Nursing diagnosis "altered energy field"

Nurses General Nursing

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"Altered energy diagnosis"

Do you support this NANDA diagnosis? Or do you feel that this diagnosis threatens the legitamacy of our profession? Nanda still stands behind it. What are your thoughts?

paphgrl

It can be used, however, to set a direction for studies and let the scientific process to prove it or disprove it.

What else... how about having a double blind study where 1/2 the patients are really perfectly healthy and the other half all have illness that TT claim they can treat (they may have done this already, don't know)?

Well, I digress big time...

It's ok to digress, LOL!

Regarding studies, I don't think they will be very valid until we can measure consciousness.

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Specializes in ER.

For those of you who scoff at alternative modalities and think they have no place in nursing ... do you similarly scoff at all spiritual beliefs? Do you also scoff at people who want to pray? or be visited by a chaplain? or engage in other religious/spiritual practices?

llg

Oh yes! But only in private. People get positively rabid if you tell them Jesus is the Christian version of Zeus, and just as real.

Just watch the flames...:coollook:

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Specializes in Med-Surg, Trauma, Ortho, Neuro, Cardiac.
May I ask a question of all those who cast disdain upon TT? Do you believe in the use of biofeedback? Do you believe it is just one of those alternative treatment modalities, without a scientific bases? Do you believe it does not or does have a place in our current nursing treatments?

Grannynurse

Not everyone has disdain, but are discussing whether or not it should be a nursing diagnosis.

From what I've read, it is something that nurses can do on their own, and thus qualifies as a NG. I'm just on the fence about should it be included. I do challenge some who say it shouldn't because their reasoning doesn't quite ring true with me, as their are other NG's and medical treatments that benefit without scientific proof. But do we want to go there as nurses, or should we leave that to the alt. medicine practioners. I'm on the fence as well.

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Specializes in Transplant, homecare, hospice.
"Altered energy diagnosis"

Do you support this NANDA diagnosis? Or do you feel that this diagnosis threatens the legitamacy of our profession? Nanda still stands behind it. What are your thoughts?

paphgrl

Where's that energizer bunny when you need em!

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May I ask a question of all those who cast disdain upon TT? Do you believe in the use of biofeedback? Do you believe it is just one of those alternative treatment modalities, without a scientific bases? Do you believe it does not or does have a place in our current nursing treatments?

Grannynurse

I do believe that biofeedback has a scientific basis. TT, however involves no physical contact with the pt. I believe alternative treatment modalitys have a place in nursing if they are proven to be effective. The research does not support the validity of TT or the presence of an "energy field".

For this reason, I believe NANDA should omit the diagnosis. If the patient wants to persue TT, that is fine, but I don't believe that TT belongs in the NANDA diagnosis if we are to embrace the concept of evidence based practice.

There are many interesting anticdotes that seem to support TT, but I find no valid research proving its effectiveness.

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To be scientific, "energy field disturbance" is a liter of feces give or take a few ml's.

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Specializes in Nursing Professional Development.
Oh yes! But only in private. People get positively rabid if you tell them Jesus is the Christian version of Zeus, and just as real.

Just watch the flames...:coollook:

No flames from me. I put most of that stuff in the same category. I just try to avoid confrontations by not scoffing, mocking, etc.

llg

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No, because there is an art side to nursing. But when we are dealing with nursing diagnosis, I do think the more scientific backing one has, the better.

Given the current state of TT in terms of scientific understanding, it is at a state of requiring more studies because there are lots of strong anedotal evidence (according to NIH). And as you suggest, develope tools if possible to do the studies. But from a scientific point of view, anedotal evidence (no matter how strong), cannot be used. It can be used, however, to set a direction for studies and let the scientific process to prove it or disprove it.

The thing is with the cases of TT being effective, we have to ask is there another explaination? If so, is this alternative explanation(s) as good as the TT explaination or better? For example, could TT be effective in some cases has nothing to do with manipulation of energy fields? Could it be just the theraputic alliance that is set up between the nurse and the patient instead? There are many interesting things one can do in terms of looking at the effectiveness of TT. One I could think of is to have the practioner do the TT with different distances (according to the nursing diagnosis, you are suppose to do it between 2 to 3 inches). Say we do one with about 1 inch, 2 inches, 3 inches, 4 inches, 5 inches, and 6 inches. Are there any statistical significance differences with the result? Now you do have the potential problem of unconscious bias if the practioner is convinced that 2-3 inches is the "correct" distance. Maybe one can teach new TT practioner, keep everything the same, except the distance, then see if there are any differences. I mean you have to be fairly creative here in coming with something that meet the rigor of scientific research (hard to do, but I think it can be done).

