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.
Yanhui Shen, MSA
Yanhui Shen received a Master of Science in Acupuncture and is currently in the professional doctorate program at the Virginia University of Integrative Medicine. She also teaches at the university. Previously, she served as a pediatrician and pediatric clinical teacher at Beijing Luhe Hospital, Capital Medical University.