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Shiatsu Society
News
Autumn 2007 Page 14
In 2004, Dominique, a trained Physiotherapist,was working as part of a Palliative Care team inthe hospital service of Saintes in South-West France. During this time, he was also in his final  year of Shiatsu training. This extract of his study into the effectiveness of Shiatsu in helpingcancer patients overcome side-effects of chemotherapy was carried out as part of hisfinal year assessment.Thanks to the open-mindedness of the doctorsin his department, he was given the opportunity,very rare in France, of treating existing hospital  patients with Shiatsu. Patients were referred by the doctors of the Department of Oncology,who also supervised the study. The patientsreceived the Shiatsu free of charge, and thetreatments were carried out as part of thenormal routine of the Department.
Chris Atkinson
My starting point for this study was an articleby Dr. Koster-Vidal which included thefollowing:
“I discovered the existence of Shiatsuthrough one of my patients undergoingchemotherapy for breast cancer. I was surprised by her general state of health, theabsence of side effects and the speed of recuperation after her chemotherapy  sessions (only one day of tiredness). She said “ In fact, Doctor, I don’t know if I ought to tell you, but before and after my chemotherapy, I am having Shiatsutreatments”. Since then, I have had theoppoprtunity to observe the effects of thisdiscipline on other patients.”
This prompted me to think about bringingtogether my study of Shiatsu and my ownprofessional practice in caring for cancerpatients.Could Shiatsu be a useful aid in diminishing theside-effects of chemotherapy? And if so, howcould the outcome be evaluated?The study was carried out from September2004 to May 2005 with 16 patients in the careof the Oncology Department of the Hospital ofSaintes in Southwest France. None of thepatients knew Shiatsu and each patient hadalready received 3 chemotherapy treatments. Allof them had experienced post-chemotherapyside effects, of which the most frequent were :•physical fatigue•nausea•hair loss•psychological fatigue•vomiting•problems with the mouth•constipation•skin problems and sensations of tingling.It was during consultations with certain patientsconcerning their experience of side-effects thatthe Oncologist proposed a series of Shiatsutreatments, as an additional part of theirtreatment in hospital.The first appointment took the form of ageneral explanation of Shiatsu, an outline ofwhat would happen during the session, andwhat possible effects could be expected. Thepatient was given a written summary of themethod, specifying that the Shiatsu sessionswere intended as a complement to the existingmedical treatment and in no way areplacement. In addition, the patient was askedto sign a Form of Consent.Before each Shiatsu treatment, the patient wasasked to evaluate their experience of side-effects after chemotherapy. For each specificsymptom, the following criteria were noted:•The onset of the symptom, its duration andintensity, and any other relevant comments.•The intensity of the discomfort was notedon a scale of 1 to 10 (0 = no discomfort ;10 = maximum discomfort).The Shiatsu sessions took place as soon aspossible following the chemotherapy, as thisgave the best opportunity for the collection ofstatistics. Individual case notes were taken anda synthesis of symptoms was established foreach patient.In treatment, two Meridians were frequentlyfound to be significant: Liver and Stomach; the
The Role of Shiatsu in theTreatment of the Side-Effects
by Dominique Chevalier
translated by
Chris Atkinson MRSS
 
Shiatsu Society
News
Autumn 2007 Page 15
The averagerate of improvement for the combined  side-effects of all the patients was64%.
” “ 
of Chemotherapy 
Liver having a clear association with the storage,distribution and elimination of the toxinsinherent in the chemotherapy, and Stomachrelating to the preoccupation with nausea andvomiting experienced by the patients. Eachsession began with a systematic treatment ofthese two meridians, in order to address themost distressing aspects of the chemotherapy.This table below shows the rate of improvementfor each side-effect.Generally speaking, almost all the side-effectswere diminished, some more than others,ranging from 40% to 83% reduction. Theaverage rate of improvement for the combinedside-effects of all the patients was 64%. Themost significant improvements occurred withthe very common side-effect of vomiting andnausea. In one case, a patient who, beforeShiatsu, had been vomiting up to 10 times aday for the whole week following thechemotherapy, vomited 3 times only on the dayafter the chemotherapy, after the first Shiatsutreatment.Another significant improvement was in mouthproblems: patients were quickly able to resumenormal eating because of this improvement,and therefore more quickly recovered fromphysical fatigue.On the other hand, the side-effect leastimproved was that of hair loss. However,Shiatsu enabled the patients to find the wearingof the refrigerated cap more acceptable, on anemotional level. The distress caused by loss ofhair and its relation to the question of self-acceptance, evolved positively with time.Second least improved was psychologicalfatigue. It is difficult to measure the extent ofthis effect, since there are many factorsinvolved, even when the general effects ofShiatsu were appreciated by the patients. Both
Side-effect Average intensitywithout ShiatsuAverage intensitywith Shiatsu% gain
Hair loss7,66,120,0Nausea72,268,6Vomiting6,91,282,6Physical fatigue8,42,866,7Psychological fatigue8,24,742,7Skin problems4,61,371,7Tingling sensations4,81,079,2Headache3,01,066,7Shivering6,01,083,3Diarrhoea4,02,928,8Constipation6,21,871,0Mouth problems6,51,478,5Liver pain6,00,0100,0Fever8,52,768,8Muscular/articular pain4,02,245,0Odour of the chem.10,03,367,0Coughing8,05,333,8Ringing in the ears8,00,0100,0Sensation of drunkenness9,01,880,0
total6,52,364,4
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