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Lauren Muser Cates is an educator and massage therapist based in the Washington, DC area. She is a graduate of the Potomac Massage Training Institute and Metta Institute’s End of Life Care Practitioner Program. Lauren is currently serving as the president of the Society for Oncology Massage and is co-founder of Healwell, a non-profit organization whose mission is to improve quality of life for people living with acute, chronic and terminal illness through hands-on integrative therapies, education and research.
She offers a variety of oncology massage and end of life CE courses as well as a 9-day hospital-based training course at her home hospital in Arlington, VA. Lauren’s passion is preparing massage therapists with the skills and information they need to work safely while also working from a place of true service and heart. She is working to ensure that
greater integration and acceptance of massage therapy in the larger medical field does not result in a sterilization of the therapeutic relationship and a loss of the intangibles of good listening, practitioner presence and good old fashioned love. She believes that all massage therapists should have at least basic training in oncology massage and that awareness around end of life issues has been integral in her own growth and path.
She is a licensed massage therapist in Washington, DC, certified in Virginia, a credentialed member of the medical staff at Virginia Hospital Center in Arlington, VA and an 8-year hospice volunteer.
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