Working with Accupunturists

[Lyanna]

I had a client recently come to me with an injury she had sustained almost a year ago, she did not do anything about it right away, she waited six months.
The way she injured herself was by falling on her right arm, she hit her wrist, rolled over her elbow and her scapula took most of the momentum and pushed it into her back. She has lots of spastic, hypercontracted muscle tissue in her bicep and anterior deltoid, and her shoulder is medially rotated, so her pecs are also hypercontracted and she has very limited ROM in her right shoulder.
I had worked on her once, using lots of positional release and deep specific friction to start releasing her deltoid, and I showed her stretches for her pec MM. Since I had done such deep work with her, I advised her to ice her bicep and deltoid to prevent any soreness or inflammation to the injury site. She said she felt fantastic when we were done and she already had gotten some ROM back.

After that one treatment, she went to try accupuncture, and wanted to get both therapies at the same time and I supported the idea, until I tried to massage her again. I started doing more deep tissue techniques and she pulled her arm away from me and told me that her accupuncturist had said that deep tissue would interfere with her healing, and not to let me do anything more than very light strokes. I asked her if she had been icing her shoulder and she said she had been using hot packs instead, because that was what the accupuncturist had advised her to do, because cold would "keep her energy meridians closed". She also told me she did not feel better after the accupuncture, but she was sure it was working and did not want me to continue her deep tissue therapy.

Can anybody give me some advice on how to work with a client who is also receiving accupuncture? While I believe in energy work and even practice Reiki II, I do not see how I could not help this client with both techniques. Do they contradict each other or is this just a difficult client?

 

[starcraftstrategist]

I'd suggest speaking with the acupuncturist. However, I work regularly with an acupuncturist and don't have a problem with doing deep work on many of our "seen-by-both-of-us" clients. But, since I know the acupuncturist well and also see her for myself, IF she says don't do something... I don't do it, unless we have a pow-wow and work it out. I'd defer to the acupuncturist, when they are a good one, because they are doing meridian work and that can have very specific items that must be done in very specific ways, for very specific reasons.

 

[D00M- m]

I do not work with any acupuncturists, and my client did not give me any information on hers. So I do not know what is going on in her sessions. I am just a little territorial of my clients, I guess.

 

[Muttlove]

Maybe you could take it as an opportunity to branch out and work with someone. You can ask your client for the info and also set up a time to go meet the acupuncturist. I get great referrals from 3 different acupuncturists!

 

[uniquejason]

Workign together

I agree with asking the client if she would be willing to have her information shared with her acupuncturist. If so, have a talk with them, ask what they would like you to do and why. Perhaps you will feel enlightened with the reasons and feel comfortable doing like stroking techniques. If not, you should tell both the acupuncturist and your client that that there me be a conflict. Best of luck.

 

[Mario]

Thanks to both of you, I am a bit nervous about that sort of thing, but I will talk to my client the next time I see her and see if that would be okay with her. It certainly wouldn't hurt.

 

[Mj F]

I think I would tell the client that The acupuncturist is a specialist in Acupuncture and you are a specialist in massage.
This is not a situation of one being more highly trained or knowledgable than another, just different training and approaches.
If she does not want deep massage to an area though, I would consider myofacial release.
BTW I swap massages with an accupuncturist and she works very deeply with massage.