Category Archives: Live Event

Treating Children with Seasonal Allergies

And I want to point out that when we talk about seasonal allergies, this is a range of diseases that can manifest in various ways starting with allergic rhinitis en-enlarged adenoids and that affects the sleep,…

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Disclaimer: The following is an actual transcript. We do our best to make sure the transcript is as accurate as possible, however, it may contain spelling or grammatical errors. Due to the unique language of acupuncture, there will be errors, so we suggest you watch the video while reading the transcript.

Hello, this is Moshe Heller from the Motion Center and Motion Herbs. I want to thank the American Acupuncture Council for letting me present today on this topic of treating children with seasonal allergies. This is a lecture that I’m repeating a lecture that I did exactly a year ago also talking about this subject.

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But spring is here, and and it is the time to talk about these things. And we have lots of patients that we meet or at least I’m seeing a lot of patients who are in need for help in this season with allergies. So now we can go to the slides, please. The spring is here, as I mentioned, and there’s these…

When spring comes and as practitioners of Chinese medicine, we always need to say to be in, in touch with the changes of the season. We feel those fluctuating temperatures the blooming plants and trees, and that all brings these sneezing and sniffles, and runny noses, and irritated eyes and ear– scratchy throats, and these are all signs of the seasonal allergies.

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And today, we’ll dis-discuss how we can help these patients with both acupuncture and herbs. And I want to point out that when we talk about seasonal allergies, this is a range of diseases that can manifest in various ways starting with allergic rhinitis en-enlarged adenoids and that affects the sleep, can cause sleep adne-apnea.

And children who have a tendency to have seasonal allergies will also tend to have some food allergies, and we’ll talk about why that is happening in a se- in a second. We have to understand that there’s a reaction of our immune system which causes an inflammatory process or an allergic inflammatory process, and we need to address that from multiple ways.

I just want to remind you this slide reminds you that there’s a lot of times the spleen or our digestive sy-system is at the center of this me- of this disease process, of the pathology. And we have a weakness a lot of times of the spleen and stomach, which then does not support the lung appropriately, and therefore our wei qi is imbalanced and overreactive.

And that our spleen also produces phlegm and dampness, which goes upwards and affects the orifices. So that just points out that when we see children with allergies in– I always discuss diet because for me there’s always a relationship between allergies and our diet. So when we suspect there is an allergy in the pathology then we always have to talk about are there any phlegm-producing foods that they are consuming and how we can change that in order to help in resolving the issues that that we’re that, that are presenting.

It’s really important to just start by asking what they eat on a regular basis. What’s their diet like? I always say, “What do they eat in the morning? What are their snacks? What are their lunch like? What’s their snack in between lunch? What’s their dinner like?” And that helps me Really understand what they tend to eat and is there any contributing factors for that?

And so always consider giving a three-week food journal. That is extremely helpful. I found that to be very helpful when I have patients do that and when they actually report that, then we can see what they’re eating and discuss, have a discussion about diet. So when we talk about pattern differentiation in in these conditions, we always look for, is there any lung or spleen qi vacuity or deficiency?

Or what we see a lot of times in Chinese in pediatrics, is that the … There could be a situation where there’s what we call hyperactive spleen qi deficiency, where the patient is actually s- s- having a spleen deficiency, but their behavior is very hyperactive and doesn’t really match the deficiency symptoms that we are, that they are presenting.

We always, I always also look to see if there’s any lingering pathogenic factors. As we know, lingering pathogenic factors can be a very common cause of disease in children. One telling sign is that their lymph glands under their mandibles are swollen. And so I’ll palpate that and if there’s, they’re swollen, I’ll start to ask questions about lingering pathogenic factor.

Was there an illness that was never fully resolved or has been chronic and that could be the trigger? There could be also a liver yang rising. We children also can manifest with liver yang rising and sometimes emotions, when liver … When we talk about liver yang rising, a lot of times emotional factors can be part of that situation.

What we may need to note is that each of these patterns may have bouts of either wind cold or wind heat attacks, meaning that it’s concurrently a wind cold or wind heat that’s attacking on the surface. And there it can be also complicated with phlegm dampness. In some cases, there could be an underlying kidney involvement, a kidney vacuity.

