by Daniel J. Benor, MD and Rita Benor, RN

INTRODUCTION

Holistic healing is a term which is becoming familiar through the increased acceptance of alternative and  complementary therapies. There are several cautions for those involved in this process

 

HISTORICAL NOTES

Healing comes from the early English and Germanic roots of haelen, meaning to make whole. Holistic healing is actually a redundancy, brought about by Western society’s narrowed focus upon diagnosis and treatment of diseases rather than upon addressing the people who have the diseases.

We believe that holistic healing is the involvement of practitioners/ therapists in helping people to address disharmonies or blocks to their well-being as they seek to become whole in body, emotions, mind, relationships (personal and community) and spirit.

For millennia in Western society (as is still true in many societies which have not abandoned their ancient traditions) the world was a unified. mysterious whole. The feminine principle prevailed. Humans were integrally a part of nature. They felt themselves to be a part of the mysterious forces which guide and rule the wonderment of life (in every aspect of Gaia). our planet, and all the life forms and forces upon it, and of the vaster cosmos beyond. We understood the world through heliocentric and anthropocentric myths (Campbell 1972).

Gradually the masculine, logical principle came to dominate. The earth was the center of the universe and man was seen to have been created by God and to have been given the earth to rule. Thus began our separation from nature.

Many factors contributed to this process and the world has been demystified by scientific methods of observation. Copernicus and Galileo showed that the earth revolves around the sun; the body lost much of its mystery under the dissecting knives of the early anatomists: Descartes emphasized the divisions between body and mind; and the industrial revolution gave us the methods and tools to make our lives more secure through exploring. taming and conquering nature.

The same principles were extended into medical practice. Reductionist modern science hopes to explain the whole by analyses of its parts. The discovery of microbial and viral agents for disease, of vitamins and hormonal agents for maintaining health, and of numerous sophisticated medications lead to the hope that all disorders will eventually be treatable through addressing causative physical agents for disease and dis-ease. In line with the rest of Western science, we have been promised by medical science that eventually we shall understand the ultimate mechanisms which guide and shape our health (probably in terms of biochemical processes). and then we shall be able to develop the means to conquer all illness. Indeed, organ transplants, sophisticated prostheses, and genetic engineering would appear to present signs of early achievements in these directions. However, not all is rosy. The promises of antibiotics which would eliminate infectious diseases are proving to be false promises. Infectious agents are developing immunities to antibiotics at alarming rates (McTaggart 1996). Costs of health care and limited health care budgets are bringing about bureaucratic governmental reshapings of health care systems. Doctors and nurses are being forced to limit the time they spend with patients while budgets limit the amount of care according to diagnoses: again overlooking the individuality of the person who has the diagnosis. This is not to put blame on health caregivers who are working very hard to provide individually-focused care. They are simply unable to make the time available to do so under the present health care systems.

The influence of the masculine principle is subtle and pervasive in medical practice. Our very language shapes us to conform to separation from nature and urges us to participate in ‘battles which can be won’ if we only work hard enough at it. We suffer ‘heart attacks’, nervous breakdowns, and ‘organ failures’, and engage in aggressive treatments. ‘wars on cancer’. ‘conquering illness’, and .seek to ‘defeat death’.  All of this hype focuses intensively upon the disease. ignoring the frailties and strengths of the processes of life and spirit. It also pushes away. rather desperately, from acknowledging the inevitability of death (Hocking 1994).

Even without these outside pressures. modern medicine has lost sight of the whole person in many ways. in the name of efficiency it divides people into arbitrary parts, treated for the convenience of the medical and nursing practitioners by different specialists in different departments.  The objectively observable and measurable aspects of disease are the focus of attention. Doctors and nurses can often ignore the dis-ease attendant to being ill. Too often they overlook the psychological, social, environmental, and other factors which contribute to the development and perpetuation of disease. There is a tendency to minimize or even to deny the seriousness of the illness and to avoid discussion with the patient. particularly when death is possible or immanent (Hocking 1994).

