Children’s Program
Children in hospitals or in hospice are especially vulnerable. In addition to dealing with the challenges that every growing child faces, these children must cope with the added burden of a serious illness or trauma; those in hospice deal with the possibility that they may die.
With the help of a government grant in 2002, The Heart Touch Project began training volunteers to provide these special children with compassionate, caring touch on a weekly basis. We created two additional trainings to prepare certified massage therapists to help these children—Massage for Medically Fragile Infants and Children and Infant Massage Instructor Training. These trainings build on our foundational training—Heart Touch Training in Compassionate Touch.
Because most of the training that massage therapists receive centers on an adult population, these two trainings use a developmental care model to explore the physical and psychological issues that are unique to infants and children. The role of family culture and values are also considered, since these too are part of the child’s world.
Once trained, volunteers apply to one of our partner hospitals. Heart Touch is honored to have established partnerships with three premier hospitals in the Los Angeles area that treat children.
• Children’s Hospital Los Angeles
• Mattel Children’s Hospital at UCLA
• Cedars-Sinai Medical Center
Depending on the hospital, a volunteer will see patients in these areas: Neonatal Intensive Care Unit, Pediatric Intensive Care Unit, Pediatrics, Hematology/Oncology, Rehabilitation Services and an Outpatient Pain Clinic.
Those who volunteer with children in hospice are assigned clients with the only organization in Southern California with a hospice team that specializes in services for children who are terminally ill.
• TrinityKids Care
Research has shown that there are measurable benefits that massage and caring touch provides for children. Here are a few.
• Helps control pain
• Aids in managing symptoms
• Improves sleep patterns
• Helps improve breathing
• Reduces anxiety
• Lowers need for some medications
• Can reduce time in hospital
• Provides end of life comfort care
More information on the benefits of massage for a pediatric population can be found in our Resources and Research
listing.As with adult hospice service volunteers, those in the Heart Touch Children’s Program commit themselves to a year of service.
Heart Touch is a pioneer in the training and managing certified massage therapists to work with hospitalized or terminally ill children. It is our vision that massage would be available to every child in a hospital or hospice as a standard patient care benefit.
For the Calendar of upcoming trainings for the Children’s Program, click here.
For Application Forms for the trainings, click here.
