Our Approach

Principle Premise

To ensure our body and mind enjoy sound health, we need to pay close attention to three aspects: circulation, motion, and equilibrium. Circulation should be uninterrupted, motion unrestricted and equilibrium maintained dynamically.

Uninterrupted circulation

Our body takes in things, processes and utilizes them, and releases the waste. Constant circulation occurs in this process. Therefore, uninterrupted circulation means that we need to maintain the free flow of whatever needs to be circulated in our body and mind, i.e. energy, blood, fluids, nutrients, hormones, thoughts and emotions.

Unrestricted motion

Body is always in motion. Unrestricted motion means body’s organs and various tissues maintain natural healthy mobility and inherent motility. When there is a restriction in motion in a certain area of body, due to whether structural or functional impairment, it can cause a cascading effect of disharmony in the body.

Dynamic equilibrium

Life, on one hand, desires to move forward and expand for growth and advancement. On the other hand, it also wants to step back and retract for preservation and protection. East Asian medicine calls the harmonious interplay of these two aspects as the balance of Yin and Yang. So, dynamic equilibrium means that the constantly interacting nature of various energies, functions, structures, thoughts and emotions in our body and mind, though having ups and downs, should be balanced as a whole.

Maintaining these three requirements is called “homeostasis”.

What happens if..

If this homeostasis is broken, the person may experience various signs of decreased sense of well-being and vitality, such as fatigue, discomfort, disruption of sleep and digestion, mental uneasiness, and so on. When this state is prolonged, so called “dis-ease” can develop.

Role of Practitioner

The body’s expression of pain or discomfort is a signal that something needs attention, often in a specific area. Therefore, the practitioner’s assessment efforts focus on identifying the areas of the body that are not in balance or healthy state through a series of examination and interview. Based on the assessment, the practitioner would use Acupuncture, Chinese herbs, Manual therapy, and life style recommendations to support each individual body’s needs to restore proper circulation, motion and equilibrium. When your mind and body become balanced, the great healing potential within you unfolds on its own to heal whatever “dis-ease” you may have. In this process, the practitioner is simply a listener, guide, and supporter of your body’s healing potential.

Services

Acupuncture treatment is administered by inserting fine needles into the skin at specific points along the pathway of energy in order to restore balance and harmony to the body. This vital energy, or Qi (pronounced chee) moves through the body in precise channels supporting the functions of the body, mind and spirit.

When Qi energy is obstructed or moving disharmoniously, the resulting imbalance begins to surface in the form of specific symptoms. To assess the flow of your Qi energy, The practitioner will feel and listen to various parts of your body. In the process, his hands may come in contact with your skin. Sometimes, you will see his hand just hovering above certain areas of your body. Points will be found based on assessment of Qi and the channels flow and quality. Reassessment follows after the needling of those points. In this way, treatment becomes a part of assessment, assessment a part of treatment. The whole process is like a dialogue between your body and the practitioner.

Chinese herbal medicine is another main modality of East Asian medicine. In many cases, herbal medicine would be an effective option for restoring the proper circulation in the body. The purpose of the herbal remedies in East Asian medicine is not to suppress the manifestation of illness, but rather to bring the body into harmony, thereby eliminating the cause of dis-ease.

Our approach of Chinese herbal medicine focuses on restoring the adequate circulation of Qi energy, blood and fluids in the body. When circulation is impaired, the body shows patterns of restriction and pressure. Pattern can be defined as a consistent repeatable characteristic set of signs and symptoms. Subtle yet prolonged patterns often manifest as an individual’s constitutional traits. In assessment of the pattern, the practitioner will palpate the patient’s various areas of body, including the abdomen, ask specific questions, and take the patient’s constitutional traits into account. Then, he will prescribe a matching formula, a synergistic combination of herbs, to the corresponding pattern of the person that can restore circulation in the body.

Our manual therapy focuses on restoring natural healthy motion of tissues in the body through gentle hands-on techniques, called visceral, neural, and vascular manipulation developed by French Osteopathic physician Jean-Pierre Barral.

In this process, the practitioner would first identify the area of body restricted in motion which becomes a source of pain or symptoms through a palpation technique called “listening”. It is called “listening” because practitioner’s hands tune into what your tissues try to tell.

It is not uncommon that the restricted area (the source of problem) is not the same as the area of symptoms. Once a specific tissue in a specific area is located, the practitioner would use gentle touch to engage in communication between the tissue and surrounding structure. In this process the practitioner’s hands provide a gentle signal to the restricted tissue, listen to subtle response of the tissue to the signal, and follow through the response to positive changes in the area of the body.