With measurable disease as the focus of health care, people have come to focus upon health primarily when dysfunctions appear. Many people only become aware of health because they have lost it. They are not educated in health prevention and maintenance. Furthermore, there is very little awareness that total health is more than just being free of disease. Total health involves nurturing and harmonization of emotions, mind, community. and spirit. It also requires a positive focus on ways of being which are enjoyable and meaningful. Without joy in our lives we are more prone to illness, and even to serious diseases (Le Shan 1989).

The masculine principle now dominates, reducing and analyzing, seeking to extirpate and cure disease while the gentler, feminine, caring, organic aspects of ministering to people with illnesses are considered by Western medicine to be lesser and often unproductive aspects of ‘medical problems’.

Fortunately, the public is not as indoctrinated in scientific methods and thinking as health caregivers are. Growing numbers of people are seeking the help of other therapists, feeling that they deserve to have caregivers who listen to them and who address them as persons rather than as problems. In the UK, as in the rest of the world, this demand is bringing about a major return to whole-person care; most notably through complementary and alternative therapies.

Within the conventional caregiver community, many nurses are awakening to the limitations of the biomedical model and are gradually reintroducing a focus on whole-person care (Benor l996a, Pfeil 1994, Rankin-Box 1993). This is evidenced in holistic nursing associations in the UK. the USA, Canada. Australia, and Mexico. Nurses are increasingly in positions to influence this process as they are the largest group of health care practitioners to be embracing the wider philosophy and understanding of illness and health through the integration of whole-person care and of complementary therapies into traditional health care environments.

It is conservatively estimated that 40,000 nurses in the USA practice Therapeutic Touch (Benor l996b). Growing numbers of nurses use aromatherapy, reflexology, massage (Fraser & Ross Kerr 1993. Malkin 1994), and other forms of caring involving touch. Doctors are learning to incorporate homeopathy, acupuncture. and spiritual healing into their practices. In the workshops we do with doctors and nurses, it is the touching therapies which are most popular. How sad, in contrast, to find that in the defensive practice of medicine in the USA, psychotherapists in many states are forbidden to touch clients lest they open themselves to accusations of sexual misdoings which could lead to malpractice claims.

 

DISTINGUISHING BETWEEN WHOLE-PERSON CARE AND HOLISTIC THERAPIES

Whole-person care addresses body, emotions, mind, relationships (personal, community), and spirit. While we may discuss these individually, in reality they are inseparably interconnected with each other in a mutually-interacting manner. The question of whether complementary therapies are holistic is debated in this issue by Professor Pietroni and Professor Saks (p 4-11). Discussions such as these are important and an essential part of reflective practice.

The body is not merely a collection of chemicals, cells, and organs. The whole is far more than a sum of its parts. The body is a reflection of a person’s emotions and mind. Emotional tensions and mental worries alter muscle tensions, blood pressure, and hormonal balances. Chronic tensions may contribute to physical dysfunctions such as eczema, asthma, hypertension. migraines, cancers, and more. Conversely, physical dysfunctions may bring about emotional and mental instability, anxiety, and depression (Benor 1996a). There is a vast literature on body-mind interactions and interventions (Benor 1992, Dethlefsen & Dahlke 1983, Harrison 1984, Hay 1984, Rossi 1986). Relationships with family and community are reflected in the state of one’s health. For instance, losing a person who is close to us predisposes us to illness (Parkes 1964).

Spirit expresses itself through the body. We may become aware of spiritual aspects of our being through intuitive, inner knowing of the rightness or wrongness of what we eat, say, and do. Meditation and prayer may bring us into deeper spiritual awareness (Benor 1994). Spiritual healing may shift a painful experience of illness into one with spiritual dimensions (Benor 1992, Benor in press a). Hundreds of studies have shown a strong positive correlation between religious affiliation/practices and states of health (Levin 1994).