And what we always need to understand that when there’s an allergic s- condition that we … That there’s when there’s an allergic condition, there’s always some heat hidden or it’s … The heat is coming from somewhere. It could be yin fire, it could be qi stagnation, and it could be phlegm congestion.

All these are possibilities, but there always is a heat source or a cause for the heat to be present. So when we the … When we talk about allergies, it means that there is an hyperactivity of the immune system, meaning it reacts at the times that it’s not supposed to react, and therefore I

That, for me, always represents a heat condition or a hot condition that it could be deficiency heat, it could be excess heat, but there’s heat somewhere in the system, and we need to figure out where it’s coming from. Again, once we come with a di- have a diagnosis, we always can consider these different points.

Our main points are always Lung 7 and Large Intestine 4 to help resolve the exterior aspect of that. Du 23 is a point that I use a lot for clearing of the sinuses, so if there’s any accumulation, congestion, runny nose, anything that we need to address in the sinus area, Du 23 helps to clear both damp and phlegm and wind and cold from the si- from the head.

So that’s a very important point, as well as Gallbladder 40. Gallbladder 40 is a really important point, and sometimes I may use moxa on it or just needle it depending on the presentation, and that’s a very helpful point to … Especially when we have rhinitis as as part of the presentation.

Liver 3 there’s a lot of heat and the face is red and fa- symptoms of heat in the upper part, in the facial area, then I would consider Liver 2 or Liver 3 if there’s, there are not. Always remember this area between Large Intestine 10 and Large Intestine 11, maybe towards the triple burner line is what we call the immune regulation area, and I check for sensitivity or puffiness and and address that area also if needed.

Triple burner cis 16 triple warmer 16 is also a very important ar- immune point and help to regulate the lymph drainage in the neck area. And so that’s a very important point that I consider. As well as Du 12, if there’s lung qi reg… for lung qi regulation and a- activation of the thymus gland.

These are– this is why we would choose Du 12. And I always palpate the spine and needle very tight spots and look at areas like Du 2, Du 3 and/or Du 6. So these are areas that I check to see if there’s any irritation. And we could use needles. For some children, I might use shonishen technique and I always want you to remember that teishin is meaning the needle that is non-skin penetrating is always part of– has always been part of our nine traditional needles.

And we just need to understand that when we’re stimulating the skin, we’re stimulating the depths of our nervous system and also our qi. And therefore, it’s important to remember that we don’t necessarily need to use a needle in for all these points, but we can definitely use teishin or non- non-needling techniques or non-insertion techniques.

I also wanna point out we’re shifting a little bit to talk about herbs. One point… One thing I want to point out is this s- s- research study that was done on stabilizing mast cell a- mast cell activity. And there is a formula that was used. The Chin- included three Chinese herbs.

Those are… This formula is called Shuang Huang Lian, which is genin hua phloroglaucina, radix scutellaria, huang Qin, and forsythia, Lian Qiao. So these three herbs really help to act to regulate mast cell. And I’ll also mention that I’ll show you a product in a few seconds which is made from quercetin, bromelain, and nettles which are which is a great compilation to also help regulate or down-regulate mast cell activity, similar to what this formula might be doing.

So you can use these three herbs as a component in other traditional formulas that you might be using or according to the pattern differentiation to help with down-regulating mast cell activity. I also want to mention another research study that was done by Dr. Li from Mount Sinai. She used a formula.

She used a-another traditional Chinese formula Wu Mei Wan to address food allergies in particular. But I in my experience, it will definitely also be a good formula to consider in environmental allergies. And the formula is, This is the traditional formula.

It has known– it’s known for its zhūyīn. This is the ma-ma-main formula in the zhūyīn which addresses also parasites. And that’s why I think Dr. Li chose it because of the parasite theory and allergies that you can definitely read on in this, you have the research study right here.

And it points out– And this is actually the formula that was finally used in the research. This is the product I was referring to. It’s called D-Hist. Again, it’s made from quercetin, bromelain, and and nettles, which are all help in regulating allergic or the histamine response, regulating histamine response.

And it– There is a pediatric version, the D-Hist Junior chewables. I usually give this in larger quantity than is recommended on the dosage because I believe that the quantity of quercetin needs to be high in order to down-regulate or get a very a better effect on the for the patients.