What else, there are so many questions. Would the believe of the patient make a difference in the results. Do it on patients who believe TT 200%; do it on patients who is absolutely sure TT is quackery; do it on patient who has no opinion; do it on patients who are not sure.

What is the claim of TT (I did not look at some of the links references in this thread in detail)? Does it claim it can cure cancer or does it just claim it can alleviate anxiety or certain kind of physical pain? The claims dictates where the research is going.

Assuming there is such a thing as the kind of energy field TT claim (and most Eastern medical/spiritual/marital art system claim), it should be able to develop some kind of equipment to measure it eventually. Once that equipment is in place, now you can ask another question like can a person actually manipulate energy field? We got the machine, let's actually measure whether a TT practioner is affecting the energy field. If it turned out the tT practioner is not affecting the energy field and the patient got better... well, it is something else that is going on.

Let's see... TT claim that lots of our illness is because our energy field is misaligned or out of balance (as lots of other energy medicine claim also)... a question could be what cause those out of balance or misalignment in the first place? Could it be our unhealthy life style? Our fast-pace high stress environment? Polutions? If it is because of these mentioned factor, then balancing the energy field is just treating the symptoms just like TT in the nursing diagnosis charge against Western medicine. The root causes are these factors.

What else... how about having a double blind study where 1/2 the patients are really perfectly healthy and the other half all have illness that TT claim they can treat (they may have done this already, don't know)?

Well, I digress big time...

I had TT performed on me, by a certified practitioner. And I did not believe in it. As a matter of fact, I had attended several workshops given by the originators of TT, back in the 70s and found it difficult to accept. I can describe the feeling of warmth I felt in the area in which the practitioner focused her TT. And I did have a minor lessening of my pain. Do I now believe in TT? I really do not know because I've never had the experience again. But I do support more studies, including double blind ones. And the developing of more tools to attempt to measure the altered energy fields. And until that time, it remains an art, something that has not yet been scientifically proven.

Grannynurse:balloons:

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I consider myself pretty smart, especially to see that Western medicine has many limitations. Apparently many others do as more out of pocket dollars and visits are made to "alternative" practitioners than primary care physicians.

There are studies from the 50's (a vet no less) showing the effectiveness of acupuncture. There have also been recent MRI studies. You must realize that you won't see these studies published in the mainstream medical journals...although JAMA did publish a few a few years ago. (The JAMA TT study was so flawed that it became an embarrassment to JAMA). Even a skeptical society wrote that if you wanted to debunk something at least do it right!

I've taught many Zen Shiatsu students (in an acupuncture school) to feel energy in just a few minutes. Once you can do this you realize that it is there...just like the wind or electricity, even though you can't see it. It's interesting that many of the students were engineers from the computer industry. They had no trouble with the concept of energy.

It really helps to be up on what's happening before you debate it...unless you just want to throw out an opinion.

My nuts and bolts comment was directed at those who feel that everything must be proven scientifically. In the past few years more and more tools have been developed to measure things previously unmeasurable.

Grannynurse:balloons:

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I do believe that biofeedback has a scientific basis. TT, however involves no physical contact with the pt. I believe alternative treatment modalitys have a place in nursing if they are proven to be effective. The research does not support the validity of TT or the presence of an "energy field".

For this reason, I believe NANDA should omit the diagnosis. If the patient wants to persue TT, that is fine, but I don't believe that TT belongs in the NANDA diagnosis if we are to embrace the concept of evidence based practice.

There are many interesting anticdotes that seem to support TT, but I find no valid research proving its effectiveness.

Actually the only scientific base for biofeedback is the measurement of the patient's blood pressure, pulse and respirations. A dropping of these signs is believe to validate the patient entering an altered therapeutic state.

Grannynurse

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Specializes in Urgent Care.

But I really believe in the evidence based practice standards, and there is nothing more than anecdotal evidence to support this stuff (even if there is ALOT of anecdotal evedence)

no one has yet published a REPRODUCABLE, PEER REVIEWED study, if anyone knows of some lets see it and we can review and critique the study

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But I really believe in the evidence based practice standards, and there is nothing more than anecdotal evidence to support this stuff (even if there is ALOT of anecdotal evedence)

no one has yet published a REPRODUCABLE, PEER REVIEWED study, if anyone knows of some lets see it and we can review and critique the study

Actually what would be really interesting to do is to have people who are very familiar with TT picked say 3 best highest quality studies. Then we can all review it in detail together. And people who are really against it do the same thing. So we have 6 studies (or maybe we can do 2 each, less work). Good exercise for everyone (students to experienced nurses) and for some of us a good review of what is good science and what is good evidence based practice. This assume we all can get a hold of the studies without shelling out mega bucks of course.

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