Job Descriptions - Definitions - Career Fields: Aromatherapist
 

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Aromatherapist

You will need to be very physically fit, alert, excellent with communication and able to get along with diverse types of people, patient, compassionate and intelligent. As massage is part of the therapy, you should possess strong hands and not tire too easily. A basic knowledge of anatomy is essential. Aromatherapy might just have been invented when a Frenchman, Gattefosse, working in his laboratory early this century, burned his hand during an experiment. He yelled, plunged the wounded hand into a dish which contained lavender oil and was subsequently amazed at the speed with which it healed. He was the first person to coin the phrase `aromatherapy' in the first book on the subject in 1928. In 1938, another Frenchman, M. Goddissart from Los Angeles, reported excellent results in the treatment of skin cancer, gangrene and wound healing with essential oils. The last known person to complete this chain of development of this remarkable form of medicine was Mme Maury, a biochemist who extended the subject to cosmetology and rejuvenation. The essences extracted from plants are complex natural oils that contain esters, alcohol, aldehydes, ketones and terpenes. No-one really knows how or why they work but that is not so surprising - the common aspirin is a good example of something that works but which was used extensively before physicians and chemists really understood its properties. The contraceptive pill, derived from Mexican yams, is probably the best known and most widely used of these natural plant extracts in the West. In plants, essential oils act as pesticides, fungicides and bactericides and may even have some hormone-like properties. Aromatic oils are used in toiletries, foods and pharmaceuticals. Lemon and orange are the most popular ones used in food, toiletries and cosmetics while clove oil, for toothache and eucalyptus inhalations are familiar to any mother. The oils are found as components of hair oils, tonics, inhalants and many other patent medicines. (It takes 2,000 lbs of rose petals to make 1lb of rose oil!) When Tutenkhamun's tomb was opened in 1922, many scent pots were found which showed that frankincense and myrrh were widely used by the rich of the time. Oil of melissa and rosemary, for example, are sedative or stimulating depending upon the dose. In 1963, a Japanese team found that fennel, peppermint, cardamon and other oils had an antispasmodic activity in the intestine of mice. Calamus reduces blood pressure and some oils given orally help improve the peripheral circulation. The plant sarsaparilla contains the male sex hormone testosterone; hops, fennel and aniseed contain oestrogens and vitex agnus castus contains progesterone-like substances. There are various ways of applying aromatic oils. Some are used orally, some are massaged into the skin, some are inhaled and some therapists use a combination of all these methods. People on the whole have become very tired and suspicious of expensive medicines which often ruin their bank balances and do nothing spectacular to their health problems and they are looking for a more economical method of being treated or of treating themselves. Much of what is considered to be healing starts in the mind of a patient and medical miracles are often brought about by a change of attitude.

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Beauty and Hairdressing
Medical

 
 

Courtesy: CareerExpo

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