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.
Janet Cook
Janet Cook earned a BS from the University of Iowa and gained an MS and CAS (Certificate of Advanced Study) in school psychology at SUNY-Oswego. For ten years, she worked in special programs for students with behavioral issues and/or learning disabilities, having a particular focus on those with attention deficit disorders. She graduated from the Academy of Oriental Medicine in Austin (AOMA) and has been practicing TCM since 1999. Her specializations include resilience, optimal well-being and performance, anxiety, stress, and trauma, as well as cancer and allergies.