WTF! NHST wasting money on reiki

[IfIShouldFallFromGraceWithGod]

www.jobs.nhs.uk/xi/vacancy/?vac_ref=915664952&fbclid=IwAR2aiGphck3SIarwSkxn4THBxpCFTFG7OAqOlXk435huO2zG7JLcQg2LlqE

It's a 0.2 post so costs the NHS £5K. If that helps people with terminal illness then it's money very well spent.

As a doctor, I agree with you. I don't think the NHS should spend public money on stuff that has no evidence base. In my area, cancer charities arrange pamper sessions for patients with cancer. I don't doubt that time spent relaxing and having one-to-one attention is worthwhile, but if there's no evidence it works or is cost-effective, then my view is that public money shouldn't be spent on it. People should either self-fund, or charities can offer it if their donors, trustees and service users feel it's worthwhile.

The BMJ has published several articles on reiki in palliative care, and is largely supportive of its benefit.

But clearly you know better God.

When the NHS is struggling to fund essential operations and drugs and equipment, not to mention the state some hospitals are in, I certainly don’t think money should be spent on woo.

NoBaggyPants
Thank you for recognising my superior knowledge

It's not necessarily about actual 'treatment' though, is it, it's about making someone who is in the most difficult part of an illness feel more relaxed, better etc. Cancer treatment is brutal and anything holistic that can help with that is surely worth spending money on?

When I had chemo a couple of years ago, there was a Reiki lady who came into the unit and did treatments either in the chair or in a private room. At no point was she ripping out IV drips and insisting that the reiki would do the job instead

I don't think the government should be funding non-evidence based therapies when evidence based treatments of clinical need are being cut. I don't doubt it may provide comfort, but so do many placebos.

To me, the NHS funding something gives legitimacy to it. I don't see why reiki should be any more funded than homeopathy or healing crystals.

There are many ways to offer relaxation and emotional support without funding spiritual stuff.

If a 'woo' treatment has a placebo effect (proven to work) that saves spending a shit ton on pain meds for that patient then it's money well spent surely?

I'm sure the NHS isn't thinking about replacing chemo with acupressure.

The fact that reiki lowers heart and respiration rates (indicating relaxation) is fairly well researched and published. I and many of my peers studied it's effect on animals.

I was surprised to see the job ad, but I definitely don't object to it.

As would any form of relaxation
They don't have to employ a master

Placebo effect if you think something is a treatment being delivered by a master will be much greater than a relaxation class.

Besides the cost of a 'reiki master' one day a week won't be any more than someone to give relaxation classes for the same time. The salary's not exactly mega bucks!

Not only that but if the NHS starts funding reiki knowing it has a placebo effect but saying 'it's good for relaxation', there is the danger that average Joe has an issue, sees a reiki master offering their services, knows it can be done on the NHS so it must be reputable as a treatment and no different to having a private physio vs NHS physio and is swindled out of his money by a charlatan who claims they can open energy flows.

Why not just fund a relaxation practitioner who may use a range of relaxation techniques, given the end goal is to relax patients?

Why does everyone think it's placebo effect?!

Who are we to say there isn't some higher energy that science can't "prove" YET?! Scientific understanding changes constantly. Why oh why people are arrogant enough to think we know everything is beyond me.

In that case it should be subjected to clinical trials

LoveB
In the absence of medical and scientific evidence, it's woowoo.
I don't want our healthcare system offering treatments on the grounds of 'some people said they felt happier but we don't know, science might offer evidence later' as people get denied clinically needed treatments.

I believe in the power of prayer. I bloody hope the NHS doesn't start hiring evangelists or prayer therapists over properly qualified allied health professionals

My friend is a "reiki master". She tried to insist I accept some reiki on my finger to heal It, rather than the "modern medicine" I was using - as she called it. I was in fact using a splint, ie a stick tied to my finger. Hardly the most modern invention! It needed 8 weeks to heal the tendon I had snapped. I would have done a lot of damage if I thought the reiki would work better and then removed the splint...

By the way reiki was only invented about 100 years ago so I think is a lot more modern than splint usage!

I think there are a lot of problems with "scientific research" being funded by pharmaceutical companies.

Perhaps I'm just cynical.

Isn't it basically someone hovering their hands on your while you pretend to feel more relaxed?

For some reason nearly every counsellor in my town also does reiki, and many also go whole-heartedly into crystals, gong healing and other pointless crap. Bloody hippies everywhere.

There's a healthy amount of criticality when looking at medical research and then there is suggesting we should accept any woowoo spiritual nonsense because at some point in the future someone might decide it's possible to align your chakras.

Shall we start having homeopathy on prescription as well?

It’s appalling that the nhs fund this shite. A surgery near me (town of many hippies) used to prescribe homeopathy ffs!

*lola

Yep!

Love you want the nhs to pay for people to have water and sugar pills? Seriously?

auntie no, that's not what I said!

LoveB
You've got to be on the wind up

Nobody rational would suggest that the NHS should fund water with magical memory properties that cures all sorts of ailments.