Ericka Clinton [00:00:00]:
Good day, everyone. Welcome to another episode of collaborative connections, a space for sharing and learning sponsored by the Society For Oncology Massage and the Society For Oncology Aesthetics. My name is Ericka Clinton, and I will be your host for this episode. And on today’s podcast, we have Xerlan Deery. Xerlan Deeryis a licensed and board certified massage therapist, educator, and health care consultant with over 35 years of experience. Throughout her career, Xerlan Deery has held various roles, including working in hospitals as a massage therapist, as an instructor of an s 4OM, foundational oncology massage therapy course, a continuing education provider, a hospital based massage consultant, and a founder and owner of a massage school and a multidisciplinary practice. Zirlin’s commitment to the profession is evident in her involvement in numerous organizations such as s four zero m, the American Massage Therapy Association, and the National Certification Board for therapeutic massage and bodywork. Her contributions to the field of massage therapy have been recognized through various awards, including the Healing Hands Awards from the Y Me Breast Cancer Network of Strength and the AMTA National Mentor of the Year award.

Ericka Clinton [00:01:37]:
Xerlan Deery currently works at Main Line Health Cancer Center of Paoli Hospital and Tower Health, McGlynn Cancer Institute, Phoenixville Hospital. Both are non for profit health care assistance. Okay. I need to take a break now. But welcome, Xerlan . And thank you so much for joining us today. It’s truly a pleasure to have you. Well, we should be honored.

Ericka Clinton [00:02:06]:
That is, like, a serious, serious resume and so many things. I’m like, how does she have time to do all of this stuff?

Xerlan Deery [00:02:16]:
We didn’t have any social media back then. Mhmm.

Ericka Clinton [00:02:20]:
So you had to just work. Right?

Xerlan Deery [00:02:24]:
Yeah. Yeah. It’s just do the thing. It was mostly most of the connecting was actually on the phone. So Wow. Yeah. Or in person.

Ericka Clinton [00:02:35]:
And you did a lot by making those connections. Let’s let’s start and give our audience a little bit of information about you. How did you get the opportunity or manifest the opportunity to work in a hospital?

Xerlan Deery [00:02:49]:
Well, I’m not sure I manifested it, but I when I was in the size school in, like, 87, 88 in San Diego, I was the problem child. I was the one when they would say things like, you can’t massage someone that’s pregnant, but they need it. I had been pregnant. I wanted to massage. You can’t massage cancer patient that spreads cancer. I would be the one that would remember to say, okay. How does this work? Because we get the biology part, and I don’t understand the stats. And so my teacher, doctor Barry Green, he was also a clinical, psychologist.

Xerlan Deery [00:03:24]:
And so he had some really good evidence based skills and logic and such a brainiac. And he would say, you might be the one that figures this out. You might be one of the people that finally figures this out. I’m not gonna dissuade you. Just be careful. Okay. So maybe I did kinda manifest it, but I don’t I don’t know. I really got lucky because when we moved from San Diego back to Oklahoma, Tulsa, Oklahoma where I’m from, this ad was in the paper.

Xerlan Deery [00:03:52]:
And it was from Hill Harris Medical Center, and they were hiring a massage therapist for the women’s center. And it was a full time job.

Ericka Clinton [00:04:00]:
Wow.

Xerlan Deery [00:04:00]:
Wow. Okay. I’ll go apply. Now at the time, the city the state of Oklahoma had no licensing. Tulsa had no lice had little licensing. It was a massage technician license, and you could get a license if somebody else who had the license signed a piece of paper that said they apprenticed you for 250 hours, and you had 250 names of people you worked on and turned it in. Woah. Or you could just take the anatomy class over at the community college where you dissect the cat.

Xerlan Deery [00:04:34]:
That was it. And so bopping in there with 650 hours, it’s kind of intimidating. Oh, I went to school. Silly me. But I kinda I kinda knew even in 88 that it was going that direction, that licenses were happening in states, and, you know, 500, 600 hours and more were were actually happening. So I did have that thought and to get a real good education. And, you know, don’t cut the corners. Get in there and just do it.

