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Spiritual healing for women
with breast cancer
Dr. Fiona Barlow
Bournemouth University
University of Southampton Complementary and Integrative Medicine Research Unit
Collaborators: Dr. Felicity Bishop;Prof. George Lewith; Dr .Jan Walker; Clare McDermott
Funded by The Harry Edwards Healing Sanctuary UK
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Breast cancer
Most common cancer in
women
Initial treatments- surgery/
radiotherapy/ chemotherapy
Long term treatment- hormonal
therapy
‘Drug holiday’ ? ?
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Spiritual healing – a
complementary therapy
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The study………..
• 12 breast cancer patients
• 10 healing sessions with
qualified healers
• Replicating usual practice
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•presentationalMethod - Study 1
Unitary Appreciative Inquiry -
A non-categorical holistic
qualitative method
Recording breast cancer
patient’s life patterns during a
course of Spiritual healing
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• Initial plan to recruit through the
local breast cancer clinic
• “Hocus Pocus”
• “Medicine deals with the side
effects”
• Other avenues of recruitment
Recruitment Issues……
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• Patient daily log
• Healer session reports
• One to one interviews
• Researcher field notes
Data…………..
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Findings…………….Expressions of patient experiences
Hot Flushes / night sweats
Well they’re virtually non-existent….
Yeah virtually gone, the hot
flushes……… It’s happened since
the healing started so, yeah I would
think it is the healing
(Violet)
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(Fuchsia)
I had hot flushes ….. That’s another
thing that has definitely improved –
my daily hot flushes. I still find I get
them if I get slightly agitated
(Fuchsia)
cancer (Rose)
Oncologists have no idea how
debilitating hot flushes and night
sweats are, and no idea of what it is
like to be a woman with breast
cancer (Rose)
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Joint aches
I was really crippled with joint pain, walking, anything,
sitting lying down was painful I couldn’t hold a book I
could hardly write or use the computer….. And I came for
my first session and 50% of my joint pain disappeared.
And I can remember, that’s just 40 minutes, and I can
remember sitting with my friends …expecting it all to
come back (laughter). So over the weeks… the joint pain
has virtually gone
(Foxglove)
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More energy – re-engagement
with old activities
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(Daffodil)
I was quite fed up before I
started having the healing, I
feel better in that way now
(Daffodil)
Relaxation / calmness …………
I don’t get quite so stressed, I
feel it has calmed the whole
thing down…. It smoothes
round the edges: you don’t
feel so raw (Rose)
My life was a vast amount of
stress and I didn’t feel
stressed to any great level
(Jasmin)
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Inner peace : Serenity
The whole process made
me, or kept me serene
and peaceful and able to
cope with what was going
on (Jasmin)
In fact I worked it out
afterwards … after
the Spiritual healing
I’d feel energised
(Foxglove)
Inner peace came
with the Spiritual
healing (Foxglove)I’d say it’s blissful.
Absolutely blissful
(Daffodil)I always feel elated
…. I think I could
conquer the world
(Sweetpea)I felt a bit sort of
uplifted (Fuchsia
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Summary ……..Despite the increasing survival
rates
•Breast cancer is the thief of
certainty
•Diagnosis and treatments rob
women of physical well-being
•Fear becomes a constant
companion
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Spiritual Healing as a
complementary therapy …..
• Physical - decrease or cessation of
treatment side effects
• Mind - calmness
- able to move forward
• Spirit - inner strength
- serenity
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Conclusions…………
• Spiritual healing alleviates many of the side effects of cancer treatments
• No patients took a drug holiday
• Spiritual healing as a complementary therapy can support orthodox medicine’s care of cancer patients
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Method – Study 2
•To generate possible questionnaire
items
•Study 1 (UAI) � topic guide
•Iterative procedure incorporating
member-checks
•7 core themes with associated
questionnaire items
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Focus Group Findings….
•Existential Outlook
•Overall Health
•Energy Levels
•Self-Perception
•Relationship with Others
•Coping Ability
•Emotional Balance
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Thinking Aloud …..
• To refine questionnaire items
• Focus group output � think aloud
materials
• Iterative procedure testing
comprehensibility & acceptability and
refining wording of items generated from
focus groups
• Modified wording and layout of 29 items
associated with 7 themes
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Postal Survey…..
• To test our new questionnaire’s properties
• Think aloud output � testable questionnaire (HEHIQ)
• Large scale postal study involving a convenience sample of 307 healees recruited from diverse settings
• Outcome: useable & acceptable HEHIQ
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Reflections…
• Each step builds on the previous step
• Member-checks give consistent
perspective
•
• Focus groups bridged the 2 studies
• Multi-disciplinary team necessary &
inspiring
• Quality of the final product
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Results….
We have produced a sound healing impact
questionnaire, acceptable to:
Healees
Healers
Researchers
Freely available in long (4 page) and brief
(2 page) versions
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Thank you…….
I
feel
honoured
to have had
your time
and attention
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