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.
Joseph Alban, MS, LAc
Joseph Alban completed a six-month hospital residency at the First Traditional Chinese Medicine Teaching Hospital of the Hunan University of Traditional Chinese Medicine, receiving advanced clinical training in pain management, internal medicine and dermatology. He graduated from Touro College’s graduate program in Oriental medicine and currently runs an acupuncture and Oriental medicine practice in New York City. To contact Joseph with questions or comments, e-mail joseph@albanacupuncture.com.