Xerlan Deery [00:05:08]:
Do it. Do it. And it made a difference. And so when I applied, I was maybe one of the few people that applied that had actually been to school, and that probably helped a lot.

Ericka Clinton [00:05:21]:
I bet since Mhmm. Literally, you just, you know, work next to somebody for 250 hours.

Xerlan Deery [00:05:29]:
Yeah.

Ericka Clinton [00:05:31]:
But, thankfully times have changed. So first hospital based position in the nineties or eighties.

Xerlan Deery [00:05:42]:
I actually I was at the women’s center, but that would be that was in 89. And by 1990, I actually had another position over with the, behavioral services in hospital, and I was working with the they called it the transitions unit. It was geriatric psych, and it was basically the place where older people would be for assessment because sometimes they didn’t know what was going on. Did they have dementia? Did they have Alzheimer’s? Did they have stroke? What happened? So I actually got to work with my very first cancer patient in a hospital with the physician’s order in 1990.

Ericka Clinton [00:06:23]:
That’s amazing. That’s amazing. And

Xerlan Deery [00:06:26]:
what’s even more amazing is that patient went out to the West Coast to a certain hospital to have a, bone marrow transplant and met Gail McDonald and brought me her card. And so Oh, wow. We became phone buddies.

Ericka Clinton [00:06:46]:
Small world. Right?

Xerlan Deery [00:06:48]:
Yeah.

Ericka Clinton [00:06:48]:
Really, really small world when you do what we do. That’s amazing. That’s absolutely amazing. So talk to us about hospitalized patients. How do they benefit from massage there?

Xerlan Deery [00:07:01]:
Well, you know, I have to tell the doctors about this. And the first time I ever had to speak to doctors, you talk about imposter syndrome, because I apologize for being a massage therapist and presenting their CME. But I offered that I would be quiet and that they could just eat their chicken dinner in peace if one of them would come up to the podium, speak in the microphone, and just name one disorder, one disease, one pathology that they treat that is not negatively acerated by stress. They can’t.

Ericka Clinton [00:07:37]:
Mhmm.

Xerlan Deery [00:07:38]:
So every single person would benefit. And, you know, it’s going to vary with the patients. And so sometimes people get very confused if they hear me say something like I’m working with people, after radiation, and they, oh, you can’t do that. Well, I’m not working where they’re radiated. You know? Or I’m I’m working with someone with post op pain. How do you do that? Well, I’m kinda just distracting them by working on their beats sometimes. You know? It’s it’s it’s very different than I think people realize, and you really have to be ready to listen to the person and see what they need, see what they want. Make sure you’ve got that informed consent going on.

Xerlan Deery [00:08:31]:
Because in some ways, the hospital is a little bit more serious, dangerous, you know, dicey. Mhmm.

Ericka Clinton [00:08:44]:
Right. Yeah. But I I think we walk in that room and in some ways recognize that there’s a person, not a disease.

Xerlan Deery [00:08:53]:
Mhmm.

Ericka Clinton [00:08:54]:
Yeah. Right. And they appreciate that so much. I had a I had a patient would say, you walk in the room and you don’t want anything from me.

Xerlan Deery [00:09:03]:
Right.

Ericka Clinton [00:09:04]:
You don’t want any blood. You don’t want to know how much pain I’m in. You just want me to feel better in some way.

Xerlan Deery [00:09:12]:
Mhmm. And we one of the hospitals I work with, every all the tags, name tags, have a thing to say be seen. We wanna make sure everybody is seen.

Ericka Clinton [00:09:23]:
Yes.