So I sometimes double or triple the amount of the D-Hist that I would recommend for patients I want to– I hope this helped you very to address some of your patients’ concerns especially when it comes to allergic responses. I see a lot of patients in my office, especially in this season but also throughout the year, especially food-with food allergies.

And I so I hope this helps. And I want to thank the American Acupuncture Council again for letting me speak today. Thank you very much.

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Practice Protocols Navigating the Challenging Economy

…talk about what type of practice protocols do we need to have when we’re navigating a challenging economy, because our patients are navigating it.

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Hello to my acupuncture friends and family. This is Sam Collins, the coding and billing expert for acupuncture and for you. Obviously, the American Acupuncture Council is always a resource for you as the American Acupuncture Council Network. Network members spay pay special attention, if you will.

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Let’s get into what’s going on in our world right now. Let’s go to the slides and talk about what type of practice protocols do we need to have when we’re navigating a challenging economy, because our patients are navigating it. We hear on the news every day, gas prices, grocery prices, everything. So we’re gonna be challenged now for that discretionary income.

When I say that, it’s for patients coming in, let’s face it, when they think of acupuncture, what are they really thinking about? When an economy tightens, an acupuncture practice that depends on cash pay patients needs to make some pivots. You need to make adjustments because shifting from a visit-based revenue to a value-based revenue is what you’re going to look to.

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And what I mean by that is shifting from something that’s value. Understand needs versus wants. This is something I’ll give credit to my mother, taught me when I was very young. People will buy what they want and beg for what they need. Think of how often you’ve had a friend that comes to you to borrow money to pay a bill, yet you notice they have on new shoes or they went out to a concert.

That’s, they wanted that concert, but they need to get their bill paid. I wanna put our category of care more to a want, the patient’s seeking it out, not creating that, “Oh, I need it.” ‘Cause I don’t think people often are gonna feel that need in the ways that we think it is. So keep in mind, though, discounting alone is a weak lever.

It really just compresses margin. You just, you make it cheaper, great, but it makes it more commoditized. I want a practice that focuses on doing things well, and these things are gonna be retaining a patient, repackaging and differentiating what you are that are different from others. Where do I get these?

Realize that often when you think of going out and marketing just to the public, that may not work as well. I start first with where’s the return on investment? It’s with existing patients. Think of retention first. Think of all these patients that have seen you over the years that are familiar with what you do, but they’ve just forgotten.

Acquiring new cash patients gets harder and more expensive in a downturn because where’s your marketing? I had a friend this week that said he was trying to post a job on Indeed and he wasn’t getting results. It just kept getting more and more costs from Indeed. So he had to think of what’s the return on investment.

The return is gonna come from your existing base. That’s gonna be your most reliable stream. Identify your patients. Reactivate who’s already there. Send them out emails, maybe a phone call, maybe a text message, and look for patients that have not been in for maybe 60 to 180 days. You could certainly go longer, but I would start there.

Think of the number of people who are familiar with that go, “Oh, yeah.” Make sure you use it as condition specific. Don’t just say, “Hey, come back in, get some acupuncture.” Get specific to your patient. Go into and get each one. Don’t send a blanket. Ask them how their low back pain is holding up, how maybe they’re dealing with home and work.

How about stress, anxiety? Realize acupuncture helps a great deal there. Patients often forget those changes. What about someone with headaches or how about athletes? A lot of athletes are realizing now recovery and their ability to participate in their sport comes to how well their body can maintain function.

So focus in on these types, whether it’s high school, club, or otherwise. There’s often a lot of help that you’re giving that I think sometimes we’re missing out on. Keep in mind, every professional team has an acupuncturist. Why aren’t you getting some of those patients, not necessarily maybe the professionals, but the other athletes who look up to them?

Now, I’m gonna suggest, though, outcomes. The beauty of acupuncture is its ability to work. Now, obviously, if someone comes in and they’re in a lot of pain, what is acupuncture going to do? Reduce the pain. I like that. But is that all they’re coming for? I don’t think so. This is why you wanna use simple outcome tools, whether it’s the Oswestry Dis- Disability Index, neck disability, or the PROMIS pain scales, or general pain ind- pain index.

