Sep 28 2020

2020 Lunar New Year, Year of the Rat

January 25th is the first day of the Lunar New Year. 2020 is the Year of the Rat

The 2020 Lunar New Year is a big time for new beginnings. The whole year is a REALLY big year for new beginnings. First, it’s a new decade, just off the bat. Second, it’s the year of the Rat, which is the beginning of a new 12 year zodiac cycle. Third, it’s the beginning of a new 60 year cycle which includes the 5 yin and yang elements. Some serious math action. So, if you’ve had an inkling to start any new undertaking…physical, mental, career, spiritual..this is your year! Rats are good planners, quick thinkers, resourceful, wise and kind. These are the very traits that will get you the furthest this year.

The Natural Elements

If we take into account the elemental relationship of the year (the “qi” of the year), we have a Yang Metal year with a Yang Water animal. If you look at the Five Element chart above, you see that Metal generates Water. Add on that they are both Yang versions this year…active, bright, aggressive…we are going to have a big year for water. If the storm that happened mid- January here in the Bay Area is any indication, we are on track. It’s also a good time to put yourself into salt water, so keep that in mind. Salt water pools, epsom salt baths, ocean swims.

Get Acupuncture!

The Yang Metal that is in the 202o Lunar New Year also makes it a good time for acupuncture! Getting treatment from those little needles made of metal will be a great way to harmonize yourself with the qi of the year. If something comes up, and you are thinking: “I wonder if acupuncture is good for this”, chances are the answer is: “Acupuncture is good for that”. You can book yourself online here, or give us a call at 510-629-9456. Happy Lunar New Year!

Mar 08 2020

Staying Healthy with the Coronavirus and Flu Season

Yes, one more post about COVID-19.

I know we are all being inundated with news and information about this daily, but I want to let you know you’ve got support during this time.

If you do find yourself feeling under the weather with an active fever over 100.4, cough or other respiratory symptoms, we are asking that you reschedule your appointment for an herbal consultation over the phone. At that point I can make you a formula, and either somebody can pick it up for you, I can ship it, or I can deliver it if you live close-by.

In addition, we are having everybody wash their hands at the office, before they enter the clinic space. We are also actively disinfecting all door handles and surfaces multiple times during the day.

Virus Prevention

As far as prevention goes, please take all the precautions we all are very familiar with at this point.

Cough and sneeze into your elbow,
don’t touch your face,
and everybody’s favorite: wash your hands, often, for 20 seconds. Get between your fingers and under your nails. Invest in a $5 nail brush.

For those of you with spiritual leanings, the Buddhists at the SF Zen Center recommend a lovely practice of reciting a sutra while washing your hands, instead of singing Happy Birthday. Prayer or mantra works too…basically, use these moments to up your vibration!

Immunity Enhancement

Acupuncture is definitely a good practice for improving/maintaining a healthy immune system. Other than the fact that it’s been used for this purpose for millenia, there is also modern research showing acupuncture increases T-cells and killer cells (types of white blood cells), cytokines, red blood cells, etc., etc., etc. All important parts of our innate immunity. Here is an overview of a few of the studies.

Food and nutrition are very important. Make sure you eat plenty of cooked vegetables, whole grains and legumes, small amounts of high quality (organic, grass fed, pastured) meats, a little bit of fruit. Sugar is an immunity drainer, as is alcohol and smoking. Mushrooms, garlic, ginger, dark leafy greens, pumpkin seeds, and bone broth from happy, healthy animal sources are all great additions to your diet.

Good quality sleep and moderate exercise are also very important. But be mindful of over-exercising. Too much sweating is a drain to your system, you lose vital heat and fluids that your body needs to create protection from external pathogens.

Stay Calm

And last but not least, do not panic. Fear and stress are also major factors in decreased immunity. Do your best to stay calm, while practicing due diligence in keeping yourself and your loved ones healthy.

Nov 13 2018

Acupuncture and Dry Needling, Are They the Same?

Acupuncture and dry needling, are they the same thing, or two different therapies? Well, it depends on who you ask. Ask an acupuncturist, the answer is no, there is no difference. Ask a physical therapist or athletic trainer, and the answer is yes, it is very different. As an acupuncturist, I do fall in line with my fellow colleagues. I think that yes, dry needling is a type of acupuncture. But I also see the physical therapists point of view, that dry needling can be successful without any knowledge of qi or meridians.

Lets look at the definitions and a little history of both.

Definition of Dry Needling

According to the American Physical Therapy Association (APTA) dry needling is a:

“skilled intervention that uses a thin filiform needle to penetrate the skin and stimulate underlying myofascial trigger points, muscular, and connective tissues for the management of neuro-musculoskeletal pain and movement impairments.”

We can break that down a little bit, to make it more understandable.

Filiform means “threadlike” and a thin filiform needle is an acupuncture needle.
Acupuncture and dry needling both use the very thin acupuncture needles, as opposed to a hypodermic needle that injects “wet” substances.
Dry needling stimulates trigger points, muscles and connective tissue.
Trigger points within muscle tissue

What is a trigger point?

According to the APTA again, a trigger points are:

“hyper-irritable spots within a taut band of contractured skeletal muscle fibers that produce local and/or referred pain when stimulated.”

Basically, a trigger point is what we commonly call ‘knots’ in our muscles. When we press on these knots, it is very tender, and often we can feel pain that radiates to other parts of the body. These trigger points are deactivated through dry needling. This penetration by a needle will illicit a local twitch response in the muscle, and this twitch response is what creates the relaxation of the tissues.