Xerlan Deery [00:09:24]:
And there’s even rules, and you may see that now at hospitals. Used to be people will be walking up and down the halls, and little lights would be on and things would be going off. Now we don’t do that. Even I can answer a call or a light because it might be something as simple as they need a drink of water. Mhmm. Or can someone hand them their glasses because they’re in there by themselves, And that really helps with the the nurses, so they’re not scurrying over there thinking, oh, I gotta take care of this person, and then it’s just a glass of water.

Ericka Clinton [00:09:58]:
Yeah. Yeah. That’s that’s that’s wonderful.

Xerlan Deery [00:10:02]:
And I think I think medicine is becoming much more human in that respect and in in not just including us but having those type of attitudes and encouraging

Ericka Clinton [00:10:17]:
them. Yes. Making sure people are seen is really important.

Xerlan Deery [00:10:21]:
Mhmm.

Ericka Clinton [00:10:21]:
So what so let’s flip that question around. How do massage therapist benefit from working in a hospital?

Xerlan Deery [00:10:30]:
Lifelong learning. Constantly challenged. Yeah. Yeah. And and, honestly, I mean, I just feel like it it’s such a honor to be able to serve in that respect. And then I don’t know if it’s different. It may be different in a for profit hospital or a nonprofit hospital, but the diversity is very different than maybe just a private practice or another place that people get massage. I’ve got to do massage with translators because there are people that don’t speak the same language, and that’s really interesting.

Xerlan Deery [00:11:15]:
But, also, you know, depending on where you’re at, if you’re if you’re an employee and you have benefits and the stability and, you know, the schedule, that’s one thing. But if you’re contract, you may be a little more money, but you also may have a lot more flexibility. Mhmm. And so, you know, it kinda depends. And I think a lot of hospital based programs do start with contract because it’s a safe start. It’s a much bigger deal to try to create an actual part time or full time job within the hospital with HR.

Ericka Clinton [00:11:54]:
Yes. Definitely. Mhmm. So so let’s identify the skill set. What is the type of training and skills a massage therapist would need to work in a hospital?

Xerlan Deery [00:12:05]:
All of them. Every single one of them. You are right next to people that have, like, master’s degrees. And if you utter that you just took you know, you got your, quote certification online in 2 days, you know, they’re just gonna roll their eyes. Okay? So you’re just lifelong learning. And, honestly, you don’t know what’s gonna happen because it’s never just one thing. So for instance, in in the cancer center one of the cancer centers I work at, you know, cancer has specialties within specialties. So cancer and oncology is a specialty.

Xerlan Deery [00:12:44]:
But then we have senior oncology, and then we have the LGBTQ plus inclusive care oncology, and some may have pediatrics. But you may walk in there and it may be somebody that has this cancer, and it may be very simple and may may be getting preventative chemotherapy. But they had a knee replaced 8 weeks ago, and they’re still really sore, and there’s a little swelling there. Can you work with that?

Ericka Clinton [00:13:15]:
Right. I always say, like, you you work at a hospital, you’re MacGyver, the MacGyver massage. Just like anything. Anything’s coming through the door. You have no idea what it could be, and you just are prepared for any opportunity to work, basically.

Xerlan Deery [00:13:35]:
Yeah. And even even if they you have access to, like, the EMR and everything, and you have the whole story, they may tell you something else completely different or completely different that nobody else knows because you’re the massage therapist, so now they can talk to you about this and this and this. Mhmm.

Ericka Clinton [00:13:56]:
Yep. So that that path, that river of information that sometimes is very clear or very muddy. Right? Yeah. So if a massage therapist wanted to build a hospital based program, there’s nothing in their, you know, community hospital. How would they go about doing that?

Xerlan Deery [00:14:21]:
I would say, first, there’s gotta be willingness. Willingness to be able to do a lot of things, but also recognize where you’re at. Because wherever you’re at and wherever you’re practicing, I don’t think a lot of people realize that they’re already on a health care team. They have people coming to them that are medically involved. They’re on a health care team. They may not know the other people on the team. They may not have even discussed that. They may understand that this person probably has an oncologist and dah dah dah dah dah.

