Disturbed Energy Field? Yes or No?

allnurses Guide · Jun 19, 2009

talaxandra said:
Experienced clinicians aren't aware of all the assessments they do unless something's off. For example, except when I'm doing the shift check I'm not aware that I check the O2 + suction equipment when I walk in a patient's room but I notice if it's missing. I don't realise that I automatically glance in every patient's room as I walk down the corridor, unless I see a patient on the floor, half over the bed or in distress.
I agree that many nurses have a 'gut' feeling that something's wrong with a patient, which we often attribute to intuition. I'm comfortable calling for a patient to be reviewed because they don't look right, even if they're fine on paper, and I'm happy to call that intuition.
However, I think it's actually a combination of experience and unnoticed observation - on a subconscious level I'm comparing this patient to the thousands of others I've cared for, while noting subtle indicators that I don't even notice I'm noticing, rather than anything metaphysical.
Maybe it's coincidence but I've noticed it's those nurses who have been working a while, have varied experience, or are particularly on the ball that most often get a gut feeling or intuition about a patient heading south.

Yes, that's what I was trying to say. You explained it very well. :up:

zenman · Jun 24, 2009

Woodenpug said:
O.K. With all due respect, that's just silly.
I guess a nuclear chain reaction would be a furiously disturbed energy field? Or a psychotic energy field? Antisocial?
Oh well, lol.

Now you're getting it. I haven't looked at any nursing diagnoses in years but anyone who enters the doors of a hospital will have a "disturbed energy field." Review the mind-body connection.

magnolia nurse · Jul 29, 2009

Most NP's are educated on the medical model and they Like physcians feel if they can't see it or touch it, it's not so. Why is everyone so closed minded, just open your mind to the possibilites, alternative therapies with tradition medicine can be quite benefical for the patient

talaxandra · Jul 29, 2009

But: not all alternative therapies are benign, not all are beneficial, and not all are compatible with the allopathic services provided. We therefore need to be selective about what alternative/complementary therapies we utilise, learn about and (tacitly or otherwise) endorse.

Some of us are happy to be open-minded provided it's not to the point where our brains fall out.

Woodenpug, BSN · Jul 29, 2009

zenman said:
Now you're getting it. I haven't looked at any nursing diagnoses in years but anyone who enters the doors of a hospital will have a "disturbed energy field." Review the mind-body connection.

Since "therapeutic touch" has been demonstrated as absolutely nothing, your argument is that well..... Science just aint got it?

I asked you for some way, a non-believer (yet open minded) could prove it to myself, if not to the scientific community and you made a silly joke.

I like jokes, especially silly ones. Still, if "disturbed energy fields" did not have so much evidence against or at least had some shred of evidence to support it, that would be great. If the paradigm needs to be changed, cool... demonstrate something at least as effective as the placebo effect. I love how wanna be philosophers actually think, that vague descriptions and "I have so much more experiential wisdom" actually fools anyone who is interested in more than being fooled.

Woodenpug, BSN · Aug 2, 2009

"How does an open-minded nonbeliever prove it to himself? Simple. Get out of your head and experience it."

Are you open-minded enough to experience strychnine ingestion? Many serious practioners of a faith based healing tradition feel it's necessary before one is considered a true believer.

zenman · Aug 2, 2009

Woodenpug said:
"How does an open-minded nonbeliever prove it to himself? Simple. Get out of your head and experience it."
Are you open-minded enough to experience strychnine ingestion? Many serious practioners of a faith based healing tradition feel it's necessary before one is considered a true believer.

Nope. I'm not a fan of that group

Woodenpug, BSN · Aug 2, 2009

zenman said:
Nope. I'm not a fan of that group

O.K. point taken or better stated by my favorite philosopher:

"One man's theology is another man's belly laugh"- Robert A. Heinlein

I accept that you believe in disturbed energy fields and appreciate the experience of your posts.:chuckle

LMTtoRN · Sep 5, 2009

I would have to say yes.

