What is Geriatric Massage?
Many people believe that Geriatric massage composes only the use of a lighter touch and soft strokes.Geriatric Massage Therapy is much more than this. Geriatric massage is tailored to the specific health conditions and needs of our ever growing elderly population.
These conditions can have physiological, psychological, and sociological components that aren’t normally a concern in standard massage.
Geriatric patients frequently suffer from Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, dementia, diabetes, cancer, arthritis, heart disease, and a host of other diseases or ailments. Many Geriatric patients may even have injuries or they are in the recovery process from surgeries.
What are the methods used to give a Geriatric Massage session?
A session may involve full body work or may only involve a specific area such as ones hand, arm, head or neck. The client may be fully clothed or draped. In most cases the session may take place in the client's own bed, hospital bed, wheelchair or geri-chair. Based on the clients condition we may use our massage table or the client may be seated in a ergonomically designed massage chair.
Compressions, myofascial, craniosacral and energetic techniques allow massage therapy to be utilized for both the elderly population and those who may be frail or have compromised systems. Most often given in shorter sessions.
A Geriatric massage session usually lasts around 25-45 minutes, as a longer session may be too tiring for an elderly person. It really depends on the individual and this is determined during our initial evaluation.
