Palpation club
My friend and colleague Niklas brought into being the first BSO-based Palpation club. He scheduled three sessions with 'expert' members of the faculty and open to any interested student. Overdue. Well Done, Nick!
21/05/2014
Session 1 with Ernest Keeling. Ernest runs the first-year class 'comparative palpation' and has enough perseverance and dedication to keep it going year after year. He has many many years of experience and a passion for osteopathy that is downright inspiring. Whilst in the first year Ernest has to deal with a lot of blank faces, today he quite evidently enjoyed the attention of fifteen interested students. For us, to learn from his experience and life-long dedication was a gift and we listened to him humbly. Two things struck me about our lecturer today: The deep pensive demeanour and the joy he seemed to take in teaching us. We went through two similar exercises, a 'listening trio' and a 'palpation trio'. Both times, there would be an active person talking about their difficulties with palpation or actually palpating; a listener or someone who was being palpated, and an observer. This set-up allowed for productive communication and reflection, step-by-step matching perceptions and gaining a higher level of understanding. Here are a few thoughts that we discussed / that Ernest shared with us: - developing palpation, one needs to focus on his/her strengths. There needs to be some ability that can take you forward. - communication is at the heart of it: if you don't get an answer from the body the whole thing is pointless. - a level of healthy optimism is appropriate; something will happen. - you need quite some motivation to get good at it (Note: I got the impression from today's session that for many in our group this motivation is a profound love for experiencing the body, for helping others get better - for osteopathy...). - assistance to progress: you need help from people who understand what you say. - don't expect any one else to feel the way you do. Certain models are therefore difficult to convey, which does not render a need for inter-practitioner communication obsolete - quite the contrary. Accept the way you work. - the choice of language appears to have a huge effect on therapeutic communication with the body etc (positive vs. problem-oriented). - there is space for emotions in what we do - they even play an important role in communicating with the body. - the interest is in taking the patient further, not in whether what you feel is right or wrong. Answering a colleague's question as to what helped him develop during his career, Ernest answered: 'Anything that helps me to clarify and feel better...'. No answers - conversation. |