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In this issue of To Your Health:

• Hospitals Starting to Recognize the Value of Massage Therapy
• Studying the Benefits of Massage for Advanced Cancer Patients
• Answers to Your Massage Questions: Highlights From This Month's "Ask a Massage Therapist" Online Forum

With millions of baby boomers entering their proverbial "golden years" and interest in complementary and alternative medicine growing exponentially, it's no wonder that hospitals across the United States are beginning to embrace massage therapy as a viable and important component of patient care.

Patients are requesting additional treatment options and hospitals are beginning to realize the benefits of not simply treating the condition or disease a patient has been diagnosed with, but also treating the person suffering from the disease. With studies being conducted that suggest the effectiveness of massage in helping cancer patients and others facing debilitating illness, hospitals are beginning to add therapists to their staff. And hospitals are utilizing massage therapists with pregnant patients and other special-needs patients as well.

Massage is becoming one of the most popular complementary and alternative medicine therapies offered in hospitals. "Massage therapists are helping to heal patients, staff and the entire medical system by simply and profoundly reminding people, through touch, of the place of stillness and compassion within us all - the inner spark and connection with divinity from which all healing flows," said Laura Koch, founder and director of the Hospital Based Massage Network, an organization that "supports massage and touch therapists pursuing integration of complementary care into mainstream medicine through their work."

Even in a professional hospice environment, those suffering from advanced cancer are consistently, if not constantly, plagued by fatigue, pain, and loss of appetite. Cancer patients and health professionals at hospice programs are anxiously awaiting the results of a study to be conducted by the Health Sciences Center at the University of Colorado at Denver. Researchers hope to show that regular massage therapy decreases pain, improves quality of life, and reduces physical and emotional distress among patients suffering from advanced stages of cancer.

Jean Kutner, MD, MSPH, associate professor of internal medicine at the CU School of Medicine and principal investigator in the study, is optimistic. "Hospice programs are very interested in the study because they believe massage works, and we anticipate that the study will show that patients who receive the massage therapy will experience a better quality of life during end-of-life care." Dr. Kutner also feels that patients suffering from advanced cancer are made to rely too heavily on drugs to treat symptoms that massage can treat more thoroughly, and without all the side effects and interactions. Now, researchers have to provide hard evidence as proof. "Most complementary therapies have not undergone rigorous scientific review," she said. "People believe it works, but data are needed to prove if patients are truly benefiting, and a study of this magnitude will help us gather that data."

The National Institutes of Health awarded a $1.2 million grant to conduct the study. As of March 2006, a total of 299 patients with advanced cancer have been enrolled. Registered participants have been enrolled from several sites around the country as part of a national hospice research network. Dr. Kutner and the team hope to have 440 patients enrolled in the study by August.

Question: I was in a very serious accident where I was hit by a car. My leg was seriously injured and required 3 painful operations so far. It's been 4 months since the last operation, and the tissue around the surgery sight (right side of tibia on the right leg) is still noticeably swollen, although there is no pain there. My question is, can a massage therapist help eliminate the swelling at the surgery site? It's been 4 months already since the last surgery and the swelling hasn't completely gone away.

Answer: With your doctor's permission, lymphatic drainage massage may help the swelling go down.

Rajam Roose

Note: Information provided in this Q&A section is drawn from the "Ask a Massage Therapist" online forum, in which massage therapists field questions relative to the massage profession. Readers are encouraged to post their questions at www.massagetoday.com/ask/. Answers should not be misconstrued as a diagnosis, prognosis or treatment recommendation and do not in any way constitute the practice of massage therapy or any other health care profession. Readers should consult their own health care providers for medical advice.

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