Complementary therapies may be offered in the spirit of whole-person care, Many people come for such treatments because complementary therapists spend time listening and counseling. This is in contrast with conventional medical practice. where doctors and nurses are encouraged to spend as little time as possible with people in the name of efficiency. However, research shows complementary therapies are potent and effective (Benor 1992, 1993) and are not just opportunities for people to have someone to speak with. Complementary therapies such as spiritual healing, Therapeutic Touch (Benor 1996b), Autogenic Training (Benor l996c), applied kinesiology, meditation, psychoneuroimmunology, and the like (Benor 1993. Benor in press b, Benor l996d). when practiced at their best, encourage people to take responsibility for their own health.  They may also heighten  intuitive awareness and spirituality. Styles (p 16-20) discusses the value of some therapies in the use of aromatherapv in hospitalized children with HIV disease.

So strong is the imprint of the medical model that there is a tendency to misuse complementary therapies. They may be   given as partial methodologies which address symptoms rather than being offered as systems of diagnosis and treatment to enhance a person’s state of being.

Even when on offer as whole-person care, the offer may be available only to the affluent who can pay for such interventions out of their own pockets. However, this is a double-edged sword. The fact that so many people are willing to pay for complementary therapies is an incentive in the private sector (Eisenberg et al 1993). and a demonstration of public belief in their efficacy (Woodham 1994).

It is helpful when health providers model whole-person caring. sorting out their own wholeness so that they can be fully available to their clients. This can often be difficult in the current therapeutic milieu. Medical and nursing bureaucracies are insensitive to the personal needs of individual doctors and nurses. The good news is the growing acknowledgement of high levels of stresses by individual doctors and nurses, even though the ways of dealing with them have not yet been fully developed or instituted (Benor l996a, Benor 1995). This is such a new realization and so contrary to prevalent practices that many caregivers do not feel entitled to put their own needs forward. Involvement in holistic approaches is therefore often a covert statement of the caregivers’ own healing needs (Benor 1996a). All of these changes move rather slowly. We must be patient and draw support from one another in this journey towards wholeness.    
 

CONCLUSION

Our language is important to our understanding and practice of health care. We should be moving towards integrated care: integrating complementary therapies with conventional medical and nursing practices: integrating awareness of the practitioner’s health needs in the provision of care; and helping people in integrating their bodies, emotions, minds, relationships, and spirit into a harmonious  whole. Healing is a journey, not a destination.

 

REFERENCES

Benor, D. (1992) Healing Research, Volume I: Research in Healing. Helix. Oxford/Munich.

Benor, D. (1993) Healing Research. Volume II: Holistic Energy Medicine and the Energy Body. Helix, Oxford/Munich.

Benor, D. (1995) Medical Student Health Awareness: The Louisville Program for Medical Student Health awareness. Complementary Therapies in Medicine , 3(2):9 3-99.

Benor, D. (in press a) Healing Research, Volume III: Science, Spirit and the Eternal Soul. Medford, NJ: Wholistic Healing Publications (in press).

Benor, D. (in press b) Healing Research. Volume IV: A Synthesis of Recent Research. Medford, NJ: Wholistic Healing Publications (in press).

Benor, R. (1992a) Healing unto death. Doctor-Healer Network Newsletter , 4: 19-21.

Benor, R. (1996a) Reaching towards wholeness. European Nurse, 4: 240-249.

Benor, R. 1(996b) Therapeutic touch. British Journal of Community Health Nursing, 1(4): 203-205.

Benor, R. (1996c) Autogenic Training. Complementary Therapies in Nursing & Midwifery, 2: 134-138.

Benor, .R (1996d) A holistic view to managing stress. In: Fisher R A, McDaid P (eds) Palliative Day Care. Hodder Headline, London.

Campbell, J. (1972) Myths to Live By. Bantam. New York.