Xerlan Deery [00:14:57]:
But just that thought of, wait. I’m on a health care team. I need to recognize and appreciate and respect all these other people that are working with them. Mhmm. But I also might wanna give them 3 cards. Say, would you please make certain you tell your oncologist that you got a massage from me this week? You know, if you have a nurse navigator, would you please let them know that I’m out here and I’m serving you? If they’ve got any questions or anything, I’d be more than happy to answer them. And it’s things like that that are not pushy that really make a difference, especially if that person, they keep seeing the same card. Mhmm.

Ericka Clinton [00:15:45]:
Right. So they start to be familiar with you. They realize that the the patients that are coming to you have really good outcomes and benefit from your work. Mhmm. And then I think sometimes you get these magical invitations. Right. Come and, you know, do massages for nurses’ week or speak at a health fair or something, and all of a sudden you’re kind of recognized as part of that system.

Xerlan Deery [00:16:15]:
Mhmm.

Ericka Clinton [00:16:15]:
And then as I always like to tell people, and then somebody will probably find some money to pay you.

Xerlan Deery [00:16:21]:
Yes. And, you know, while health care may seem very challenged, and a lot of times people are like, oh, we don’t have any money for that, Sometimes they do, and they have different committees and different funds that they may be able to utilize that with. But, also, one of the things that a lot of people don’t pay attention to and I tell people, no matter where you work, you’re working for yourself. Because some of the biggest mistakes is people get this wonderful opportunity, and they’re handed a hospital based program, and they’ve got a whole in integrated team, and they’re all having tea, but they’re not marketing. They’re not reaching out. They’re not trying to make themselves available and working as hard as they would if they were in their own place trying to make the rest, so to speak. And so we do need to pay attention to that. We also one of the things that every hospital based program may be looking at is return on investment.

Xerlan Deery [00:17:22]:
How much are they investing? What is their return? And while that return might be invisible and not really have a dollar sign in front of It it’s gotta have a lot of value. And as we see things shifting with massage therapists in hospitals and VAs and different insurance companies saying, oh, yeah. We’re gonna maybe cover this, and more people getting opportunities to work in hospitals and rehab centers. I noticed a lot of massage therapists are becoming, an ANDA, such as a physical therapy assistant and a massage therapist. That’s another new person that’s gonna be on the health care team with you too. And they’re gonna start looking at these things and need to validate what is that return on investment. How much are people going to pay for the massage? How much are they going to value the massage? And and it’s gonna be different because, well, massage therapists out in the world may want to go, yeah. We need to see you for an hour or try to get an hour and a half or add this or add that and when you’re in the hospital, it’s like you’re minimizing because there’s so much going on with these people.

Xerlan Deery [00:18:42]:
They can’t take that full hour, sometimes not even the full 30 minutes. And it’s also not just go lighter because that ends up boring like a human petting zoo. And so there’s a lot of skill, a nuance that’s going on as we make adjustments with these techniques that we’re doing, standard massage techniques.

Ericka Clinton [00:19:08]:
No. And I like what you said about the kind of understanding because at the end of the day, unfortunately or fortunately, a hospital is a business. Right? And so they have to understand the value you bring to the hospital. They know the value their surgeons bring. They know their value their nurses bring. Even the radiology techs, they know the value they bring. They don’t know the value of their massage therapist necessarily.

Xerlan Deery [00:19:34]:
Until they start hearing it from their patients.

Ericka Clinton [00:19:38]:
Exactly. And that’s really the feedback that’s gonna be helpful. Mhmm. I also found when I was able to have the conversation about risk with a lot of information and confidence about how low risk massage is. Right? And dispelling all those myths, which it’s amazing to still talk to medical professionals. They massage spreads cancer.

Xerlan Deery [00:20:05]:
Like, oh my god.