I'm a new RN, but have over 30 years experience with alternative therapies. There have been multiple occasions over the last 6 years as a practicing massage therapist that I have worked on a client, "known" that something was wrong, and recommended that they go and see their primary HCP. One man had "back pain" that was not resolving with massage, I knew he needed treatment because something didn't "feel right"... he had a ruptured disk. Another client had a mole that didn't "feel right" and was diagnosed with melanoma after bringing it to the attention of their PCP. Another client had neck surgery because responses from massage treatment didn't "feel right." There are more, but I'll take up too much room here.

Another example: as a last semester student nurse I had a patient recovering from abdominal surgery that was doing very well. He was sent home, but then returned the following week with a fever. The infection was treated, and it seemed he would be sent home again. I "knew" something was wrong, but there was no single thing that could be diagnosed. His fever was down, his BP was stable, his incision was healing well, his appetite was good, his bowels performed normally. I went in his room q30 mins to assess... assess something that would give me data in order to call the doctor. I spoke to my coassigned nurse and my instructor about my feelings, but they didn't see anything wrong either, and didn't have any advice for how I should bring it up to the doctor. The man died less than a week later of internal bleeding, possibly from an anastomosis that opened up. I never heard if an autopsy was done to determine the exact reason of death.

If "disturbed energy field" was an option for me as a student, I would have used it. If it might have been taken seriously, and other diagnostic efforts were made to check this man's abdomen, could he have been saved? We'll never know.

buddiage · Sep 5, 2009

It is hard enough to maintain respect for the nursing profession without something like this to have to overcome. Nursing dx, in my opinion, is like restating the obvious- and for what benefit? I don't have enough to do already?

While I am a spiritual person, and believe there are things that we cannot see (and maybe we do have energy fields), this does not belong in the nursing profession, and I would not know enough about an energy field to diagnose anything about it anyway. I believe in "gut" feelings, but I don't believe that a gut feeling has anything to do with energy fields. If NANDA clings to dealing with energy fields, than maybe NANDA needs to have a small paragraph in nursing texts in the "history" of nursing section, including the date it was neutralized. Come on....we know better now. MHO...

sethmctenn · Sep 7, 2009

Having it listed as a NANDA diagnosis doesn't require anyone to use it. It just gives options to those who do practice energy medicine as part of their holistic nursing practice.

I'm actually a bit conflicted about this issue. In some ways, trying to merge holistic therapies into conventional treatment actually lessens both of them. For instance, in Ayurveda or Traditional Chinese Medicine, one doesn't treat disease, one improves the underlying consitutional imbalance that allows the disease to manifest in a given individual. That is really hard to test. Most of the studies have been on taking one drug, one herb, etc...and test it individually. If you did the same form of research on farming, it would show that farming has no scientific basis.

First, one would study clearing land and no food would grow so therefor clearing land is not a scientifically proven method of growing food

Then, one would study fertilizing and get only weeds so it's not effective

Then, one would study planting seeds (but not clearing the land or fertilizing)

etc...

So, holistic therapies are put into a conventional medicine context where the 5000 year (Ayurvedic) to 3000 year (Chinese Medicine) constiutional medicine basis is lost and then research is done on them.

My own experience with energy medicine has been extremely positive. I'm not sure how to best do research on it. I do believe that quantum physics gives some theoretical underpinning for it. We haven't had much success studying other aspects of quantum physics yet. I'm an open minded sceptic. Until it's proven to me, I don't necessarily give it much credence. Energy based medicines have been proven to me through experience with animals and people. I know that's anecdotal but MOST medicine has come from we tried it without any real evidence, it worked, we studied it to prove that it works. I'm in the minority in that I believe that evidence based medicine rarely is. It's a religion/belief system as much as any other. So much research is horribly biased and the conclusions often don't truly match the research. I put as much trust in the validity of my own clinical experience and choose to believe the patients who tell me these therapies work for them. Is it placebo effect? Why would I care? (I don't believe it is because it works well on many animals but...) If the treatment is absolutely safe and the patient perceives benefit (and uses fewer meds and therefor health care dollars) then I'm for it.

zenman · Sep 7, 2009

From a class I'm taking: "We've seen that the human mind can be defined as an embodied and relational process that regulates the flow of energy and information. The mind emerges as this flow occurs within and among people, and it develops as the genetically programmed maturation of the nervous system is shaped by ongoing experience."

Daniel J. Siegel, M.D.