How can the Manual Lymphatic Lymphedema Certification help me as a massage Therapist.

Hello Mary,

My name is Jane and I am a Certified Massage Therapist from

Richmond, Va. Here in VA we are Certified as opposed to Licensed (but

were are working to improve that legislatively). You can perhaps

better acquaint yourself with my practice by visiting our website at

www.GetRichmondMassage.com. Let me attempt to answer your questions

getting to the heart of what I am thinking you really want to know.

First, what lead me to pursue continuing education in what I'll call

lymphatic studies is that I was continuing to see clients come into my

practice with swelling conditions and disorders of various origin and

I felt ill prepared to help them. I did not know if what I was seeing

was a contraindication for massage and bodywork or if there was

something I could do to help them if I were but better educated in

these areas. I felt woefully under prepared by my massage school

education and I was determined to learn more.

I have been in practice for 8 years now and my choices for continuing

education have usually been based on the types of conditions I have

seen coming through my practice with significant enough frequency to

compel me to learn more in these areas. During the past 6 years I

noticed that I was seeing more clients with various types of cancer,

including post treatment breast cancer, prostate cancer, lung and

pancreatic cancer and the skin cancers. This lead me obtain additional

training specific to massage therapy for oncology and palliative care.

This training raised my awareness of clients who were presenting with

various swelling conditions, some having to do with cancer and cancer

treatment (as with secondary lymphedema resulting from cancer

treatment) and some having to do with non-cancer related surgery,

trauma, primary or idiopathic lymphedema and other causes. My cancer

training taught me that I needed highly specialized training (roughly

140 hours to become a Certified Lymphedema Therapist(CLT)) in order to

legally work with people who had a variety of serious swelling

disorders including lymphedema. It seemed logical to me that becoming

a CLT would better equip me to provide more complete care to my

oncology clients and also equip me to meet the needs of a whole host

of other clients who have other types of swelling conditions.

Additionally, I would be better prepared to discern when I encountered

a client with a serious contraindication that I should not touch at at

– very important indeed.

After researching various Lymphedema certification programs and course

offerings I realized this training would greatly enhance my ability to

effectively recognize and help many of the people already coming

through my practice. In particular I was interested in receiving

training from a program accredited/approved by one or both of the two

most widely respected National Lymphedema organizations in the country

(LANA or NLN). Additionally, I hoped to find a program that was

affiliated with a clinic or hospital so that I could see and work with

real patients who had some of the conditions we learned about and

might expect to see in real practice (as opposed to just working on

one another – healthy, lympedema free people). Coincident to this

ongoing stream on consciousness, I received a mailer from Cross

Country Learning announcing the offering of an introductory class in

Effective Manual Lymphatic Drainage techniques. After reading the

instructor's ( Carmen Thompson) bio and the course overview I decided

to take the one day course with the hopes of moving a few steps closer

toward my new goal of becoming a CLT. In a nutshell, the course was

outstanding! Carmen delivered over and above my expectations which are

high. She is very knowledgable and has an abundance of hands on

experience on the subject matter. She has studied a variety of

approaches to Manual Lymphatic Drainage (MLD) and Complete

Decongestive Therapy (CDT) and this knowledge informs her teaching. As

an instructor Carmen has a very approachable demeanor, is willing to

answer your questions until you understand the concept and

demonstrates all manual techniques ensuring that the student has time

to absorb them.

During the one day class we learned far too much to convey in this

letter but suffice it to say that we learned the major components of

the lymphatic system and how they work together to form and move lymph

throughout our body, why this is important to our health, and how to

manually facilitate this process. There were perhaps 40 students in my

class, PTs, PTAs, OTs, RNs and Mts and they all seemed fully engaged

in the class and the labs. During the end of class Carmen announced

that she offered a full certification course thus propelling an

excellent class into an incredible one. To me this was an amazingly

fortuitous series of events. After I had time to further investigate

the details of Carmen's four part certification course, I signed up

for and completed it.

But I ramble. Now let me attempt to answer your questions.

1.What was the best thing you learned from taking this class?

In a nutshell, among the best things I learned was a variety of MLD

techniques and protocols that I could use immediately to help folks

suffering from a variety of swelling conditions. I also learned when

to use them, equally as important. I have been using many of them

since completing the class. I also learned how to do CDT another very

useful set of techniques.

2. What was/are the thing or things you would change about this class

if you could?

I have to say I was pretty satisfied with the course content. There is

a lot of information to grasp. I might perhaps suggest improvements in

some of the course handouts. There is such a volume of information

provided, included orally during lectures that I found it hard to keep

it all straight at first.

3. Did taking this class effect your practice? please explain.

Absolutely. First, the knowledge, hands on skills and clinical

practice prepared me to return to my practice and begin to immediately

work with and help people with a variety of swelling conditions.

Carmen made herself available to answer questions wherever I might

have felt uncertain. Second, I began to market myself as a CLT and

began to see new clients specifically for this reason. I would say,

perhaps 6 or so per month just though the information from my website

– no other marketing.

4. On effectiveness of Marketing?

I think the marketing advice is sound and effective. I have a fairly

full practice already so I did not need to do any more marketing. I

was more interested in better serving my current and new clients (by

referral and website) than marketing at large to gain new ones.

5.What type of practice do you work in?

Massage Therapy Practice – 7 member team. See the website.

6. Would you take this class again?

I just completed the Advanced Topics course being offered for the

first time. I would highly recommend both the full certification

Course and the Advanced Topics class. It is important to add that you

definitely get out of this class what you put into it.

Sorry for being so long winded and I hope this helps. Also,

Please ignore typos etc.  I did this quickly so as to respond in a

timely fashion.

Warmly,

Jane