It is often asked whether reiki can help physical issues, as well as be a source of calm for both the nervous system and emotions. I usually tell my clients that their first port of call for a physical issue is a physical therapist, and I stand by this. If you have a sore shoulder or an illness, you should see a physiotherapist or a doctor. And reiki should never be a substitute for conventional therapy.

I also am sceptical about people self-diagnosing their problems as being an energy blockage. Louise Hay was famous for convincing a huge number of people that physical issues were related to chakras or other energy fields, for example, that a block in the throat chakra could mean you have trouble expressing yourself. But a closer look at her teachings and through interviews, it was found that she just made it all up. And because it mostly makes sense to people, it’s been spread as a common truth.

But I think if you have a sore throat, it’s not because of your throat chakra. It’s because you’re sick. And while I don’t rule out the possibility that illness is related to the body’s energies or our mental health (and stress levels), I continue to emphasise that reiki is generally better for stress and anxiety, or other mental health issues rather than physical issues.

Still, there seems to be some interesting research coming out that says energy healing (and reiki) can help physical conditions. I worked for years in the HIV sector, so I know the value (and complexities) of getting evidence. I always knew that a controlled trial for reiki would be difficult because you’d have to find a large enough group of people with exactly the same condition, and then test them against a placebo group. But researchers do seem to be doing this.

A study from the University of Utah evaluated the specific efficacy of Reiki and mindfulness for adults with chronic knee osteoarthritis (KOA) pain compared to sham and waitlist control conditions. In this placebo-controlled randomized trial, 164 adults with physician-confirmed KOA were assigned to one of four groups: Reiki, sham Reiki (i.e., Feiki), mindfulness meditation, or a waitlist control. Active treatments were delivered in four weekly 30-minute sessions. What they found was that both Reiki and mindfulness may offer effective, well-tolerated, and time-efficient alternatives for managing KOA-related pain, with meaningful symptom improvement after just two hours of intervention. Check out the study here. It is certainly a legitimate study that has yielded some interesting results.

A client also just alerted me to a study on another form of energy healing, the Bengston Energy Healing Method, which sounds like it has some similarities to reiki, as applied to pancreatic cancer cells both in the lab and in rats! Here’s a general description of the results of the study. They had three healers apply the method to both the cells and the rats, and with a rigorous scientific study (check it out here, the language is far above my detailed comprehension but I get the overall the gist of it all), they found that the healing exerted antitumor activity against pancreatic cancer cells and Pancreatic Cancer Patient-Derived Organoids in culture and that BT treatment alters mitochondria ultrastructure and has the potential to reduce metastasis of pancreatic cancer cells.

While this doesn’t say that energy healing could cure cancer, it may help in some way. I’m impressed with these studies!

Discover the gifts and benefits of a session of Japanese reiki therapy, healing energy from an experienced practitioner. Visit my website or Facebook page for more information and SMS, email, call me or book online if you’d like to make an appointment. Since 2011, I’ve given over 3,800 reiki treatments.

Clients come to relieve stress, anxiety and for many other issues, or to just give reiki a try to see what it does for them. Folks come from all over Sydney and elsewhere to see me. There’s easy (meter) parking in the area, and I’m easy to get to by public transport too.