I wanted you to in- demonstrate improvement trends, not just a reduction of pain. If all you’re looking for is to get rid of pain, that may go on a visit or two, they’re gonna think, “I don’t need anymore.” I want to see the progress so that the patient now understands the value. The value of the service makes price less of an issue This is the want.

Define the care. You’re taking them from acute to corrective to functional. Notice this is not about just getting them to maintenance. I want you to avoid terms like maintenance or wellness. That is where people don’t see the need. I want it to be their ability to function and maintain their ability to their lifestyle.

Maybe you wanna start to change your pricing, but pricing is not a race to the bottom. It’s not so much changing a price to make it the cheapest, but making it more affordable. Realize if you go to purchase a car, you’ll notice they never really advertise the price of the car, ’cause if they told you the car was eighty thousand, you would never wanna buy it.

But if they tell you, “Oh, you can get this car for six hundred and fifty a month,” all of a sudden now it seems affordable. So this is where it comes to you. What about monthly debits? Maybe where they get two to four visits at a preferred rate. Maybe with that, they join this package, they’re gonna get some priorities, maybe priority scheduling, maybe same-day visits, or discounts on other things.

Maybe they get discounts on your herb programs. But focus on the access and continuity of the care, not that it’s cheap. Tie it to a specific diagnosis, condition, or a goal. Maybe you have lumbar pain and stabilization program. Maybe it’s a stress program. Maybe it’s a headache program. Any of those are fine, but it’s gotta be anchored to the value of an outcome, okay?

Not just the cost of the visit. I’m looking more to the outcome, and don’t tie the outcome only to pain, but their ability to maintain their lifestyle and function. Now realize prepaid packages could be a good start to this. Realize in every state you can do it. Some states like Montana and Florida do require that you put money into a trust account.

But for the most part, just keep it simply compliant that the patient understands what they’ve purchased. Maybe the single price is eighty dollars a visit or a hundred. But if you buy a package of ten, maybe it’s only sixty a visit or six hundred, but that’s six hundred paid up front. Make sure it’s a good financial understanding, meaning if the patient knows what they’ve pur-purchased, they sign a financial document.

Make sure there’s expectations from you as the provider, what you’re gonna give to the patient, but also to the patient, the expectations of the visits, the, continuity of care, what happens if they miss a visit and so forth. I would just say, “Okay, good. We’re gonna extend it.” But do make a plan.

Don’t just leave it open-ended ’cause realize to be compliant, there’s gotta be some type of refunds. Now, refunds would be if it’s unused, they get it back. But I would suggest just p-push it forward to a different plan. Make sure you’re making clinical differentiation. Again, not just pain, but conditions.

Maybe they work at a desk. Maybe they have a neck or back issue from that. Maybe they’re a runner. Maybe they’re, again, headaches, stress, sleep. You can name almost anything that you deal with. Think of the myriad of services that acupuncturists can help someone with. Start to tie it to that, not just the reduction of pain, but how those increase function.

Realize if I’m reducing a headache and the headache is gone the headache’s not there, but how does that tie into their sleep or to their lifestyle, their stress level, how they’re dealing with relationships? What about integrating some care? Pair your services with other things. Maybe you’re gonna pair it with some type of exercise program.

Maybe you pair it with some massage. Maybe you pair it with stretching. But think of the myriad of things. It could be yoga, tai chi, qigong. Think of all the places you could go with this for a patient to go, they’re gonna come in and get this 30-minute visit, then they’re gonna get maybe some guided exercise or an ability to just have a p- a space in your office to do it, even if you’re not one-on-one with them.

Bottom line, though, is give me some outcomes and objectives. Give them something they can measure and see, not just, “I feel better,” but there’s things they can do that where they’re better. Expand your cash-friendly services. What about setting up a community acupuncture? Think of this is why the j- not the joint, but modern acupuncture.

Realize modern acupuncture is struggling. I’ve seen a lot of them close because I think more and more offices like ours are beginning to integrate that in that you can offer that style. But what about adding to it? Again, soft tissue programs, guided exercise, or how about short tune-up care plans?

Something that, okay, this is a three-visit care plan or a four-visit, but make it something that’s accessible. What I would avoid is across-the-board discounts, okay? That’s the death knell, because you’re gonna attract price shoppers. Someone’s gonna go, “Who’s the cheapest today?” That’s not the type I want.

