Who I Am.
My name is Tammy Anderson, RN, BScN, MN (ongoing) co-education chair of CTNIG of the RNAO.
I bring 14 years of experience at the Hospital for Sick Children working with acutely ill children and their families in the areas of chest and paediatric medicine. I worked briefly in CCU. I am currently working part-time as a clinical teacher at Humber College, which is an exciting new opportunity for me. In the future I would like to be a Nurse Practitioner specialized in Paediatrics' and Therapeutic Touch (or the closest title to that). I am currently working on my Masters of Nursing and Family Nurse Practitioner course at D’Youville College.
I have an interest in counseling and bereavement that has grown through the years as well. I have frequently been the nurse that walks in the room and hugs the family. I have cried with them and listened. I am a mother of three children. My son is nine years old and I have two daughters, one is six and the other is eighteen months old. I treasure my children’s health and respect how lucky I am to have healthy children. I am in awe at the strength and the love I see in the families that I have worked with at Sick Children’s Hospital. Some of the obstacles I have seen families over come. I have known many little miracles.
I feel joy to have the tool of Therapeutic Touch to comfort children and families. While receiving Therapeutic Touch, a child can close there eyes and escape the hospital for a while: perhaps to Disneyland, perhaps to the beach. I can be the nurse that doesn’t give any ‘owies’ and that can be a wonderful feeling.
I am a Therapeutic Touch Practitioner and have been practicing Therapeutic Touch on sick children and/ or parents at the Hospital for Sick Children from about 1996. I have been a member of the Therapeutic Touch interest group at HSC from 1996. Darka Neill and I are co-writers of the Therapeutic Touch policy at HSC. I organized and assisted with classes and offered Therapeutic Touch to staff on occasion. I have given various presentations to the nurse managers committee and nursing practice, and gone throughout the hospitals to do Therapeutic Touch requests through the years. I have seen Therapeutic Touch facilitate children going to sleep and pain scales going down on a consistent basis. I am a co-education chair on the board of the Complementary Therapies Interest Group of RNAO. Feel free to contact me about any educational issues around Complementary Therapies. I would greatly be interested in members input of what is helpful to them.
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