Dr David Hamilton Home Page

Healing Hands Benefit Premature Infants
(www.drdavidhamilton.com)

A study published last month by medics at McMaster Children's Hospital in Hamilton, Ontario, showed that Therapeutic Touch (TT) – the laying on of hands - benefited premature infants.

It was a rigorously controlled trial – double blind and randomized – involving 20 infants of gestational age less than 29 weeks. Ten received 5-minute TT sessions on 3 consecutive days and ten did not.

Measurements of Heart Period Variability (HPV) were taken 5 minutes before, during and after the treatment.

The results showed that the infants who had received Therapeutic Touch had increased Heart Period Variability’s, while the infants who did not receive the treatment showed no change. Low HPV is often associated with heart conditions so this demonstrated an improvement in heart health by Therapeutic Touch.

My research into this phenomenon has shown me that we all have the ability to heal. Actually, the key is a caring, compassionate desire to help. From this caring space, we really all do have healing hands. I know that this may be a little much for sceptical people but know that neuroscience research shows that emotional states in one individual often impact upon the brain of the other. Numerous other studies demonstrate that we are far more connected to each other than we have previously known.

Click here to read the article, published in ‘Advances in Neonatal Care’

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