Dethlefsen, T. Dahlke, R. (1990) The Healing Power of Illness: The Meaning of Symptoms and How to Interpret Them. Element. Long mead, UK.

Eisenberg, D., et a. (1993) Unconventional medicine in the United States: Prevalence, costs and patterns of use. New England Journal of Medicine 328: 246-252.

Fraser, J. Ross Kerr, J. (1993) Psychophysiological effects of back massage on elderly institutionalized patients. Journal of Advanced Nursing, 18: 238-245.

Harrison, J. (1984) Love Your Disease – It’s Keeping You Healthy. Angus and Robertson, London.

Hay, L.L. (1984) You Can Heal Your Life. Hay House. Santa Monica, CA.

Hocking, D. (1992a) Denial in terminal care. Doctor-Healer Network Newsletter 4: 15-IS.

LeShan, L. (1989) Cancer as a Turning Point. Gateway. Bath.

Levin, J.S. (1994) Religion in Aging and Health. Sage. Thousand Oaks, CA.

Malkin, K. (1994) Use of massage in clinical practice. British Journal of Nursing 3(6): 292-294.

McTaggart, L. (1996) What Doctors Don’t Tell You: The truth about the dangers of modern medicine. Thorsons. London.

Parkes, C.M. (1964) The effects of bereavement on physical and mental health: a study of the case-records of widows. British Medical Journal 2: 274-279.

Pfeil, M. (1994) Role of nurses in promoting complementary therapies. British Journal of Nursing 3 (5): 2i7-223.

Rankin-Box, D. (1993) Innovation in practice: complementary therapies in nursing. Complementary Therapies in Medicine 1: 30-33.

Rossi, E. (1986) The Psychobiology of Mind-Body Healing. W W Norton. New York.

Woodham, A. (1994) HEA Guide to Complementary Medicine and Therapies. Health Education Authority. London.

An earlier version of this article appeared as: Benor, Daniel and Benor, Rita. (1997) The missing ‘W’ (in holistic care), guest editorial. Complementary Therapies in Nursing and Midwifery , 3, 1-3.

Resources for exploring messages from your body

WHEE: Whole Health – Easily and Effectively ^®
AKA
Wholistic Hybrid derived from EMDR and EFT
  Potent self-healing method for releasing emotional and physical stress, pains, residues of traumas
  Workbook     Paperback – WHEE for pain    Articles     Workshops  

Resources for explaining the mind-body connection

Benor, Daniel J. Healing Research, Volume II: (Professional edition)
Consciousness, Bioenergy and Healing , Bellmawr, NJ: Wholistic Healing Publications 2004. 
  Thorough review of research validating the efficacy of self-healing, wholistic complementary/ alternative medicine (CAM), biological  energies, and environmental interactions with bioenergies.
  “Book of the Year” award – The Scientific and Medical Network, UK
  Paperback, CD-ROM or e-Book of Consciousness, Bioenergy and Healing
    (15% author’s discount on V2. Professional edition paperback and CD-ROM worldwide, and free postage in the US)

Benor, Daniel J. Healing Research, Volume II: (Popular edition)
How Can I Heal What Hurts?   Wholistic Healing and Bioenergies,Bellmawr, NJ: Wholistic Healing Publications 2005 
  Popular edition Explains self-healing, wholistic complementary/ alternative medicine (CAM) and bioenergies, and discusses ways in which
     you can heal yourself.
      (15% author’s discount on V2. Popular edition paperback worldwide, and free postage in the US )

Develop and deepen your intuition and personal spirituality

Healing Research, V. 3
   Personal Spirituality: Science, Spirit and the Eternal Soul , Bellmawr, NJ: Wholistic Healing Publications (November 2006)
  
  Reaching Higher and Deeper
Workbook for Healing Research, Volume 3 : Personal Spirituality:
   Bellmawr, NJ: Wholistic Healing Publications 2007