What is healing touch?

Healing Touch is an energy (biofield) therapy that encompasses a group of non-invasive techniques which utilize the hands to clear, energize and balance the human energy field. The Healing Touch educational program was developed by Janet Mentgen RN, BSN, utilizing a nursing continuing educational format. The American Holistic Nurses Association endorses the Healing Touch program. The North American Nursing Diagnosis Association identifies an Energy Field Disturbance as a disruption in the flow of energy surrounding a person’s being, which results in a disharmony of the body, mind, and/or spirit. Healing Touch is used to restore, energize, and balance an energy field disturbance. Further in depth information can be found at Healing Touch International (HTI)

Photo by Annie Hess

Profile: Nan Arpino

Nan Arpino is a Certified Healing Touch Practitioner who has completed all five levels of training the program offers. Once suffering from Trigeminal Neuralgia, and after receiving Healing Touch treatments herself, she realized first hand the benefits of this unique energy therapy. She began her study in the fall of 2000 and achieved her Healing Touch Certification in spring 2004. Further training has led to Reiki One, Medical Intuitive Seminars , Energetic Healing classes, Quantum-Touch, Therapeutic Touch and the Monroe Institute’s Excursion Workshop. In May of 2005, the Eastern Shore News highlighted her practice in a feature story titled “Healing Touch Therapies - Healing Touch Finds a Niche on the Shore.” The Va. Nursing Students Assoc. invited Nan to lecture about Healing Touch and Energy Therapy in Jan. 2009, for the 57th annual VNSA Convention at the Founder’s Inn and Spa in Va. Beach. It is her belief that pain can be managed and decreased by incorporating a body, mind and spirit approach, which treats the person as a whole. She has been a licensed cosmetologist since 1980 and earned her B.A. in sociology at S.U.N.Y. in 1977. Nan is currently scheduling treatments at The Salon at Eastville by appointment only.