Don’t burn out, Zen out. Meditation for you and your patients:

Patients and practitioners alike can benefit from meditation and mindfulness training for the rehabilitation setting. Nari Clemons joined us today to discuss her upcoming Meditation for Patients and Practitioners course taking place in New York.

We all live in a fast paced world. Our smart phones are letting us know to get back to people with email or texts, we have busy practices with full days, and many of us also have care-giving to do when we get home. Many practitioners see chronic pain patients, sometimes with abuse history or a history of many years of failed medical care. Our patients come to us stressed out and ready to unload, and this happens all day long.

We know our pelvic patients would do better to calm their system. We go home at night so drained sometimes. We would do better to regulate our system. But how? We are all so busy. In Meditation for Patients and Practitioners, we focus on the therapist as well as the patient.

Perhaps you have tried meditation for yourself or your patient. Perhaps you didn’t respond to imagining a waterfall or counting your breath, and you gave up. Perhaps your patient didn’t really take to it, or you can’t figure out how to fit it into your sessions. So many of us know that we are tired of our own low level anxiety, or that our patients would do better if we could get them to re-frame mentally. However, when it comes to implementing those changes, we often come up at a loss.

A randomized control study[1] of nurse leaders who work in understaffed environments were tested with a workplace meditation program. Stress scores were tested at baseline and one week after completing a 4 week program. What do you know? The participants had a decrease in distress scores and an increase in positive symptoms.

“But my day is too busy,” you think? In this course, we work on strategies to center yourself at the beginning of your day, the end of your day, or during your day with 1, 2, or 5 minute strategies. This way, even on your busiest days, you have a way to reel in your stress level and find your calm. For your patients, we offer around 10 different techniques.

When teaching PF1, PF2A and PF2B, we talk about the need to downtrain the nervous system to be effective with pelvic pain, constipation, and history of trauma. Yet, the question always arises about which technique to use with a patient. In the Meditation for Patients and Providers course we give you a working model of how to choose a technique for your patient depending on the time you have, the patient personality, and the situation you are working on resolving.

As one participant said after the last course, “Excellent course. No other course has so beautifully described such practical techniques that are just as important for the therapist’s mental health as they are for the patient’s”. Sound exciting? Join us at the Meditation for Patients and Practitioners course being offered July 19-20 in New York City.

[1]Bazarko, Dawn et al. “The Impact of an Innovative Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction Program on the Health and Well-Being of Nurses Employed in a Corporate Setting." Journal of Workplace Behavioral Health 28.2 (2013): 107–133. PMC. Web. 2 June 2015.