A student stands over a patient, needle poised. They have a “perfect” prescription: a textbook combination of points harvested from a lecture slide on chronic lower back pain. But as the needle meets the skin, the student hesitates - the symptom of a quiet habit that has taken hold of our profession. We routinely say we “prescribe” points. It sounds efficient. It echoes the authority of biomedical culture and fits neatly into the insurance field. But vocabulary is never neutral; repeated long enough, it dictates behavior.
Dorene Bowe-Shulman, MAc, LAc (NCCAOM), MMHS, BS
Dorene Bowe-Shulman is doctoral candidate with PCOM, an acupuncturist with the Healing Garden Cancer Support Center in Harvard, MA, as well as at Be Well and Beyond in Acton, MA.  She is a Professor at the New England School of Acupuncture at MCPHS University teaching clinical core courses and supervising student clinics. She is credentialed as an acupuncturist at Boston Medical Center in Boston, MA, the state of Massachusetts and the NCCAOM.