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.
Shabnam Pourhassani, LAc, QME, DACM
Dr. Shabnam Pourhassani attained a bachelor's degree in holistic science (2006) and master's degree in acupuncture and Oriental medicine (2008) from South Baylo University; and her doctorate in acupuncture and Chinese medicine (DACM) from Pacific College of Health Sciences in 2021. She practices in Newport Beach, Calif., and is an inpatient staff member of Cedars Sinai Medical Center and the California Rehabilitation Institute [a Cedars Sinai / University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) Health partnership].