"Serious exploration of alternative ways to improve the quality of life for persons undergoing cancer therapy represents a cornerstone as we face a new era in the treatment of this insidious disease. This can be accomplished by reducing pain, nausea and other debilitating 'side effects' - and most importantly, to give hope where it has perhaps diminished.
"As part of an integrative practice, I believe acupuncture has a solid and scientifically promising basis. Thus, continued investigation of acupuncture for clinical application and research is warranted in the area of cancer treatment and beyond."
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Fertility acupuncture sometimes gets presented as a narrow protocol: a handful of reproductive points applied uniformly across patients. What this case reinforced for me: The most powerful work happens when we read the whole picture. The hormone data, the constitutional tendency, the sleep, the digestion, and the menstrual pattern, so we can treat the environment the ovaries live inside.
Mast cell activation syndrome (MCAS) affects more than 15% of the U.S. population but evades most practitioners’ radar. Just five years ago, it wasn’t even on my radar, despite already having 20 years of experience as a clinician at that time. The more I dug (similar to leaky gut and post-COVID syndrome), the more I found my patients were suffering from this disorder.
The motivation behind our practice of medicine is important, impacting not just our experience but also the experiences of those we treat. It is perhaps for this reason that the aspiration to help not just some, but all beings heal, has historically been an important part of the medical tradition. To explain this, we need to consider how medicine is interwoven with other social domains.