Touch in the counselling relationship: an exploratory study.

There is a continuum of views on the extent to which touch enhances the treatment process of patients. Health professionals must deal with the use of touch in some way, even if their final decision is not to use it. Health professionals were interviewed about personal touch as a part of their professional relationships with patients. Even though the subjects using touch differed in health professions and primary theoretical orientations, a commonality was the belief in a strong person-to-person relationship as an integral part of the helping process. Instruction concerning touch appears to be inconsistent in the curricula of health-professional schools. Thus sensitivity to the use of touch is more likely to develop through professional experience. Touch is more likely to be used in a fee-for-service, private practice setting. The part of the body most likely to be touched is a hand, and possible sexual misinterpretation of touch is best dealt with openly and at once.