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.
Jason Jishun Hao, DOM, MTCM, MBA
Jason Jishun Hao is the president of Neuroacupuncture Institute located in Santa Fe, N.M. He has been practicing, teaching, and researching Chinese scalp acupuncture for 35 years. Jason Hao is a co-author of the book "Chinese Scalp Acupuncture" published in 2011. For more information please visit www.neuro-acupuncture.org.