Remember, you’re not a 99-cent store. You’re a doctor. When I pick a doctor, I’m picking a doctor because they’re good. Now, it’s gotta be affordable and reasonable, but I’m gonna pick you because of what you’re offering, that outcome. So make sure that you’re giving them function and necessity, not wellness.

Make an emphasis towards how your care gives them an ability to work, sleep, daily function, athletic function, and recovery. If you wanna get a good place to get patients, join a gym. Get in there and work out. Dress nice. But the more people learn that you’re an acupuncturist, trust me, you’re gonna get people that wanna come to your services.

Realize people who go to the gym generally have higher than average incomes if they have a gym membership. They may even have decent insurance. Realize this doesn’t negate using some insurance, but this means we’ve gotta pivot for these types of patients. Bottom line is your proof. Measure the outcomes.

Now, what I say about bottom line is not the proof of the patient, your outcomes. When you make these changes, anything you do, whether it’s taking insurance, not taking insurance, doing packages- Track your visit averages. Track your revenue per visit. What’s the retention rate? Did this really work? You’ve gotta have a metric.

Think of it, it’s like going onto Shark Tank a little bit. You have to go on and say, “Did this work?” And if it doesn’t, that’s okay. We pivot and adapt. Realize a practice is always changing. This is why we call it a practice. It’s not a perfect. You wanna start to learn what to works. What does your community look for?

What are your goals? Your goals are what my goals are. You have a good, successful, fun practice. Acupuncture works well, but often people don’t understand it because they’re tied to the pain model. Let’s get them going beyond that. The American Acupuncture Council is always your support. My network is the big support.

If you’re a network member with me, reach out. Let’s get into some details here. Let’s do a one-on-one Zoom. Let’s spend some time together. If you’re not a network member, take a look here. This is something we’re really here to help you. Our goal, make your practices successful because without you, I lack success as well.

Until next time, my friends.

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The Questions I Get Most Asked About Facial Acupuncture Part 2

So for today, I would like to start out with contraindications. And this is a big subject because it takes into account.

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Hi, this is Michelle Gellis. I would like to thank the American Acupuncture Council for giving me this opportunity to speak to you today. This is part two of the top 10 questions that I get asked about cosmetic acupuncture. A lot of the answers to these questions came from my book, treating the Face. It is a comprehensive guide for acupuncturists and health professionals.

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It is a hardcover book and it is about 500 pages, full color book, and I talk in the book extensively. About how to set realistic expectations with a patient and how to answer their questions, whether it’s a potential patient or whether it’s a current patient. And during my training that I offer to acupuncturists and people who are trained and licensed to perform acupuncture.

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Is marketing information that they can hand out to their patients or put on their websites because a lot of these questions are questions that I get over and over again. And in my almost 25 years in practice and teaching I have found one of the top 10 questions that. People ask me. So last time in part one I talked about how does it work and how many treatments will I need before I get or before I see results?

How much does it cost last? How long do the treatments take? How long do they last? So if you miss part one, you can check that out as well. So for today, I would like to start out with contraindications. And this is a big subject because it takes into account. Two things. One is physical contraindications that patients might have that can be major red flags or maybe minor warnings before you treat them.

And then the other is things that your patients may have. Had done to themselves as far as any sort of treatments or procedures that can be either a minor or a major contraindication for your treating them. So let’s talk about physical. Contraindications to treatment with cosmetic acupuncture.

And the first one is I break it down into two parts. So it’s high blood pressure and you might be thinking a lot of my patients have high blood pressure. A lot of elderly patients have high blood pressure. How am I ever going to do this if high blood pressure is a contraindication? And what I say to you is this, if someone has treated, medicated or untreated high blood pressure, do not make this person or these people your first patient or patients.

You definitely want to treat a few. Healthy patients before you take on patients who have any sort of health conditions. And the reasons for this are you want to build up your confidence, your skills, your knowledge, and really get an idea of how powerful your treatments are before, you dive into someone who maybe has high blood pressure, it’s well controlled with medication, but you do a treatment on them and your treatment causes their blood pressure to shoot up and why would this happen?

