One of the easiest assists to give is the Locational Assist. A Locational Assist is done by directing a person’s attention off the painful area of his body or his difficulties and out onto the objects in the area around him.

Say you wanted to give an assist to somebody who had a very indefinite difficulty. That is the hardest one to do an assist on. The person has a pain, but he cannot say where. He doesn’t know what has happened to him. He just feels bad. Use the Locational Assist. You will find out that this assist will work when other assists will not.

PROCEDURE

1. You and the other person sit or walk, side by side, inside or outside.

2. Tell the person you are going to do a Locational Assist and briefly explain that you will be pointing out things and asking him to look at them:

“I am going to be asking you, over and over, to look at various objects around here. I will point to the object when I tell you to look at it.”

3. Point to an object and tell the person:

“Look at that (object).”

Pick various objects to use in the command. For example, the door, the wall, the tree, etc.

4. When the person has done so, acknowledge him with “Thank you” or “ Okay ” or “Good.”

5. Continue giving the command newly each time and pointing to different objects in the area. Be sure to acknowledge the person each time after he has looked at the object that you have told him to look at.

6. Keep doing this until the person is alert or has an improvement or relief of some kind.