The importance of the client consultation process must be made obvious in any massage home study courses that you evaluate. When working as holistic therapist it is very important to carry out a client consultation before performing a treatment.
If this is their first visit you will need to conduct a client consultation with them. A client consultation helps you to determine why the client has come to see you. It helps you to evaluate any health issues they may have, be these emotional or physical. This will help you to formulate a treatment plan to help elevate the client's symptoms.
The client consultation information should include:-
- Personal details
- Medical History
- Contra Indications
- Clients lifestyle
- Treatment record
When carrying out a client consultation we are looking for contra indications to treatment. Contra Indications are health conditions that the client may have which mean that you should exercise caution or possibly avoid working on an area of the body. In more extreme cases you may need to avoid treatment altogether.
It is important to inform the client of this eg. "I am just going to run through a consultation form with you. The reason we are asking these questions is to determine that it is safety to proceed is to determine that it is safe to carry on with the treatment. We are looking for health conditions that mean we may have to modify the treatment or may need to get a doctor's permission before we can proceed. All the information that you give me is private and confidential and will only be used to determine whether it is safe to proceed with the treatment."
It is important that you check with your insurance company to determine which contra-indications they require you to check for, the list of contra indication can different for each insurer. If you do not check for their list of contra indications, then you may find that you are not covered should a client make a claim against you.
Ensure that both you and the client sign the consultation form to indicate that this is a true statement of the client's health.
If the client is a regular, then ask them to check the consultation form that they have filled in and inform you of any changes. Once you have determined that it is safe to proceed with the treatment, take the client to the treatment area and perform the treatment. Following the treatment, you should assess the treatment, make notes of any observations that you made during the treatment and give the client after care advice.
When you assess the treatment:
- Ask the client if they enjoyed the treatment, if not why not.
- Ask them what they liked the best and make notes, you will be able to modify their next treatment and do more of what they liked best?
- Was there anything they didn't like, if there is then again you can modify the next treatment and miss out what they didn't like?
- Was the pressure ok, again this allows you to modify your next treatment to meet your client's needs?
- Write their answer up on the follow up form, along with any problem areas you found when performing the treatment. It is important to write up this information as this is your record of the treatment, and you can use this information in the unlikely event of a claim being made against you. Just be prepared.
Client consultations are a very important part of being a professional holistic therapist. They protect both the client and you. They make sure that you do not perform a treatment on a client that may be detrimental to their well being and in the unlikely event of a client making an insurance claim against you, it shows that you took all the steps required of you and it shows the health information that the client told you, and it was this information that you used to decide to proceed with the treatment.
No comments:
Post a Comment