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Healing
Healing involves the transference of benign healing power to the patient via a healer.

What can Healing Treat?
The Confederation of Healing Organisation's Code of Conduct forbids healers to claim to cure. Their healing is delivered as a complement to orthodox medicine, not as an alternative. However, healing may help accelerate recovery, reduce pain and provide peace and tranquillity to those who are stressed.

Principles
Many cultures, past and present, have a tradition of healing linked to religion, magic and shamanism. Healers believe that they channel energy from an external source. Some healers define that energy as the power of God, God being whatever the patient believes God to be; others maintain that it is a 'cosmic' energy. Whatever the definition, a healer has the ability to link with this force and channel it to the patient.

While healers believe that healing also works at a spiritual level, most healing outside churches' jurisdiction is given on a non-denominational basis irrespective of belief. There are several variations of contact and distant healing including spiritual, spiritualist, colour and psychic, etc.

Consultation and Treatment
The initial consultation may last up to an hour. Your healer will begin by asking about general health, specific complaints and whether you have seen a doctor. If you have not, a genuinely complementary healer will recommend that you do.

For the actual healing, you may be asked to sit or lie down. Your healer may then lightly place his or her hands upon or near you ' to, in effect, tune into you.

Once healers are in touch with you, they will again place their hands either on or near you at their discretion. You may feel a sensation of heat, cold or a slight tingling from the healer's hands. You may also experience a feeling of calm as treatment progresses.

Patients are encouraged to relax during treatment as a positive attitude helps the healing process. The healer may help you with this through a variety of breathing and visualisation techniques and by making sure you are comfortable.

A single session is sometimes sufficient but, generally, healing is progressive. Do not be discouraged if results are not immediate. The experience of the Confederation of Healing Organisations (CHO) is that "some people receive some benefit sometimes".

CHO healers are required to keep a record of patients' visits or personal details of patients. These records are confidential and are accessible only to the healer and patient without specific approval to the contrary.

Costs
Most CHO healers do not charge a fee for their work but all appreciate an offer to contribute towards expenses. A few, who work full time, do charge a fee. Check with your healer before the initial consultation.

Self Help
Your healer may be able to teach you some self-help visualisation techniques. There are also a wide variety of books and audio tapes on the market.

How to Find a Practitioner
Some GPs refer their patients to a healer or have one working in their practices. Some healers work in hospitals, hospices and nursing homes. Healing is carried out at the request of the patient; the Patients Charter, produced by the Government a few years ago, entitles a patient in an NHS hospital to request the services of a healer ' and pay for it if necessary.

The CHO is the biggest umbrella group for complementary practitioners in the UK and comprises 16 Members (one Member has 25 organisations under its own umbrella). The Confederation can provide you with a list of healers near you or information on how to obtain distance healing. It also has a mandatory code of ethics. All its members have been interviewed and have undertaken a two-year probationary period and training under supervision during which they will have had to deliver healing productively to at least four patients (two of these cases will be investigated to eliminate doubt on possession of a healing gift). All have professional indemnity and public liability insurance.

Ask your healer if he or she belongs to a member association of the CHO and ask to see a membership card. While an unregistered healer may be experienced and entirely reputable, it is always advisable to consult a registered healer.

Precautions
Continue to act on your doctor's advice throughout healing and be wary of healers who raise false hopes or ask you to stop taking medicines.

The CHO advises patients to tell their doctors that they are receiving healing. Its Code of Conduct requires healers to ask whether you have consulted a doctor about your medical condition and, if not, to recommend that you do so. If a patient refuses to go to a dcotor, a healer must record this and will then do the best possible for the patient.

Your healer is also forbidden to countermand the advice or medical treatment prescribed by your doctor or advise upon it.

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