icuabbie

If there is any way to get Hospice involved they will be a tremendous help with the palliative care and contacting the Dr's. I worked in hospice for a while and we saw pt's in nursing homes and assisted living. I don't know if this patient would qualify for hospice benefits but it's worth looking in to. Unfortunately most Dr.s are not trained in palliative care and they don't always know what is best for the patient. Does she have an oncologist following her? They are usually intune with the palliative meds. Ativan is a great choice for agitation and restlessness. Many people get very restless when they are in the dying process. There comes a time when the nurses will need to advocate for just keeping her comfortable. Sometimes it takes a lot of drugs and if you havn't dealt with this you might feel like your over doing it. Contact Hospice. Most hospices will even make time to come to your facility and give an inservice to the staff. Good luck. She is fortunate to have someone who cares.

It really is an awesome process. Interactive varies from guided imagery in that is an interactive process between the guide and the client or patient. Once the client is in a relaxed state the guide facilitates the inner experience or work that the client needs help with. There are a lot of clinical applications of IAGI, such as; relaxation and stress reduction reducing anxiety pain and symptom relief preparation for labor and delivery preparation for sugery and procedures potentiating the action of medication and treatments minimizing side effects dealing with chronic illness empowering the patient tolerating difficult procedures accessing inner wisdom and guidance accessing insights and information concerning a particular problem or situation active participation in the healing process addressing emotional expression or release exploration/understanding of parts and aspects of the self finding meaning in illness or crisis and enhancing coping skills Most nurses have the qualities to be a great guide. The process is always client oriented, generated and directed. Here's an short example: 1. Discuss the presenting situation or problem. Ask permission to explore this in imagery to aid in understanding. 2. Facilitate a relaxed, inner focused state. 3. Ask for an image to come to mind for ___(the pain/problem) 4. Ask the person to observe and describe the image in detail. What does it look like? What is the color, shape, size? 5. Ask the client what qualities or characteristics the image seems to embody or convey. The image may have certaiin feelings. 6. Find out what feelings or emotions arise for the person as they are exploring this image. 7. Faciliate a dialogue/open communication between the person and the image. Encourage expression of feelings between the two. The person may want to ask questions or find out more about the image. Perhaps why is this image here? What does it want or need? What does it have to share or say? If it's an image of pain or symptom, what does it need to be relieved or alleviated? In order to facilitate the communication, you can suggest "Give it a voice and let it respond." or "let it respond in a way you can understand. 8. Working with whatever time frame you have, let the person know that the imagery will need to be brought to a close soon. Keep in mind the resolution may not happen in one session and that this is an exploratory technique to learn and understand more about what may be going on for this person at this time. Provide closure and come back to a waking, alert state. There are many specific techniques for specific goals. It is really sacred work when you can help someone get in touch with their subconcious and help them gain insight. Here's a quote from the class. "Each patient carries his own doctor inside of him. They come to us not knowing that truth. We are at our best when we give the doctor who resides within each patient a chance to go to work." ---Albert Schweitzer--- Abbie

Nice to see more responses on this. I have to leave for work in about 30 minutes so I'll post more on IAGI tomorrow. It's different from guided imagery and a great tool. Bye

I'm 44 and I've been nursing for 15 years. I work in the ICU and starting to look at other possible areas to go into. Tried the home health/hospice also, the paperwork is ridiculous. These are the areas that I'm considering: Cancer Center (would need to get certified as a chemo nurse), cardiac rehab in the hospital, education dept. in the hospital. I'm certified in Interactive Guided Imagery and My ideal job would be to market myself to do group and indivdual sessions for cancer pts, rehabing alcoholics and addicts, people preparing for surgery, people wanting to lose weight, stop smoking or just stress management. There are alot of options out there. Some larger companies hire or contract with nurses to do employee health. Drug companies and medical equipment companies hire nurses and train them about their products, but usually you have to travel. I'm fortunate to work in a unit where there are alot of RNs that like night shifts, because I hate them too. Hope this helps.

Are there any nurses out there that are using guided imagery or interactive guided imagery with patients? I'm certified in Interactive Guided Imagery(sm) through the Holistic Nurses Association. If you are out there I'd be interested to hear from you.