Ericka Clinton [00:20:07]:
But there’s still some of those folks out there. So being able, I think, to have that conversation and understand, you know, the risk the hospital will take by employing you, which is very little, and being confident enough to say there’s data to look at. There are studies to review. There’s new information, right, that says that we are much more beneficial than we are risky. I would say it’s also important. Now is besides those 2 questions, would you say developing a hospital based massage program is fairly straightforward? Think about design of your sessions and how how many people you could work on, which is never enough in hospital setting. Right?

Xerlan Deery [00:20:57]:
It’s,

Ericka Clinton [00:20:57]:
like, thousands of people in the hospital. You’re one person or maybe a team of 5 people. And even if everybody gets 15 minutes, you’re missing something. Right? So

Xerlan Deery [00:21:07]:
Well, but sometimes you don’t realize how much you can do in 15 minutes. Sure. And because like I said, a lot of them really can’t take the longer session or a session that’s more confrontive to the body. And so, you know, it it goes both ways in that respect. But being able to be really specific, understanding understanding that informed consent means that I’m gonna be completely vaccinated, and they’re gonna feel safe in the hospital because they’re gonna know that I had to go through this this huge scotlet. Oh. And, you know, we even have tighters where they’ll do the blood and tighters to say, oh, no. You need this.

Xerlan Deery [00:21:58]:
This vaccine needs to be boosted now. And yeah. Because we’re trying to keep them safe, and we’re trying to also use that informed consent to let them know what exactly we’re doing and how we can help, and that we can help them sleep. We can help them with the fatigue, which fatigue needs a different name in the hospital because it’s really a lot more than fatigue Yeah. And neuropathy and the pain management. And when the physicians and the nurses start hearing back from the people about that being successful, you know, when somebody goes to the trouble of, we didn’t get the massage therapist’s name because we didn’t think of it in the moment, but mom had the best sleep she’s had in months. What was her name? Where is she? How do we find her? How do we get her back? You know? It’s things like that that can be tipping points for people.

Ericka Clinton [00:23:00]:
Yeah. Yeah. That impact can be huge even in the smallest framework of time in a hospital based situation. So let’s talk about kind of you as a practitioner in a hospital system.

Xerlan Deery [00:23:19]:
Okay.

Ericka Clinton [00:23:19]:
What are what are some of the challenges that you face working in a hospital?

Xerlan Deery [00:23:27]:
Well, sometimes finding a place to work because it it’s it’s easy if they say, oh, you’re in the infusion center. But then if you need to work with someone that’s in radiation and you need to kind of work with your colleagues to figure out which exam room you can use. Or are you in the waiting room, or did you just modify a whole storage closet? It it can happen. Right? And, yeah, I was really lucky because the first two hospitals I worked at, they did full hospital orientation for me. But a lot of people don’t get that. So they don’t know how to use make the beds go up and down. They don’t know how to use the chairs. They don’t know how to get out of the way of all the lines and plumbing and electronics and stuff.

Xerlan Deery [00:24:16]:
And I think that’s really unfortunate in in some ways. And so that can be a huge challenge for people. And then when you have a room, sometimes somebody else designed it. And somebody else who really loved the massage and loved their massage therapist designed it, and it’s too small, or you’re sharing it with an aromatherapist, and there’s no window, and there’s no airflow happening, or the table is like, where did they get this? There yep. I’ve got really frail people coming in here, and I don’t have a step stool. And it’s not a hydraulic. You know? And so, honestly, this is the it’s things like this and some of our experiences, expert witnesses that play to that when people are thinking of having a hospital based program. And starting an s you know, being challenging us is like, yeah.

Xerlan Deery [00:25:20]:
It’s a challenge because a lot of these people don’t know what they want. They want that word. They want the star. They want we have this. They actually don’t know what they want. And that’s where the consultants really can help with hospitals and help them, you know, create a very good space, safe space, and help them actually create a program that is not just safe, but very effective for their people and for their community. And I think it does make a big difference in their community. Their community knows that there’s massage therapists there.

