"can I Practise Professionally With Your Training?"

There is a whole industry built around voluntary regulation of holistic and beauty therapies and the important point is that regulation is voluntary and there are many routes to take for the therapist. You can choose which course you take, which insurance policy you buy, and which professional body you choose to join if any. You do not have to join a professional body in order to purchase insurance and it is useful to think of these two issues as being entirely separate. Join a professional body whose values you share and who will support you in your practice, and find a competitively priced insurance policy from the best provider! What is a professional body? A professional body is set up by therapists themselves in order to support members in practising and teaching their therapies. It will have its own ethical stance, membership rules and member offers to help you build your own business. If it accredits courses, it will do so in accordance with the rules of the insurance industry. This means that tutors who want to accredit their courses with the professional body will need a teaching qualification, knowledge and experience of the therapy and insurance as a teacher. Each professional body sets its own rules and standards. Some of the professional bodies have created a structure which conforms to the requirements of the CNHC which was set up as an umbrella body to police complementary and holistic therapy work with some official encouragement. Students and therapists are often confused about who the CNHC are and what authority they have to regulate their training and work. It is an umbrella organisation set up in order to police the complementary therapy sector on a voluntary basis and so far its main impact has been to stop therapists from advertising the benefits of their treatments unless they can produce 'scientific evidence' which the CNHC accepts as valid. Many holistic therapists have received disciplinary letters and had to change their websites and advertising in order to remain within the CNHC. Did they need to do this or stop practising their complementary therapies, as some of the therapists involved believed? The Professional Standards Authority (a quango created to promote safety in the health and social care sector) recognises the CNHC as an 'accredited voluntary register' and membership of the CNHC is normally via one of the professional bodies it has agreed to work with. CNHC membership opens up opportunities to work as a volunteer in the NHS and in some other organisations. They have no statutory powers and do not have the same status as the Law Society or the Institute of Chartered Accountants as there is no compulsory regulation of complementary therapies in the UK. Some people would like to see compulsory regulation and many of them are influential in the professional bodies, which means that some of them have rules which holistic therapists need to adhere to even though the law does not require them to do so in order to practise. The situation in the UK is liberal and allows therapists to choose when, where and how they will train - our accredited holistic and beauty therapy courses are run by independent schools and tutors. Therapy schools, trade suppliers and individual tutors are free to produce original courses in a format which suits their students - we offer blended online and practical courses, one and two day courses and longer training as well. We are insured as teachers and as experienced therapists. Most important of all, the courses are accepted by our insurers as being of a high standard for them to give cover so that the students who do the course can go out and offer their services to the public. It is in the interests of the insurers to demand good practice and teaching as they face financial risk if a therapist acts inappropriately and their client makes a successful claim against them.

The public is protected in the UK by the therapist's insurance, which is how they will gain compensation if they are in any way injured as a result of their treatment. The insurance providers have rules which therapists, schools, tutors and professional bodies need to abide by and they are careful to make sure that therapists do not expose themselves and their insurers to the risk of claims for poor practice. This is the really effective level of regulation which the therapy client can rely on to protect them. It means that standards are high because if they are not the therapist (or school) will lose their cover. This is very serious as once you have lost cover with one provider, no one else will want to touch you! All therapists are required to keep records and to observe health and safety standards by the insurance industry. This means that our students will always carry out a full consultation, keep client records confidential and get medical approval where necessary before carrying out treatments. They will patch test where appropriate and use adequate sanitisation and sterilisation measures. All our accredited courses will train therapists to keep to these industry standards, which are constantly under review. Therapists will always go through the relevant topics on any initial training course or CPD day in their chosen area of work and they sometimes say this can be a chore! It is repetitive at times, but the message is important and repetition and reinforcement lead to high industry standards and confidence on the part of insurers.