by Kathie Lipinski, RN, MSN
As a Reiki Master Teacher, Nurse Massage Therapist, and Holistic Nurse in private practice, my experience has shown that Reiki enhances all nursing skills. Reiki enhances both nursing care and judgement in a hospital, private practice, administrative, managed or home care setting.
Nurses have always been known to have a sixth sense or what many refer to as "Nurses’ Intuition." It is that ability to "know" when to check on a patient, to call a family when a patient is not doing well, to have a doctor recheck a patient, to call or visit a home care client when a visit wasn’t planned "just because" you had a feeling, or recheck paperwork. Reiki training enhances this ability to "know" or "sense" things or be more aware of subtle signs.
Because Reiki comes from the source,
the nurse never has to worry
about depleting his or her own energy.
Working with energy is another way of gathering information on a deeper level. It gives one "subtle clues" as to what is really going on with a person. It helps one to become more aware of the emotional or spiritual component of dis-ease that the nurse can share with the client to gain understanding or insight.
This insight fits with the nurses’ role of helping a person to understand and learn more about their health or illness and to provide guidance to change behavior and increase awareness. Reiki training makes a nurse more aware of subtle energies – physical, mental, emotional and spiritual. This subtle energy phenomenon is known to Nurses as the "Human Energy Field".
Reiki enhances Therapeutic and Healing Touch techniques since it is an energy source in itself. It helps the nurse to protect herself from picking up negative energies or vibrations from the person she is working with. Because Reiki comes from the source, the nurse never has to worry about depleting his or her own energy. Reiki treats both practitioner and client.
The most important benefit of Reiki is the self-care aspect. With all the energies that a nurse has to give in caring for others, a nurse often suffers "burn out." Reiki is an excellent way for nurses to take care of themselves and restore their energy and avoid depletion.
Reiki has helped me fine tune my clairvoyance so that I can "see" the emotional component behind the dis-ease or emotional turmoil. It has enhanced my touch so that my hands are more sensitive to the muscle state. When I use guided imagery or regression with a client, it helps me to see the traumatic event and dialogue with the people involved. Reiki has taken me from traditional nursing to a more holistic model where deeper healing is addressed through the use of subtle energies.
Many of my Reiki students and friends who are nurses often tell me about the ways they use Reiki. Some use Reiki energy to help them more easily locate a vein when inserting an intravenous line (IV). Others give their patients Reiki while taking their blood pressure or pulse. The patient’s often reply that they feel "something special" or feel more relaxed. It is amazing what just a few minutes of Reiki can do.
Home care nurses use Reiki in physical and psychological assessments, changing dressings, paper work, health care teaching and working with family members. Recovery room nurses report using Reiki over the incision site of painful areas and find patients have an easier time waking up or recovering from anesthesia and surgical trauma. Emergency room nurses use Reiki to calm patients down quickly and to be more open to treatment. They find that Reiki also calms down family members. Dr. Nancy Eos explains in her book "Reiki and Medicine" how she uses Reiki to help her decide which person needs to be seen first (triage).
Nurses in administrative or management positions use Reiki when doing stressful tasks such as staffing, counseling, and reviewing employees. Reiki calms the situation, and creates a more receptive state and clearer thinking. Some managers and staff give themselves Reiki before and during a staff meeting and find the meeting goes smoother.
Nurses in private practice tell me how Reiki enhances their hypnotherapy skills, guided imagery exercises, their work as a dula in Labor and Delivery, and massage sessions, etc.
As nurses’ roles continue to change and expand, Reiki is there to assist in their professional development. Reiki assists nurses in caring for themselves and restores their energies so they can continue to give of themselves in their role as health care advocates. Nurses who practice Reiki are in the unique position to combine both Reiki and their strong medical knowledge to help clients and improve the health care system.
