately. Maybe someday... but for now I plan to study with one of her former students and leader in this field on her own right, Tracy Walton, who is more conveniently for me located on the East Coast.

U.S. News and World Report writes last month about a positive study on massage with advanced cancer patients here. The outcomes find that massage did reduce pain compared with the control group in the short term. Massage (by therapists trained in oncology procedures) was compared to simple touch, which probably has wonderful benefits on its own, especially for people suffering physically and emotionally from disease. I don't know if the majority of massage schools will include oncology training soon, but if they do, I hope they strive for the quality and scientific thoroughness of Macdonald's and Walton's instruction.

Massage Eases Pain, Anxiety After Surgery

Hopefully all hospitals offer massage to patients in the near future, and it's great to see research to back up the benefits. Massage used to be a part of nursing but became lost in the current high-technical system, where nursing staff are far too overburdened to take back this work. Massage therapists working in hospitals will help bring touch to those in the greatest need, and allow a greater number of people to have access to healing touch.
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Business Week, December 17, 2007, 16:00 EST

It's now standard post-surgical practice at some U.S. hospitals

By Ed Edelson
HealthDay Reporter

MONDAY, Dec. 17 (HealthDay News) -- A 20-minute evening back massage can help relieve the pain and anxiety that often follows major surgery, new research shows.

"In patients getting massage, the acute response was equivalent to a [dose] of morphine, which was pretty remarkable," said study senior author Dr. Daniel B. Hinshaw, professor of surgery and a member of the palliative care team at the VA Ann Arbor Healthcare System in Michigan.

According to Hinshaw, the idea for the study originated years ago, when he would ask nurses to give elderly patients a massage to augment pain relief medication. "Over the years, I have been concerned about the kind of pain and suffering that surgeons produce," he said. "How could we improve pain relief and reduce suffering?"

The massage trial included 605 veterans undergoing chest or abdominal surgery, randomly assigned to one of three groups. One group of 203 veterans received standard care, while another 200 got a daily 20-minute back massage. A third group of 202 got 20 minutes of individual attention but no massage. They were asked to quantify their feelings of pain and anxiety on a scale of 1 to 10.

"It's normal for a patient to have peak pain in the first day, which then declines," Hinshaw noted.

But, according to the study, "The rate of decline was faster by about a day for patients in the massage group," he said. Patients also experienced short-term declines in anxiety following massage, the team found.

Reporting in the December issue of the journal Archives of Surgery, Hinshaw's team found no differences in longer-term patient anxiety, length of hospital stay or the amount of pain-relieving medication used among the three groups.

Massage will now become part of the post-surgical routine at the Ann Arbor facility and related VA facilities in the region, Hinshaw said. His group is exploring its use to reduce the incidence and length of delirium experienced after surgery. Delirium, which is difficult to treat, can often lengthen the time spent in the hospital after surgery, he said.

A similar program of post-surgical massage has been in place at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn., for the past few years, said Susanne Cutshall, a clinical nurse specialist there.

"Ours is for cardiac surgery," Cutshall said. "We have a full-time therapist available. If there is a suggestion of back, shoulder or neck pain, the therapist can come and see them. Patients get a brochure about it before they come here, so they can ask for it."

The Mayo massage program "started about five years ago, when we were looking at pain medication," Cutshall said. "We stopped to listen to what the patients were saying about back, neck and shoulder pain. It seems to be muscular in origin."

A massage session at the Mayo can last from 20 minutes to 40 minutes, depending on what the patient might need, Cutshall said.

"Most people, it helps," she said. "It may make the pain a little better, they might sleep better, they might be less anxious."

More information

There's more on post-surgical pain treatment at the U.S. National Library of Medicine.

SOURCES: Daniel B. Hinshaw, M.D., professor, surgery, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor; Susanne Cutshall, R.N., clinical nurse specialist, Mayo Clinic, Rochester, Minn; December 2007, Archives of Surgery

Copyright © 2007 ScoutNews, LLC. All rights reserved.

http://www.businessweek.com/lifestyle/content/healthday/610946.html?chan=autos_executive+health+--+lifestyle+subindex+page_alternative+medicine