What is Holistic Medicine?
Holistic medicine differs from modern "western" medicine. Modern medicine is a system that treats symptoms and diseases with the use of drugs, radiation, surgery, or similar interventions. Holistic medicine is a system of healing that treats the whole person- mind, body, emotions, and spirit. A holistic doctor may use all forms of health care to relieve the symptoms and disease, while also addressing the imbalances in a person's health and lifestyle factors that may have led to the condition or illness.
What is Acupuncture?
Acupuncture is a therapy that heals by inserting very fine sterile needles at specific locations on the body. Acupuncture is a branch of traditional Chinese medicine that utilizes the body's own electrical system (qi) to promote healing. Qi energy is the electrical activity in the body that connects all of our mind and body systems.
*Qi is pronounced "chee"
How does acupuncture work?
To describe it simply, acupuncture stimulates the electrical current that connects the brain and body continuously. Systemic balance is called homeostasis- and it is necessary to maintain internal stability. When at any point that electrical current (Qi) is compromised, homeostasis is also effected so symptoms of imbalance occur and disease ensues. The name for this electrical current in traditional Chinese medicine is qi. The strategic insertion of fine acupuncture needles along specific electrical pathways (meridians) will stimulate that bad connection so that the process of homeostasis may correct under/over productive systems in the body that need to be addressed.
Acupuncture helps the overall function of the body and is effective for many acute and chronic illnesses. It stimulates the natural healing processes of the body to restore health and healing by activating specific points along energy pathways and meridians mapped by TCM practitioners over hundreds of years of careful and meticulous research and documentation of treatments.
TCM= Traditional Chinese Medicine
Electrical activity (western medicine) = Qi (eastern medicine)
How does Traditional Chinese medicine work?
By looking at the whole person, this means that all body systems are relevant for a specialized diagnosis: body temperature, appetite, digestion, body aches and pains, sleep patterns, elimination patterns, menstrual history, vision, hearing, emotional habits etc. This complete review of systems is the way that TCM differentiates individual patterns to provide the most precise diagnosis and very specific treatment protocol. Once an individual's pattern has been identified with a review of systems, a pulse reading and quick look at the tongue verifies these findings. Because the tongue is the only internal organ we can actually see, the conditions of the interior may be observed (hot/cold, wet/dry, excess/deficency). No two tongues are exactly the same!