Dr. Alex Trebing has studied both Western medical science and holistic medicine for the better part of the past decade. After graduating from the MSOM program at East West College of Natural Medicine, he took a summer externship in China to travel all around the country working in different clinics and hospitals treating palsy, stroke victims, and other neurological conditions. Upon his return, he began his doctorate in acupuncture and Chinese medicine at Pacific College. His doctorate centered around the integration of Western and Eastern medicine; a fitting focus for Alex's passion and fascination for integrating the ancient wisdom of Chinese medicine with the cutting-edge science of modern neurology.
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.