Access Bars

Domain XII · Complementary, energy & biofield · Gary Douglas, Dain Heer · 1990 · Santa Barbara

What it is

Access Bars is a single-session touch procedure, not a staged therapy. The framework below separates what the organisation publishes from how a psychotherapist could place it within their practice.

Format

• Access Bars is a single-session touch procedure, not a staged therapy. The framework below separates what the organisation publishes from how a psychotherapist could place it within their practice.
• Session format. The client lies down on a massage table, clothed, with shoes removed. The practitioner sits or stands at the head and touches points with light, sustained fingertip contact. Each hold lasts a while, and the practitioner chooses which points to touch by what they "perceive". There is…

Who practises it, and how they are trained or regulated

• Training route. Practitioner: a one-day class (about 8 hours in one published listing). Participants receive two sessions, give two, take home a manual and head chart, and leave as a "Certified Access Bars Practitioner". No prerequisites are listed.
• Facilitator (teaching the class): attend three Access Bars classes, each with a different facilitator, then apply online to Access Consciousness. Further requirements, annual licence renewal and fees are reported but not confirmed here.
• Certification is issued by Access Consciousness itself. It is not a regulated health qualification and does not extend a psychotherapist's scope of practice.

Evidence status, as the guide reports it

• Evidence status (one line). There are no randomised controlled trials. The studies the organisation promotes are preliminary or uncontrolled: an EEG study, thermometry, and a 2023 survey of 15 people whose authors note the lack of solid evidence. Critics find no robust benefit beyond that of a…

Questions to explore with your client

• What drew you to it, and what are you hoping it will change?
• Is there physical contact? Was it explained beforehand, and do you feel free to say no or stop at any point?
• Does it involve intense or unusual breathing? Have you been told about the medical conditions for which that is not advised?
• Is it a group, retreat or community? How do they respond if someone wants to leave or raises a concern?
• Does it use a device, heat, cold, water or a physical procedure? Has a medical professional checked that it is safe for you?
• Who runs it, and what training or registration do they hold?
• What actually happens in a session or meeting, and how often?
• What does it cost, and is there pressure to commit to more?
• How do you feel afterwards, in the hours and days that follow?
• Does it fit with, or clash with, the work we do here?

What practitioners of it watch for

• Watch for escalating spending, invitations into training pathways, or pressure from the group.
• Watch for a client who feels they have "missed out". Explore what they hoped the touch would give them.
• Look for recurring distress across sessions. That means the procedure is not suitable for this client now.
• Gaps in records. Failure to document encounters was one of the findings against a registered social worker.
• Watch for the client crediting Bars for all change and dismissing their own skills, and for growing reliance on sessions.

When to involve someone else

• New or worsening physical symptoms, or advice to stop or change prescribed medication: involve the client's doctor or prescriber.
• Signs of coercion, isolation from family and friends, escalating costs or secrecy: discuss openly and consider safeguarding.
• A crisis or thoughts of suicide: follow your crisis protocol. In the US, call or text 988; in the UK and Ireland, Samaritans on 116 123.

Drawn automatically from the guide's own sections. Stay curious: neither endorse nor dismiss what the client values, and check anything that matters against the full guide and its sources. Not medical advice.