What to Expect: Oriental Medicine
Your first visit will begin with an in depth assessment of your overall condition and an initial
treatment. The intake and treatment will take up to one-and-a-half hours. Typical follow-up treatments last approximately 45 minutes to 1 hour.
During the assessment I may ask you about some things that you might not think are
connected to your chief complaint, for example, your emotions, sleeping patterns, and
eating habits. Chinese medicine considers the whole person, not just one isolated symptom.
When viewed together, the myriad of symptoms and signs you are experiencing reveal patterns of
disharmony. Although treatment will focus on your chief complaint, your whole being must
be considered in order to develop the most appropriate course of treatment. One of the strengths of East Asian medicine is that it appreciates that while illnesses may be identical, the persons suffering from them
are individuals.
Pulse, Tongue and Abdominal Diagnosis
As part of your intake, viewing your tongue and palpating your pulse can provide an Oriental Medical
practitioner with a great deal of information to help guide the treatment. The tongue is a microcosm of the human body, and its shape, color, markings, and coating have significance. The pulse reveals the current energy patterns of twelve different organ systems and any imbalances that exist in their relationships to each other. Abdominal palpation, which derives from Japanese practice, is also a valuable assessment tool; it can help direct the practitioner to the most appropriate herbal formulas for a given patient.
Treatment
A typical treatment in the Japanese tradition includes acupuncture, moxabustion, and East Asian medical massage, to the accompaniment of soothing music. Japanese-style treatment emphasizes disposable, hair-thin needles, shallow needle insertions, and intuitive sensing of Qi movement by the practitioner, all of which provide for a very gentle and relaxing experience. This style of treatment is especially preferred by highly sensitive people, fibromyalgia patients, and persons with environmental sensitivities.
Moxabustion, the application of heat to acupoints using specially prepared forms of Artemisia herb, is used extensively in Japanese-style acupuncture. Its effects are highly nourishing and helpful in restoring vigor to organic functions that have become depleted.
Needles are typically retained for about 20 minutes, first on the front and then on the back of the body.
After Your Treatment
Relief is often immediate; for some individuals, it can be delayed by a few hours or even one day. Improvement might last for a few hours on the first visit and then last longer with each successive
treatment. OR, relief may last from the first treatment until your next visit. It is
important to recognize that we are all individuals with varying responses to treatment. Factors such as constitutional strength, depth and duration of illness, number of prescription medications taken, and psychological well-being can also have an impact on how quickly improvement proceeds.
Course of Treatment
As part of your first visit, I will discuss with you a proposed course of treatment. Because
individuals vary, it is difficult to state definitively at the time of your first visit how
many treatments will be required. In general, acute conditions of recent onset may only
require two or three treatments. Chronic conditions usually require more treatments to achieve
sustained results. With chronic conditions I usually recommend an initial course of
four treatments in order to better assess the extent to which acupuncture will help the condition.
The ideal approach to illness is to begin treatment as soon as possible. The sooner you seek
help, the easier it is to treat. For longstanding illnesses, weekly treatments may be required
for some time in order to achieve a sustained return to wellness.
As part of your course of treatment, I might make recommendations regarding herbal medicine, diet, and lifestyle. These are customized to your case and derive from the Chinese medical philosophy of treating the whole person. The more consistently you are able to follow through with these recommendations, the better the results you will achieve.
What to Exprect: Homeopathy
If you are new to homeopathy, see the Homeopathy page on this site for more information about the basics of this profound healing art.
Your first session will seem like an extended interview and can last up to two hours. During the initial homeopathic interview, I will want to learn as much as I can, not only about your chief complaint, but about you as a person. We may explore past traumas, likes and dislikes, food preferences, mental and emotional habits, things that make you feel better or worse, ways of coping that have and have not worked for you, and anything else that may yield information about the remedy that will be most likely to resonate with your condition. It is your story that is to be told during this time, and it is my job to listen intently.
After the homeopathic interview, you will receive a remedy with detailed instructions on how to take it. Follow-up visits for homeopathy occur less frequently than for acupuncture (at intervals of three to six weeks) and last about forty-five minutes to an hour. Between visits, though, you should keep in contact and also be observant about changes you might experience: changes in ways of thinking and feeling, changes in your physical symptoms, sleep patterns, dreams, coping strategies, and so on. Jotting down any changes in a diary or day planner can be helpful. Be sure to report your observations during your next consultation, as they will aid me in determining whether to continue with the same remedy, change the potency, or move on to a different remedy.
The length of a course of treatment varies depending on factors such as the strength of the Vital Force, age, how chronic or acute the chief complaint is, and environmental sensitivity. Sometimes, even long-term, serious complaints are reversed after one or two visits, whereas for other individuals, deep healing requires a number of months. Children and adolescents tend to respond especially quickly to a well-selected remedy; older adults often take longer.
What to Expect: Pranic Healing
In the intuitive therapy known as Pranic Healing, we are trained to scan eleven or more specific energy centers of the body (chakras). After first obtaining details about the health problems that concern you, I will scan all of the relevant energy centers to determine which centers might be congested, overactivated, or depleted.
The next step involves cleansing all energy centers that are imbalanced, in a specific order depending on the condition. This cleansing must occur before any energizing or strengthening can take place and can be thought of as a form of energetic detoxification. Specific color pranas (energies) are used in the cleansing process. Color pranas are then projected to energize centers that are depleted and need strengthening.
What you experience during a session depends on your sensitivity. Some people perceive distinct physical sensations; others experience immediate emotional changes; still others have no immediate specific reactions. Your subjective perceptions are not necessary for the healing energies to work, however. It often happens that the body continues to "cleanse" energetically for several days after a treatment, and during this time improvements may be felt incrementally. The frequency of sessions recommended for you will be customized to your individual circumstances.
After a Pranic Healing session, it is advisable to avoid bathing or strenuous exercise for about twenty-four hours, to help stabilize the effects of the treatment.
If you are recovering from a serious illness, it is a good idea to schedule a regular maintenance treatment about once a month for a time, even after your symptoms have abated. Think of this as a maintenance plan similar to a "well baby" program. The goal is to strengthen your immunity and your overall energy field to prevent recurrence or relapse.