The reason is. Cosmetic acupuncture by nature is designed to open the channels up to the face and head and really increase the blood flow, the flow of qi up to the face and head and left unchecked. If you don’t really have good skills or if you do too much, or if your patient’s blood pressure is a little high that day, you could give your patient a headache or worse.

So let’s assume you’ve been doing this for a while. You’ve done many treatments on many patients, and someone calls you and they say. They have high blood pressure. It wasn’t very high to begin with. It was maybe borderline. They’re on medication. It’s very well controlled In that situation, you could start out very slowly, very few points and check their blood pressure before and after.

Treatment and see how they do. They might be a better candidate for more intradermal needles or microneedling rather than treating a lot of chest, neck, face body points. That are designed to bring all this energy up to the head. In my protocol, I specifically have designed. The point structure so that it will bring that energy up.

But you could potentially leave some of those points out. And I talk about this in my classes. My classes are available, recorded and live throughout throughout the world. I, I taught classes all over the world, and you can check out my schedule on facial acupuncture classes.com and look into some of these concepts and some of the theories behind them.

So that, that is high blood pressure, a big conversation Also, pregnancy. You do not want to be bringing all this energy up to the face, head and neck when someone is pregnant. Also, there are points in my protocol that are designed like large intestine four to release things like impurities that would not be good for someone who’s pregnant.

So pregnancy is a contraindication. People who are just generally unwell you don’t want to be doing cosmetic acupuncture on them. People who are diabetic have seizure disorders. People who are very sensitive to needles. As far as contraindications. In my book, in my classes I have a release form and in it are all the different contraindications and all the reasons for them.

So there definitely are some physical contraindications and you would wanna check those out. Additionally, if someone has had Botox recently, you would not want to treat them for about three weeks after the Botox treatments ’cause they take about two weeks to settle in. I like to err on the side of caution and when I say Botox, any neurotoxin.

Dysport. Xeomin I don’t know the brand names of all of them. And then after that, they need to find out from whoever injected them exactly where the neurotoxin was injected. People sometimes forget, or they’re not quite sure, and you wanna avoid that area completely because. Doing cosmetic acupuncture in that area can cause the neurotoxin to wear off.

As far as other treatments such as fillers, peels, lasers any other surgeries on the face. I would direct my patient to the person who did the treatment, and have your patient ask that person. When is it safe for me to have cosmetic acupuncture? There are so many treatments out there now. It’s impossible for us as practitioners to know for each.

Level of chemical peel or laser specific laser treatment, and their practitioner should know the answer to that question. As far as a facelift, cosmetic acupuncture can make facelifts last longer, but because the face is going to continue to age after the facelift, but the cosmetic acupuncture can help.

So that it happens more slowly. And you definitely want to wait about a year after a full facelift before doing cosmetic acupuncture, mainly because of.

Issues that they might have with vascular issues, neuropathy swelling, those types of things. Okay. The next question that people ask me is do I need any specialized training before I do cosmetic acupuncture? I’m an acupuncturist. I know where the acupuncture points in the face are. And the answer is unequivocably.

Yes. In fact, the American Acupuncture Council does ask on whenever you go to renew your license, if you’re doing anything that is outside of the norm for acupuncture and you’re doing specialized treatments. And if the answer is yes, then they do require you to have specialized. Training.

And there are just a few of us in the US that are registered and certified to do cosmetic acupuncture training. I am one of them, and you can check out my classes@facialacupunctureclasses.com. But the reason for this is understanding safety. Around treating the face and neck and head, understanding all of the myriad of contraindications and precautions.

Also their underlying conditions, needle placement, these, and then having a protocol that you can follow that. Doesn’t require so many needles. I go on social media and people that have so many needles in their face, and it’s so not necessary. So specialized training is a must.

Bruising is another question that I get. If you are trained properly. If you are getting using high quality needles and precautionary techniques, such as using arnica gel and really understanding the anatomy of the face, my book has a whole anatomy chapter. The unique nature of treating the face, because the face is so heavily vascularized and the muscles are layered.

Some are thick, some are thin, some are tiny, some are large. Some are deep, some are superficial. Really understanding how to needle the face, understanding good. Precision needling techniques will really reduce the chance of bruising. I rarely bruise a patient, if ever anymore. And the last thing is, can cosmetic acupuncture help with other conditions?

