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.
Z'ev Rosenberg, LAc
Z'ev Rosenberg has lectured widely both to the public and to students of both Chinese medicine and macrobiotics over the last thirty years. He is the former president of the Acupuncture Association of Colorado (AAC), where he spearheaded a successful drive to register acupuncture practitioners in that state. He also has written several articles for professional Chinese medical journals, including Oriental Medicine, Protocol Journal of Botanical Medicine, Journal of Oriental Medicine in America, Journal of Chinese Medicine, and most recently The Lantern Journal. He presently continues to teach and chair the Herbal Medicine department at Pacific College of Oriental Medicine, San Diego, and has had a private practice in Chinese medicine since 1983.