Muscles and connective tissue.

The APTA states that dry needling is used to stimulate not only trigger points, but also muscles and connective tissue. Connective tissue is a very broad term for just about everything else in our body. It includes blood, cartilage, bone, tendons and ligaments, fascia, and adipose tissue. It’s my guess the APTA intends mean connective tissue only as it applies to the neuro-musculo-skeletal system.

But the APTA states that using dry needling anything other than trigger points isn’t as well researched by western science. Here is where acupuncture and Asian medical theory can explain it’s efficacy very well, but it needs the concept of qi and meridians to do so.

So, the object of dry needling is to “reduce or restore impairments of body structure and function leading to improved activity and participation.”

Acupuncture and Traditional Asian Medicine

When we talk about the difference between acupuncture and dry needling, the most obvious is the scope of practice. Acupuncture is a complete system of medicine on it’s own. Not only does it treat pain exceptionally well, it treats everything from gynecological disorders, digestive complaints, heart disease, diabetes and even cancer. The only limit is the skill and experience of the practitioner. Any practitioner of dry needling would never claim they treat any medical conditions other than musculo-skeletal and nerve pain disorders. And this is where the argument for a difference in the therapies lies.

But even though every square isn’t a rectangle, every rectangle is a square. You can’t call all acupuncture dry needling, but there is a case that all dry needling is acupuncture.

Ashi points

There is a concept in acupuncture called ashi points. Literally this means “ah yes”, and refers the act of pressing on a tender spot, and the patient says “that’s it, that’s it”. Everybody knows this feeling, and you don’t have to be a massage therapist or doctor to find an ahshi point on another person. Sun Si Mao, a very famous Chinese physician who lived from 581-682 AD, is quoted as saying:

Sun Si Miao is known as the king of Chinese medicine.

“In terms of the method of ashi, in speaking of a person who has a condition of pain, when squeezing, if there is a spot inside [we] do not ask if it is a [recognised] acupuncture point, because [we] located a painful spot and they said, “Ah yes!”.”

This sounds very similar to the above definition of a trigger point.

The first known documentation of this type of acupuncture point is from the Ling Shu, a canonical acupuncture text written between the 2^nd and 1^st century BCE. It starts with “it is the point of pain that defines an acupuncture point”, and the treatment technique is described as:

“apply rapid insertion and withdrawal …of the needle, and cease when the puncturing begins to effect a cure, irrespective of the period of treatment. Insert the needles into the tender spots on the diseased area. “

This technique is a great description of dry needling as well. Find the tender nodule, insert the needle into the nodule, and rapidly insert and withdraw the needle until the painful nodule is no longer present.

Why Choose an Acupuncturist to do Acupuncture and Dry Needling

There are many advantages to having an acupuncturist perform dry needling. The physical therapists and athletic trainers definitely have an excellent knowledge of anatomy. But there is no comparison with the experience an acupuncturist has with needles. Proper insertion of a tiny needle into a body involves a lot of subtlety. The qi of the practitioner is just as important as that of the patient. A good acupuncturist spends a lot of time creating their own healthy qi. This creates a refinement in the acupuncturists ability. This refinement, whether it’s dry needling or acupuncture, will maximize effectiveness and safety.

The acupuncturist also has extensive knowledge of how to affect meridians and body systems with acupuncture needles. Many more layers of disease are addressed, at the same time dry needling is performed. Ideas such as dryness of the muscle tissue, qi and blood stagnation and deficiency may be causative factors of painful trigger points. Both trigger points and the underlying cause are addressed when an acupuncturist performs dry needling.

Jul 10 2018

How Does Acupuncture Work?

In my office, “how does acupuncture work” is a very common question. Often new patients have no idea what to expect, and there is a bit of a magical aura around acupuncture. Especially when I put a needle in the ankle, and immediately the opposite wrist feels better. But it isn’t magic, it’s medicine, and there are 5 prevailing theories that the modern scientific community has come up with to explain acupuncture:

Augmentation of Immunity Theory

Acupuncture increases levels of triglycerides, specific hormones, prostaglandins, white blood counts, gamma globulins, opsonins, and overall anti-body levels, which improves immune function.

Endorphin Theory

Acupuncture stimulates the release of endorphins, neurotransmitters found in the brain with morphine-like properties.

Neurotransmitter Theory

Acupuncture stimulates specific neurotransmitters (like serotonin or noradrenaline) . These neurotransmitters regulate the nervous system, allowing us to properly react to external and internal stimuli. This is the regulation of our reactions to things, like becoming overly stressed, or wanting to go to sleep all the time. [Read more…]

Apr 03 2018

What is Cupping, and How Does it Work?

mediums sized glass cups for fire cupping — Glass cupping cups

“So What is Cupping?”

I’m always ready for this question when I start a treatment with cups. There are many ways to explain cupping, and I’m going to attempt to do it simply from two angles, Chinese Medical theory, and modern Western Anatomical theory.

Where Does Cupping Come From?

Cupping isn’t only a Chinese modality, as many grandmothers will attest. Ancient cultures all over the world have used cupping as a medical treatment. It is at least 5000 years old and is found in Egyptian, Greek, Arab, Indian, Turkish, and Russian cultures. Many people of different ethnicities tell me of their grandmothers using glass jars and a candle to do cupping on them when they were sick.

How Does Cupping Work?

[Read more…]