Personal Information:
Name: Mr. J
Occupation: Mental Health Nurse
Age: 36
Contact details: To be produced if requested
Reason for attendance: Mr. J suffers from stress due to the recent change in his working hours. He was my neighbour and when I approached him looking for a client for doing my case studies for aromatherapy he thought I might be able to help him in his problem.
Support and family: He was married and has 3 children.
Client consent: The entire treatment was done with his permission and no doctor was consulted as his problem was minor.
Follow up to next pages for the rest
Client Profile:
Mr. J was a mental health nurse. He was 36 with three children, and a very happy family. He was of an average built and medically fit otherwise, other than the stress related problem that he started facing recently due to a change in his working shifts which negatively affected his sleeping patterns. Being a happy person he tried to carry on with his daily activities but the change in sleep cycle made it almost impossible for him to sleep at night as a result of which he started experiencing signs of day time fatigue. Being a mental health nurse himself he didn’t take much time to realise that his problem was mild insomnia due to work related stress. The discomfort had not started to cause any problem in his family, yet but he was aware of the fact that n his attempt to create a balance in life by doing his day time activities and hiding his fatigue he was actually creating more stress to himself which could worsen his condition.
Medical History:
Mr. J was a healthy individual with no major physical or mental problems in the past. His recent problem was stress related insomnia, which had just started showing its signs and was mild too. He was taking a multivitamin supplement once a day with dinner. He had never undergone any kind of surgery.
Emotional Health:
Mr. J was my neighbour and was known to me for quite some time. He was a friendly individual and was quite popular among his friends and family.
His dedication to work was beyond question which sometimes led to excess work being put on is shoulders. He never had problem with dealing with his tasks but the recent change in his shifts haphazardly affected his sleep cycle and his body started showing signs of stress.
Life Style:
Exercise: Occasional jogging but not regular.
Diet: Healthy overall, junk foods very rarely.
Bowel habits: Regular.
Smoking: Non smoker.
Social life: Was popular among his friends and family.
Alcohol consumption: Socially, not regular.
Recreational drugs: None.
Daily routines: Worked full time as a mental health nurse. Entire week’s schedule depended upon his working hours. Weekends were usually off. Sleep times used to be quite regular in the past until recently. His social life was mainly scheduled at the weekends.
Current presenting problems:
His recent problem was insomnia due to work related stress. This led to signs of day time fatigue which he tried to hide to himself. He had no other problems either mental or physical that he was aware of.
Contraindications/precautions:
Existing medical conditions: None.
Skin sensitivity: None.
Dermatitis: None.
Allergies: None.
Asthma: None.
No serious medical condition was present; neither was he taking any prescription or recreational drug, which could have a contraindication with the aromatherapy therapy treatment to be done.
Treatment Plan:
Client’s problem was an initial stage of stress related insomnia. He was otherwise a healthy individual with no special medical needs.
Type of treatment and massage sequence:
We both agreed to the fact that the main aim of the treatment was to bring about relaxation of the overall system and an effective relief from insomnia. A full body massage was planned once a week (on Sundays) for five weeks. Massage sequence would be back-back of the legs-front of the legs-feet-hands and arms-chest-and neck and shoulders. Massage movements would be slow to bring a relaxing effect. The slow effleurage would promote relaxation and draw blood to the area which would further enhance absorption of the oils and also flow of lymphatic fluids. All other lymph drainage movements would also be emphasised.
Record of Essential and Career oils:
Essential and career oils:
True Lavender (Lavandula Angustifolia)
Roman Chamomile (Anthemis Nobilis)
Bergamot (Citrus Bergamia)
Grape seed oil was to be used as career oil.
Rationale for choice:
True lavender (Lavandula Angustifolia) has calming and sedative properties that give effective relief from insomnia and stress related complaints.
Roman Chamomile (Anthemis Nobilis) is restorative, calmative, sedative, relaxant and soothing and is useful in treatment of insomnia and stress related complaints.
Bergamot (Citrus Bergamia) is reviving, refreshing, calmative, soothing, and uplifting and is useful in treatments of stress related conditions.
All three of the above blend quite well and would produce a calming, relaxing and soothing effect which would help the client in his stress related mild insomnia.
Grape seed oil is available only in pure form and could be used safely as the client didn’t have any condition that would contraindicate its use.
(Clarke, 2009)
(Lawless, 2002)
(Price, 1998)
Dilution and measurements:
The synergistic blend:
3 drops of Lavender
2 drops of Roman Chamomile
1 drop of Bergamot
Career oil:
50ml grape seed oil
Planning Information:
The treatment would be five full body massage sessions once every week on Sundays when the client would be free at home.
Additional intake of vitamin C @ 500mg per day was advised as this vitamin is a powerful anti-oxidant and hence has anti stress properties. Also being a water soluble vitamin it is hard to overdose, especially as intake of plenty of water was also advised to help cleansing of the body from toxins.
He was also advised to maintain a sleep time and to follow it as accurately as possible. Using an electric diffuser with lavender oil in bed room at night was also advised.
Client agreed to the treatment and was happy to follow it. Information was collected from his body language and by asking him about the changes he felt all the way through the treatment.
No change was made in the treatment pattern as it seemed to work as expected. However towards the end of the treatment he was advised to use deep relaxing breathing technique to help him further relax before sleep.
Evaluation:
Ten minutes was kept separate before every session to discuss with the client the effects of the treatment both beneficial and detrimental. From the data collected there seemed to be absolutely no side effects of the treatment. The client reported to feel a lot calmer and relaxed after the second week of treatment. Client was using a lavender scented candle in his bedroom as an electric diffuser was expensive. The lavender scent also helped him to have deeper sleep at night.
His sleep cycle started getting stabilised from week two onwards and by the end of week four he felt perfectly normal. He had never reported any sign of side effect at all. He particularly informed that the massages were more effective when done towards the late evenings which were feasible because he was my neighbour. Over all the treatment was quite effective in relaxing him and proper sleep at night made his day time fatigue disappear. Since he was not taking any other medication it could be inferred that the whole treatment process was a successful one.
Analysis:
From all the data collected by regularly asking Mr. J and also by carefully observing his nonverbal communications I concluded my treatment was successful. This was definitely the first person I had ever treated without the assistance of my teacher and hence the success in it made me more confident for future treatments. I was nervous during the first week though I tried to hide it at first but later decided to discuss it with him and that helped both of us as he said he had extreme confidence in me as a friend and therapist. This surprisingly brought up my own confidence level and I went on through all the successive treatments with ease.
I was a bit sceptical initially about the selection of the essential oils but further study made me realise that the oils I used were actually quite safe and had the least side effects.
I also learned techniques of studying all the possible oils and their blends when I was looking for the blend for him. This would help me in all my future cases.
However, my choice of essential oils and their blend was quite well and showed notable benefits in a short time. The client showed visible signs of improvements at the end of the treatment and this taught me the blend was indeed effective in treating stress related insomnia in an otherwise medically fit person.
