The objectives of the conference are to: (1 Present recent clinical and mechanistic studies on massage and related manual therapies to practitioners, researchers and educators;(2 Encourage the translation of manual therapy research into more efficacious clinical practice and clinical training, and the translation of clinical observations and concerns into new avenues of research, and (3 Facilitate collaboration and intellectual exchange between and among manual therapists and CIM researchers, to develop productive partnerships and identify fertile areas of further research. These objectives will be achieved through keynote addresses, panel discussions, experiential workshops, poster sessions, research presentations, and structured opportunities for networking. The Highlighting conference will convene three audiences: manual therapists, educators, and CIM researchers from a diverse range of manual therapy backgrounds. The conference will engage CIM researchers in discussions of their research findings with practitioners, educators and fellow researchers, and it will inform the research community about current techniques, concerns, and observations of clinicians. The conference will also increase the research literacy of manual therapists and educators and enhance the capacity of attendees to translate research findings into clinical decision-making. The conference will help make accessible the latest research on manual therapies, which tends to be scattered and difficult to marshal. In an environment of increasing use of massage as a complementary medical treatment, this conference will host structured discussions on the contributions that manual therapy can make to the public health.
The conference proposed in this application will contribute to the public health by deepening the research literacy and translational competency of manual therapists, leading to more evidence-based treatment. This conference will also help catalyze a more clinically relevant body of CIM research and, by convening researchers from highly diverse backgrounds, will reduce duplicative research efforts and increase the overall evidence base of manual therapy. Finally, this conference will host discussions directly focused on the public health potential of massage and related manual therapies, which are among the most widely consumed forms of complementary and alternative medicine in the world.
