KEY POINTS:
Massage therapists want Yellow Pages directories to list massage parlours under a heading such as adult services to differentiate them from qualified therapists.
Outgoing president of Massage New Zealand Barry Vautier said the heading should be changed to something like adult services, as every state in Australia had already done.
"This is important to us as some therapists still get sex calls because of the 'misnaming' in the Yellow Pages," he said.
Anyone could call themselves a massage therapist, and "cowboys" who operated under the guise of providing sexual services, or who operated unprofessionally, gave massage a bad name.
Massage New Zealand holds its first national conference this weekend.
Members are expected to debate whether the massage industry should go down the route of regulation, becoming a registered provider to the public health sector.
"The public perception of massage therapy is rapidly changing... Therapeutic massage has come a long way as a viable health modality in the last decade," Mr Vautier said.
- NZPA
