The Ethics of Touch: A Workshop for Health Professionals

Date: March 2nd, 2019
Time: 09:00 am - 01:00 pm
Location: Canadian College of Massage and Hydrotherapy - Halifax
Investment: $125 plus HST ($ 143.75)
CEUs: 2 Primary Category "A"
Registration: Please contact ailsakeppie@gmail.com to register

Introduction

Curated and taught by Ailsa Keppie (BSc, RMT, MFT therapist)

• Do you want to improve your skills around negotiating consent with clients?
  
• Do you want to explore how to work safely with previously emotionally or physically traumatized clients?
  
• Do you believe that self-awareness is an integral part of being a professional in the health field?
  
• Do you want to share, discuss experiences, and problem solve around transference and counter-transference issues that may be present in your practice?
  

If you answered yes to any of these questions, please consider signing up to attend this workshop in Halifax!

Course Topics

What participants will learn and experience:

• To be aware of what our touch and our intention transmits to a client
  
• To be aware and therefore more in control of our own needs and desires, and how to put these aside to really be present for our clients
  
• How working with touch can serve clients, and help their healing process
  
• How all human beings need touch, and how this can help a client learn to ‘feel’
  
• How to set and communicate healthy and professional boundaries, and create a sense of safety for our clients to fully enter into their own process of healing.
  
• How to take care of our own needs for touch, and to know when we need to take time for our own self-care
  
• A method for understanding and working with the different types of touch in a more profound way, in both a giving and receiving role, and developing a method of explaining this to clients, to facilitate transformation and healing
  

Considerations

This is an experiential workshop, participants will remain clothed, and everyone will have full choice around each of the exercises presented.

This course is approved for 2 primary CEU credit for RMT’s. A full description of the course is available upon request. The material taught falls under the scope of Professional Ethics for professionals who use touch.

More Information:

Working with boundaries and touch is maybe a new area for CEU courses to cover, but it is imperative for any health professional who touches their clients, to be aware of the ramifications, trauma or transference related, that may come up while either negotiating the work to be done with the client, or while the client is actually on the table. A good self awareness, and ability to be both cognizant of ourselves as therapists and of the subtle cues of the client, beyond both verbal and written consent, is helpful in negotiating healthy boundaries and a clear professional relationship in today’s highly charged society. Many unclear messages and social conditioning can mask a client’s real feelings and ability to give true consent in a setting where there is a clear power differential between therapist and client. This course offers a chance for professionals to discuss, learn about, and explore their own physical, emotional and mental responses, which in turn allows the therapist to hear and honour a client’s whole self in treatment. The polyvagal theory and our human need for touch and social engagement will also be discussed in relevance to the therapist/ client relationship.