And the answer is yes. When you know how to treat the face and in my classes I teach about facial motor points, submuscular needling, some scalp acupuncture. For treating the face, you can help with things like TMJ, Bell’s Palsy, trigeminal neuralgia. Stroke ms. Myasthenia gravis even facial herpes and a lot of different skin conditions that affect the face, like acne, rosacea, hyper and hypo pigmentation.

So this all, is included in a really good comprehensive facial and cosmetic acupuncture training. And you can be the facial acupuncture specialist in your area because it is a highly specialized training. I hope that answers some of your questions. Again, if you didn’t see part one, you can check it out.

This concludes part two and I want to again thank the American Acupuncture Council for giving me this opportunity to speak to you, and I hope to see you in class soon.

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The Questions I Get Most Asked About Facial Acupuncture Part 1

The first question that I get asked about cosmetic acupuncture. And this is a big one…

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Disclaimer: The following is an actual transcript. We do our best to make sure the transcript is as accurate as possible, however, it may contain spelling or grammatical errors. Due to the unique language of acupuncture, there will be errors, so we suggest you watch the video while reading the transcript.

Hi, this is Michelle Gellis. I am an acupuncture physician, and today I am going to speak to you about the top 10 reasons. This is part one of the top. 10 questions that I get asked both from practitioners and patients about cosmetic acupuncture. A lot of the information that I’m going to speak about today can be found in my my book.

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It’s called Treating the Face, and it is a comprehensive guide for acupuncturists and health professionals. It’s all about treating the face. It’s a 500 page hard cover, full color book. So you might wanna check that out. It’s available@facialacupunctureclasses.com. Okay. Before I get started, I wanna thank the American Acupuncture Council for giving me this opportunity to speak to you today.

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The first question that I get asked about cosmetic acupuncture. And this is a big one because I get this asked almost all the time, is does it work? And the answer to that is Unequivocably. Yes. And there have been numerous studies research studies that have been done, and a lot of them are cited in my book or journal articles that, you can research both on my website or online, and what they have found is cosmetic acupuncture helps to improve the. Thickness of the skin, the depth of wrinkles on the skin, the color of the skin, and the overall vibrance of the skin, both on the face, the neck, the chest, around the eye area. So it absolutely does.

Work. The next question that I get asked very frequently is, how many treatments will it take in order for these treatments to work? How many times will I need to come in? And that is actually a really big question because the answer is, it depends. The way I like to think about cosmetic acupuncture is it’s like going to the gym.

So if someone were to come to you, if 10 people were to come to you and say. How many times will I need to go to the gym before my muscles look like they look when I was in my twenties or before I am fit or before I lose X amount of pounds? The answer would of course be, it depends because it’s going to be dependent on.

With your skin, it’s going to depend on several factors, so it will depend on your age. And the reason for this is as we get older, it takes longer for our bodies to produce collagen. So that’s one important factor. Another important factor is your lifestyle. So that takes into. Account a lot of things.

How much sleep do you get? How much water do you drink? How much alcohol do you consume? Do you smoke? Exercise is a big factor because the skin needs oxygen in order to look good. And so smoking plays into that as well because smoking takes oxygen. Out of your bloodstream. Exercise also increases the blood flow of the skin.

And having a healthy blood supply is very important to vibrant looking skin. Also sleep. If you’re not getting enough sleep, your skin is not going to be going through that. Turnover and repair process. Sun damage is a big factor, so if you have a lot of sun damage, it’s going to take longer for you to see results and you might need more treatments, more in depth.

Treatments, longer treatments than someone who has no sun damage on their skin. Genetics play a big part in determining. How you will age. So both the shape of your face and just your, the thickness of your skin. Is your skin lighter or darker? All of these different genetic factors will play into how many treatments you need.

People with darker skin don’t. Show signs of aging as far as sagging and fine lines and wrinkles as people with lighter skin and people with thinner skin. And our skin tends to thin as we age, but some people just have thinner skin. People with thinner skin are going to show more signs of aging than people with thicker skin.

So that will also play into it. The foods we eat will also determine how we age. People who are eating nutrient core diet are going to look older than people that are eating a nutrient rich diet. It takes vitamin C and protein in order to build collagen. And collagen is the building blocks of our skin.

