We are being invited, both by our conditions and circumstances and by people in our profession to “get online and do tele-medicine.” However much of what we do as acupuncturists does not translate well, as our most critical tool cannot be used in a digital form.

The questions that I’ve been noodling through for the past month plus are what is the essence of my work when I don’t have access to my kit of tools? And how would I describe what I do, when I can use my needles?

In this rebroadcast of a Lhasa webinar with Daniel Schulman, Alaine Duncan and Amy Mager as we explore the opportunities and challenges in this moment of transformation.


 

Alaine Duncan has a unique approach acupuncture that integrates modern understandings of the neuro-biology of traumatic stress with ancient healing principles from Chinese medicine. This clinical fascination has carried her heart to places and people she never imagined when she graduated from acupuncture school in 1990, and completed Somatic Experiencing training in 2007.

She founded Integrative Healing, LLC in 2012 with a goal to integrate the wisdom of Chinese Medicine with the study of neurobiology and traumatic stress in both the classroom and the treatment room. Her research background includes studies assessing the impact of integrative medicine on compassion fatigue in military caregivers; acupuncture for treatment of combat-related traumatic stress, chronic headaches in Veterans with traumatic brain injuries, pain in Veterans of all conflicts, and Gulf War Veterans Illness.

Alaine was a founding member of the Integrative Health & Wellness program at the DC Veterans Administration Medical Center where she served as a clinician and researcher from 2007-2017.

 

Daniel Schulman graduated from New England School of Acupuncture in 1999.   He has been in private practice in Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island, Canada since then.  He founded and chairs the Association of Registered Acupuncturists of Prince Edward Island.

For twenty years, Daniel’s clinical work centred around Japanese palpatory approaches, primarily those in the Nagano/Matsumoto lineage (but also including Keiraku Chiryo).  Following Nei Jing studies with Ed Neal, he expanded this into a more focused six channels perspective and in particular, an exploration of and fusion with Nei Jing Ren Ying Cun Kou pulse diagnosis.  This work involved what he calls a reverse engineered ‘palpate first, ask questions later’ approach.  More recently, Daniel has found himself in a radical clinical transformation via the elegant Sa’Am fusion of I Ching, 5 Phases and Six Levels.

Daniel has written many articles, published in the Journal of Chinese Medicine, the Journal of Alternative and Complementary Medicine, the North American Journal of Oriental Medicine and more.  A full list can be found on his website, www.danielschulman.ca where he also blogs.

Daniel’s daily practice is guided by three existentially terrifying realizations;

  • Anything can be anything (in other words, dysfunction in just about any channel or channel combination could be underlying just about any symptom)
  • Most patients exhibit no less than 12 ‘patterns’ and often more
  • At any moment in the clinical encounter, there are 10,000 things happening and at even the utmost level of awareness and presence, we may become aware of at most 30-40 of them.

Daniel marvels at the fact that even after two decades in practice, every day is novel, new and fascinating.

 

Amy Mager has been licensed to practice acupuncture and Chinese herbal medicine since 1990. Amy graduated Magna Cum Laude from Brandeis University, and earned her MS in Chinese Medicine from ACTCM in 1989 and her  Doctorate in Acupuncture, Chinese Medicine and Integrative Medicine from the Pacific College of Oriental Medicine in 2017. She apprenticed with midwife and acupuncturist. Raven Lang L.Ac. for two years.  She has been in private practice in CA and MA for over 29 years. She serves as Vice Chair of the American Society of Acupuncturists and has served on the Board of the Acupuncture Society of Massachusetts as well as a board member at large of the Maternity Acupuncture Association. She has served on the board of uprooted, a Jewish response miscarriage and pregnancy as well as the Green River Doula Network. Amy is also a trained birth educator, birth assistant, lactation counselor and End of Life doula.

Amy has been published in the books Parenting From the Heart and Round the Circle as well as on Huffington Post. Amy has published two articles in the Pacific College of Oriental medicine newsletter and JASA with her writing partner Christine Cronin DACM, Lic.Ac.. One on postpartum care, and 11 heat therapy.  She has a bi-weekly radio segment with Bob Flaherty on WHMP, “Healing Outside the Box, Inside the Heart”.  For a more in depth bio please visit www.WellnessHouseNorthampton.com

 

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