Traditional Chinese Medicine
What is Traditional Chinese Medicine?
What specifically are you referring to when you say balance?
What does a treatment consist of?
What can Chinese Medicine treat?
How often does someone need to come in for treatment?
What is Traditional Chinese Medicine?
Traditional Chinese Medicine, abbreviated TCM, is an ancient science of medicine based in the primary concept of balance. Fundamentally, TCM believes that a balanced person is a healthy, vital person. When the systems of the body have become imbalanced due to anything from job stress, a car accident, emotional episodes, etc., the gateway to disease (dis/ease) is open.
Throughout the history of this medicine, TCM doctors observed many things in order to correct their patients' state of well-being. They observed the seasons. They observed the social climate, the regional climate (northerners vs. southerners), the behavior of animals, the growth of the flora and fauna, and of course the immediate emotional and physical environment of their patient, including the patients' body structure. All things were considered in the practice of medicine.
What specifically are you referring to when you say balance?
What does a treatment consist of?
Many practitioners of Chinese Medicine refer to themselves as "Acupuncturists". However, acupuncture is only one of many forms of treatment that may be utilized.
Consultation: Before treatment takes place, the practitioner has a thorough conversation with the patient which covers any feedback from the previous appointment, and any new/ different symptoms which may have come up. In the initial visit consultation, a medical history is taken.
Acupuncture: Technically, acupuncture is the action of insertion of hair thin sterile needles into specific “energy” spots located over the body. The insertion of the needles activates the patients’ qi and encourages the proper flow of energy throughout the body. A practitioner will give an individualized treatment to each patient, based on that patients’ current state of health/ balance.
Treatment with acupuncture should not be painful. Rather, it is normal to feel sensation at the site being needled. This sensation may feel like a mild dull ache, a quick electrical type sensation, or a quick muscle twitch. Once the needles are in place, one may reach a very relaxed state, similar to a semi-lucid sleep state.
Cupping: This is a massage type treatment which involves the use of small glass bowl inside of which a vacuum is created, and then the cup is placed against the skin, creating a suction action. This treatment is very relaxing, and has the function of moving qi and blood to relieve pain, tension, headaches, lower high blood pressure, etc.
Tuina: Tuina is a form of Chinese medical massage.
Guasha: This modality utilizes a thin, hard instrument that is rapidly scraped over the skin. This is utilized for painful, tight muscles, or to relieve the early stage of a cold or flu.
Moxabustion: There is a powerful herb in our pharmacopoeia called Ai Ye (mugwort). The dried, fluffy herb may be rolled into a cigar type stick, rolled into small clumps to place on the ends of needles, packed into a small come shape to be placed on the skin (with a protective layer underneath), or piled atop fresh ginger or salt. Once moxa is ignited with a flame and allowed to smolder it has the ability to warm the body, calm pain and/ or cramping, strengthen the immune system, and treat disorders such as diarrhea.
Acupressure: Essentially, acupressure is acupuncture with out needles. Concentrated energy from the practitioner is directed, through touch, to acupuncture points over the body, to help harmonize the patients’ energy. By utilizing needles via acupuncture, all selected points are activated simultaneously; however in acupressure, more of a massage- type treatment occurs as the practitioner moves slowly from one point to the next.
Acupuncture and herbal medicine go hand in hand. The use of herbs dates back thousands and thousands of years and spans through all cultures. It is extremely safe and effective. Some common food items many people are familiar with are used in herbal formulas, such as cinnamon, cardamom, licorice, and yam. Some lovely flowers may also be prescribed in formulas; rose, chrysanthemum and gardenia, to name a few. When herbs are prescribed, it is rare to assign only one herb for the patient. Usually there are several herbs prescribed, which work together in harmony to create a safe and synergistic healing effect for your body and mind. For maximum results, herbs are assigned as a team, as partners, in their whole form.
Herbal Medicine may be thought of as "acupuncture to go", as the use of herbal formulas prolongs and enhances the effect of the treatment, taking healing to the next level. Herbs are also used more as a daily food for further healing, such as adding Gou Qi Zi (Goji berries) and Long Yan Rou (Longan fruit) to chrysanthemum or chamomile tea for a bedtime tonic to nourish blood and calm the mind. Several herbs may be cooked into a chicken soup to replenish qi.
What can Chinese Medicine treat?
Chinese Medicine has the potential to treat any condition a person would visit their western M.D. for. Of course, in times of emergency or physical trauma, such as a broken bone or bleeding situation, it is best to go to the nearest emergency hospital, or call 911.
How often does someone need to come in for treatment?
Every patient is different. It is not possible to set one standard that applies to all patients. However, one is able to say that the nature of this medicine is corrective. By that it is meant that this medicine has the ability to retrain ones body to behave properly, in a positive manner, to help keep a person in balance, free of dis-ease. One analogy of how this medicine works is that of house training a young puppy:
When you bring the new puppy home, it is best for the puppy to go outside to relieve itself; however, it does not know that yet. So in the beginning, there are accidents in the house. This is seen as a negative behavior, much like when the body is sick, it is demonstrating a negative behavior of its qi.
In the first week or so of having this puppy, the owner must remind the puppy of the good or positive behavior of going outside. The owner has to do this several time a day. In time, as the puppy begins to "see" what the owner wants, the puppy starts having fewer accidents in the house, and goes outside more often. As more time passes, the owner finds themselves having to reinforce this good behavior with less frequency. Eventually, there is no other behavior than the positive behavior of the puppy going outside.
In the beginning, the patient may need 1-2, maybe 3 treatments per week. As the body begins to transform from the behavior of dis-ease to the behavior of balance and health, the frequency of visits are reduced accordingly.