Xerlan Deery [00:25:58]:
There’s somebody there that’s gonna hold space for them and see them and take time for them and and do something that has nothing to do with having to do medical stuff in that moment.

Ericka Clinton [00:26:15]:
Right. And that’s so interesting as a as a as a as a hospital consultant. Right? You come in and really help them make the best hospital based massage program they can. Right? And you provide them with the information about space and allocation and scheduling and probably everything that they need so that they can integrate that massage therapist effectively. Because, yeah, sometimes you’re literally like, well, I’ll just go behind this door.

Xerlan Deery [00:26:50]:
Mhmm.

Ericka Clinton [00:26:51]:
And you work with this person in the smallest space possible because I have a little bit of privacy and enough room to lift my arm.

Xerlan Deery [00:27:03]:
Yeah. Yeah. Did you feel the earthquake the other day?

Ericka Clinton [00:27:08]:
I did not. I was actually in Washington DC at the ABMP conference. So I’m at the Martin Luther King Memorial and all of a sudden my phone starts going off and it’s like, there was an earthquake in New York and I’m like, what? Are you kidding me?

Xerlan Deery [00:27:26]:
Oh, I I was I was joking with a friend because I was actually at the hospital working, and I said I didn’t feel it one bit. I guess I really was holding that space good. And neither did they when I talked to them a couple days later, and they were like, no. I didn’t No.

Ericka Clinton [00:27:44]:
Didn’t feel a thing.

Xerlan Deery [00:27:45]:
Didn’t feel a thing.

Ericka Clinton [00:27:45]:
Didn’t feel a thing. Mind you, the folks at my school called me, and they were like, that building’s swaying. We’re evacuating. I was like, oh dear god. But yeah, fun times on the east coast. The moment I leave New York.

Xerlan Deery [00:28:03]:
Yeah.

Ericka Clinton [00:28:06]:
But well well, thank you so much, Geralyn. I this is this has been a really great talk. I’m so glad we got to pick your brain about this very particular topic, which you know a lot of and have a lot of experience in. And we at escrow and love you dearly and are so thankful that you are an educator, regional champion, and support our group as much as possible. And I love that you’re still doing this work after 35 years.

Xerlan Deery [00:28:41]:
I love it. I it’s it’s kinda like my semi retirement has become more than I thought of it. You know? When you love doing what you’re doing, it’s not work anymore. It really isn’t. Even even when I have to get up and I’m reading research at 6:30 in the morning. You know? It’s still okay.

Ericka Clinton [00:29:05]:
It’s great. Yeah. And that’s an amazing way to start the day after you have coffee.

Xerlan Deery [00:29:11]:
You know, the thing is there are 1,000 and thousands of massage therapists out there that are ready to make a difference in people’s lives and willing to make a difference in people’s lives. And I so wish that oncology massage was just part of every single school and that they had that just from the onset. Because, honestly, when they graduate and they go work somewhere, someone’s gonna expect them to be able to do it. Yep.

Ericka Clinton [00:29:40]:
Yeah. So we’ve gotta really get that as part of the discussion and part of the curriculum in schools. They take pathology, so let’s just have an oncology module so that they can be safe.

Xerlan Deery [00:29:54]:
Mhmm. And we have a lot of people in involved in the Society For Oncology Massage and involved in hospitals and the Society For Oncology Massage they’re ready and willing to be mentors. They’re ready and willing to teach. And so it’s gonna

Ericka Clinton [00:30:14]:
grow. Yes. With all of our hard work and sweat and tears, we’ll get there. We’ll get there. But thank you again so much for taking the time. Really, really enjoyed speaking with you. And you very much. Thank you, honey.

Ericka Clinton [00:30:30]:
Alright, collaborators. Have a great day, and I hope you enjoy today’s podcast.

Xerlan Deery [00:30:36]:
Thank you. Bye bye.