The International Society for the Study of Subtle Energy and Energy Medicine (link is external) has been continuously active in the field of energy medicine for almost two decades. This organization continues to play a formative role in developing the field of subtle energies and energy medicine through the publication of their journal Bridges and the peer-reviewed journal Subtle Energies and Energy Medicine.
ISSSEEM’s mission grew out of the work of research partners Dr. Elmer Green and Alyce Green, and their co-workers at the Menninger Foundation then located in Topeka, Kansas and involving research into psychophysiological self-regulation. In 1969, scientific colleagues of the Greens joined together to found the Biofeedback Research Society, which later became the Biofeedback Society of America (BSA). In 1988, the BSA reidentified itself as the Association for Applied Psychophysiology and Biofeedback (AAPB), an organization that today describes itself as a “society for mind-body interactions in research, healthcare and education.”
In contrast to the mind-body approaches that were based on more behavioral and biomedical research into psychophysiological interactions, ISSEEEM represented an evolution in thinking and scientific inquiry to include a body-mind-spirit perspective. Today it is home to both researchers interested in exploring energy medicine in the context of transcendent and unitive experiences, both scientifically and personal, that also helps to advance the frontiers of the science of human consciousness. They define energy medicine as the diagnostic and therapeutic application of “energetic and information interactions resulting from self-regulation” or brought about by interactions between mind and body. In this context, energy is given an expanded definition beyond the familiar acoustic and electromagnetic energy fields that are known to impact human biology and psychology. In addition the term “subtle energies” was introduced to describe not-yet-measurable energies that seemed to affect both physiologic and physical mechanisms, perhaps through a system of subtle channels, layers or sheaths that interpenetrate the dense physical body. These subtle energy systems have been described for centuries in non-Western healing systems.
ISSEEEM promoted the idea that subtle energies and energy medicine are synergistic components in a new scientific field that had its roots in Eastern medical systems and the subtle anatomy described in Western esoteric traditions. As an educational society, ISSSEEM promotes the dissemination of theoretical perspective and experimental research from biomedical, physical and behavioral sciences. The annual conference of the society draws an international audience and is now held in Westminster, Colorado near Denver. There are now 18 volumes of ISSSEEM’s journal in publication and it is hoped it will soon be available for online searches through the Index Medicus database at the U.S. National Library of Medicine.
Besides this journal dedicated specifically to energy medicine and subtle energy research, the Mary Ann Liebert publication, Journal of Alternative and Complementary Medicine (link is external), has been publishing 15 volumes to date in this complementary medicine field. From time to time valuable research articles in energy medicine have appeared here. The Volume 10, No. 1 issue in February 2004 was specifically dedicated to the field of energy medicine and is an excellent journal worth having in any energy medicine library.
