About Bowen Therapy

What is Bowen Therapy?

It is a hands-on bodywork technique. It is both simple to receive and as a therapist, to apply. It’s renowned for its profound effectiveness. 

Developed through the 1950’s to early 1980’s by Thomas Ambrose Bowen in Australia. Bowen therapy is still fairly new to the world. Whether you’re a practitioner or a newcomer to healthcare Bowen therapy provides many simple tools that are shown to work for chronic pain, inflammation and misalignment.  It is unique not because of how it is performed but for how well it works. Best of all, it is easily learned.

Thomas A Bowen

Thomas A Bowen 1918-1982

Bowen’s remarkable story is too long to convey on this page. That said we cannot move forward without stating something about his life and his discovery. A self taught healer, he stated that the method was a gift. He was supported throughout his work by Rene Horwood and he himself gave a lot to the community such as a free children’s clinic. He was rejected as a registered health provider by the Victoria government and this despite his seeing many hundreds of patients per week who traveled from all across Australia.

Tom welcomed other interested practitioners to observe and learn his developing methodologies. Several of these have been instrumental in teaching and promoting the work and have done Tom proud as he always wished the therapy be available for all.

What Does a Bowen Treatment Entail?

Treatments are usually done through clothing and in any comfortable position for the client most often in a lying position on treatment table.  It can be applied quickly and efficiently or used for long and deeply moving physical shifts that can include emotional effects too.  Bowen Therapy is safe to use on anyone – from the newborn to the elderly.

“It’s the best and most relaxing massage I’ve ever had”.

Dianne S of Victoria BC

What Can Bowen Therapy Treat?

Simple Steps to a New Career

Becoming a Certified Bowen Therapist is not everyone’s goal or reason for learning Bowen Therapy through Bowen Online. The certificate steps outlined below are optional and are not a required goal of the lessons.

Students and subscribers come from many different backgrounds and practices, even different careers. As befitting Tom Bowen’s legacy all are welcome to take part in the training and many people have taken only a needed part of the training offered in order to care for either family, friends and animals too.

Become a Certified Bowen Therapist CBT™

Granted by Bowen Canada upon the successful completion of:

1. Modules 1-6 live class
2. Modules 1-4 online via the Bowen Annual Subscriber
3. 120 hours Anatomy & Physiology
4. 100 clinical/practice hours
5. The Bowen Therapist Certification Exam

Detailed Steps to becoming a Certified Bowen Therapist (CBT™)

With prices

1. Live Classes where an instructor presents the information, demonstrates and the students practice and are critiqued and given advice on how to best perform the procedure. Modules 1-8 taken live in addition to the online classes are required for certification. The classes are open to all people from all backgrounds and there are no requirements for starting to learn immediately. In fact, you will be able to utilize all the lessons immediately.
   • • Of 8 modules classes are scheduled to teach 4 of the 8 modules over a 4 day period (such as Fri-Mon). The price for each 4 days is currently $1499, so to do all 8 modules it is 2 times that. = $2,998 USD
     • There is a period between each set of modules and it caries according to the needs of the entire class. Commonly, that’s 3- 6 months or more.
2. Online Video Lessons offer a convenient way to learn many Bowen Therapy procedures, covering a substantial portion of the curriculum typically found in Modules 1-8. These classes provide repeated access to taped instruction and demonstrations, allowing for flexible learning at different skill levels. While not a complete substitute for in-person training, certification requires completing Modules 1-8 in live classes and registering for the ‘Bowen Annual’ subscription of Bowen Online. 
   • • There is on offer a free 3 months subscription to the online lessons when you register for a live class, otherwise:
     • The cost is $30 USD per month.
     • The cost is $299 per annum, if you wish to be certified. After 2 years, should it be required the Annual subscription becomes lifetime access.
3. Anatomy & Physiology lessons that amount to approximately 120 hours of study are required to be completed or have shown to be completed at a time prior to studying Bowen Therapy. These can be completed at any stage of your studies.
   • • here are many options of Anatomy and Physiology course both online and in many local colleges where ongoing education programmes are offered.
     • Searching online you will find a lot of choice. Here is one that is free from Carnegie Mellon, for example: https://oli.cmu.edu/courses/anatomy-physiology-i-ii-v2-academic/
4. Clinical Hours are considered to be 100 hours of practice, where one hour is equivalent to one treatment given.  This is self reported using provided client tracking forms.
   • • You will need to keep track of your practice hours (Clinic hours) Forms are provided and one hour is considered as a single treatment given. So the requirement is essentially 100 hours. Or, think of giving 3 treatments to 33 people. It is a task and does take effort.
5. Certification Exam is taken at any point the student is ready, Please note the exam can be repeated should the student fail. This is usually provided by a separate instructor and some are available to do this online. Fees vary. It is an important step to certification and is designed to be a learning process as well as an assessment. Mostly it is to ensure that important points about Bowen Therapy are properly understood by the candidate. 
   1. • Once a student is ready, they make arrangement to have a 2 hour zoom call where the assessing instructor asks questions relating to client management and asks you to provide a Bowen therapy session on someone you have arranged to work on.
      • Each instructor charges a different amount. A common figure is $300 USD.