It determines the thickness of our skin and the how our skin is held up is through the collagen and the elastin. And also another thing going back to age hyaluronic acid, as we get. Older, we have less hyaluronic acid in our skin, and that is what makes the skin kind of plump. So you want to make sure you’re drinking lots of water, eating healthy fats.

Especially the omegas, the Omega threes really play into. The cell functioning and the cell turnover rate. Another thing that determines how many treatments you’re going to need is what sort of products are you using on your skin if you are not. Using quality products that have peptides and vitamins and different minerals.

Things like copper, zinc vitamin A, vitamin E, vitamin C in some cases, things like hyaluronic acid, serums, retinol, serums. There are. Lots of different ingredients that can go into serums and also day and night creams that you might put on your skin. These will affect how your skin ages and how many treatments you’ll need.

So really to summarize, if you look at the starting point. And how much sun damage, how the person is taking care of their skin, whether or not they’re exercising, sleeping, what they’re eating. Stress. I left stress out. Stress can certainly affect the skin. The facial expressions that we make can get etched on our face.

And in my book I have a whole chapter called the Anatomy of Expression. So people who are very stressed can get those kind of lines between their eyebrows. People who are depressed can show certain signs of aging. So these are all very important factors. All of that said a general rule of thumb for cosmetic acupuncture is once a week for about three months, so about 12 treatments once a week.

And most people, depending on where we’re starting, most people will at least begin to see. The effects of cosmetic acupuncture, and for most people, a good percentage of the people after that time, they can begin going to get treatments less often. Another question is, how much does it cost? And this is another, it depends question.

Depending on what you are including in your treatments. Whenever I do a cosmetic acupuncture treatment, I do acupuncture and I also do cupping. And while SHA and for most of my. Time treating patients. The bulk of my practice was in Maryland. I was in a very rural area, but I was charging anywhere between 150 and $200 US for a treatment.

And again, if you are in a major city like New York. Or Los Angeles, you might be charging a little more. I strongly recommend that you base the cost of the treatment on what it would normally be for you to treat a patient, and then half of that, so one and a half times the cost of a treatment because your patient will be in your treatment space for about an hour.

To end 15 minutes to an hour and a half depending on how quickly you work. On top of that, some people add in derma rolling, they add in red light therapy. So these things might be charged as an add-on to a standard cosmetic acupuncture treatment.

The next question that I get frequently is how long do the treatments take? And this kind of piggybacks on the last question, which is how much does it cost? And so you’re going to be. I tie the cost into how long the treatment is actually going to take, and usually once you’ve been in practice for a while, you can get your patient in and out of the treatment room in about an hour and 15 minutes.

Sometimes an hour and 30 minutes. It depends on whether or not you’re just treating the face, whether or not you’re going to be working on their neck how how many wrinkles they have, how much signs of aging are there, because you might wanna add in more needles and spend a little more time. But the good news is once the needles are in, they can rest on the table and you can go and treat another.

Patient. And another question I get a lot is how long do the treatments last? How long do they last? And this is also a, it depends question. So I’m gonna go back to what I was speaking about earlier, and that is normally people will come in once a week for several weeks, let’s say 12 weeks.

And then after that they don’t just stop going again. Think about the going to the gym analogy. So if you were going to the gym, you wouldn’t just. Stop going, but if you did stop going there would be a certain amount of time where you would still be noticing the effects until eventually they were off.

So for cosmetic acupuncture, I tell people once you’ve achieved the desired effects, at that point you can start coming less often. Every other week or once a month, once most of my patients have dis have achieved the desired effect. They start spreading their treatments out. They come once a month, just like if they were getting their nails done or getting their hair colored or getting a facial.

So that kind of answers the. How long do the treatments last? For some people treatments can last a very long time. I know. When I. Stop seeing patients during the pandemic. A lot of people were buying facial cupping and guha kits from me. They were doing a little self-care at home in addition to using their serums and their lotions.

Some of them were derma rolling at home. So these types of things can help to augment the treatments for at-home care. So this concludes part one of the top 10 questions that I get asked about facial acupuncture. I’d like to again, thank the American Acupuncture Council for this opportunity and we will see you next time for part two.