Frequently Asked Questions
Massage is an extremely personal experience and it is important that Amy is the right therapist for you. An initial consultation will only be booked via a telephone call (after you have left a message on Amy’s answering service or filled out the contact form on the contact page). This gives you the opportunity to discuss the right options so you know what to expect when you attend the clinic.
This first consultation is approximately one hour. Your medical history will be taken, yourself and Amy will get to know each other a little and a treatment plan will be discussed before any treatment occurs. Any left over time will be allocated to actual treatment.
There is no regulation for massage in Australia, so anyone can call themselves a massage ‘therapist’ - BUT - it’s really important to see someone qualified so as not to do harm (especially with delicate procedures like oncology massage). Also, Amy has been a qualified practitioner since 2001, and had her own clinic since 2004 - and is in high demand. She is far from just any massage therapist and you’ll see why after you finish your first session.
Most of the time Amy is literally ‘hands-on’ with a patient and will not interrupt a treatment to answer the phone. Leave a message, or fill out the contact form on the contact page and she will be back to you very shortly.
This depends on why you are having treatment? If it is aligned with your cancer treatment, then it will depend on how many sessions you have for that. If it is for scar massage, then everyone responds differently and we will need to monitor your progress carefully. Massage, as amazing as it is, is not a miracle cure, so we’ll need regular sessions to get results.
If it’s for lymphoedema, then it could be a number of weekly sessions before we get to a maintenance stage, in which case you might need to continue long term with treatment every 4-8 weeks.
Again this depends on why you are having treatment. If it is for anxiety associated with current chemo/radiation, come in prior to your chemo/radiation session. If it is for nausea, come in post-chemotherapy so we can reduce symptoms before they get too bad. If it is for pain – dependent on how bad your pain is – twice a week, weekly or fortnightly. If it is for maintenance, monthly to 6 weeks is great.
Everybody responds differently to treatment and there is no set number of treatments someone will need.
As we were seeing many immunosuppressed patients prior to COVID, our standards were extremely high anyway, so only minimal changes have had to be made. Hospital grade disinfectant wipes are used throughout the clinic, hand sanitiser and wash basins are in every room, every client has fresh clean linen at every appointment and as we only see one patient at a time there is no cross over in the clinic. We have added the use of masks as we are unable to maintain social distancing whilst working and we suggest you bring your own water bottle to your appointment.
You can read more on our dedicated COVID page HERE
