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By: John Upledger 2008 Massage Therapy Hall of Fame
Since we first opened the doors of The Upledger Institute in 1985, we have trained more than 90,000 practitioners in CranioSacral Therapy (CST), a light-touch approach that releases restrictions in the central nervous system to relieve pain and dysfunction and enhance whole-body health. To my delight, the majority of those practitioners have been massage therapists – professionals I consider to be uniquely qualified to practice CST.
Massage therapists tend to be deeply compassionate human beings who dedicate their lives to serving others. This along with their willingness to continually refine their palpation skills and spend up to an hour with each client makes them exceptional practitioners of subtle therapies like CST. Now with as many different types of hands-on modalities as there are personalities, I expect this trend toward specialization to continue over the next decade. While I am not a futurist, nor do I have an overly accurate crystal ball, I can tell you from my perspective some of the other trends I can imagine taking place over the next 10 years. As the massage therapy industry continues to move away from its long-outdated reputation as being primarily of ill repute or reserved for relaxation only, I expect these therapists to be increasingly viewed as the valuable, trained medical professionals that they are. Indeed, I have every reason to believe that the ever-growing respect for and reliance upon massage therapy will continue to strengthen. I also believe, and certainly hope, that conventional medical practitioners may begin to rely more on massage professionals as the first line of healthcare defense rather than the last. Personally, I would also like to see an end to the polarizing issue of semantics in manual therapy. In most states massage therapists cannot say they are “treating patients.” Instead, they must say they are “working with clients.” But does using different words really change how well massage therapists care for others? No matter how you put it, massage therapists use their skills to help people relax and rehabilitate from pain, stress and dysfunction. This is and will continue to be good for everyone. Upledger Institute |
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