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Is AI Changing How Acupuncturists Are Found? – Michelle Grasek

 

So how is AI changing search engine optimization? There’s really two ways that AI has impacted SEO, and the first is that the way people are able to search for the answer to a question has changed.

Click here to download the transcript.

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 there. My name is Michelle Grasek. I’m a practicing acupuncturist and a marketing strategist and the host of the Acupuncture Marketing School podcast. And today we’re talking about how AI is changing search engine optimization and what we can do about it as acupuncturists and local brick and mortar small business owners.

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So before we get into that today, I would love to say thank you to the American Acupuncture Council for the opportunity to be here with you. All right, let’s get into the slides. So how is AI changing search engine optimization? There’s really two ways that AI has impacted SEO, and the first is that the way people are able to search for the answer to a question has changed.

So if you. Recall, and originally we would simply type a couple keywords into the search bar in Google and we’re gonna use Google as our primary example. I know there are other search engines, but really the one that owns everything as and is the most important is Google. So we’ll use Google as an example.

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So we used to just be able to choose a couple keywords like acupuncture, frozen shoulder, or maybe. Frozen shoulder acupuncture near me, just a mishmash of keywords and put them into a Google search. And of course we can still do that, but that used to be the most common way that people would search.

Now people can use their Alexa and ask full sentences, so there are, they’re using a voice search or they can type full sentences into chat GPT. So instead of just saying acupuncture, frozen shoulder, they can say things like. Can you find me at an acupuncturist specializing in frozen shoulder near me, or can acupuncture help my tennis elbow and X, Y, Z?

So these are more conversational, they’re full sentences, and these are called high intent queries because they indicate that a person is really very interested. In what we have to offer, right? They wouldn’t be asking about, natural alternatives for frozen shoulder or acupuncture specifically for frozen shoulder if it was not their intent to pursue that line of treatment.

Okay? We know that the way we are inputting our query has changed. It’s a lot more long tail keywords. So when you’re entering a whole sentence or multiple keywords or big concepts, that’s called the long tail keyword, right? And these long tail keywords are often conversational in tone, right?

They’re phrased as an entire question. And then we also know that AI is changing the output, that social, sorry, that search engines are providing as an answer to a question. So you may have noticed when you search on Google that up at the top, Google will give you an AI summary of the answer it thinks is most relevant and most accurate to your query.

And. Google also has a specific AI search, so let me skip ahead here for you called AI mode where you get a much more comprehensive AI generated response to your query. So as an example, I typed into AI mode in the Google search. I put in. Acupuncture to manage celiac disease symptoms near me. So this is a longer tail keyword, and this is the response that it gave me.

So first it says, yes, acupuncture is likely to be helpful for celiac symptoms, and then it went ahead and it listed the local. Acupuncture clinics. So my practice is very close to my house, so I knew that my practice was gonna come up, but I was curious what the ranking would be. I have a lot of content on my website about digestion and I really just wanted to see are we ranking for these kind of local searches for symptoms that we like to treat?

You can see it’s listing five different clinics and we’re at the top and it provides the most information about my practice. And now why is that? If you take a look at this, it’s summarizing the specific answer to the question about celiac symptoms. At some point in creating content on my website over the past six years, I must have mentioned that I have Celiac and that I have been using acupuncture to help manage those symptoms for a decade, and that contributes to the reason that I love to help patients with a variety of digestive conditions.

I know that I wrote this content, I don’t remember when, I have no idea what page it’s on, but it’s very specific, right? And it is. A direct answer to this question that was put into the search query and Google found it. And there’s a specific reason that I am sharing this with you. So to review the two ways that AI is changing search is, one, it’s changing the way that we ask questions of Google.

So the questions themselves have changed. And two, it’s changing the way that the search engines AKA Google are providing the answer. Okay? So as you can see here, it says results are summarized with relevant points and fewer clickthroughs are necessary because if it’s summarizing your an answer to a question, you don’t actually have to click through to that website that it’s referencing to read the same information.

Okay. So all of this is important to keep in mind when we ask ourselves, okay, those are the changes. What can we do about it as local brick and mortar businesses, as practice owners, and truly high quality, detailed content that talks about your specific experience and mentions local keywords is going to be more important than ever.

This AI models is referring to any, aI that’s built into a search engine. So we just saw, if we skip back here, this is AI mode in Google, but different search engines have different names for it. But AI really prefers content that is detailed, that it feels is going to be authentic because it mentions a real person’s experience or background or expertise, and also incorporates local keywords.

All of this in addition to mentioning the keywords relevant to the symptom that the person mentioned in their query. Okay. And we’re gonna talk about an exact page structure for a new page on your website that you can create, where you can incorporate all of these things. But I think this is really interesting.

We’re emphasizing that. The AI search part of search engines wants to ensure that the content it’s providing as an answer to a question is authentic and relevant, as opposed to providing really basic, vague information that may have been generated solely by ai. AI generated content is not a bad thing.

When I’m creating new pages for my website, I absolutely use chat GPT to help me. The important thing to note is that. If you ask chat GPT to help you write any content, the quality of the output is going to depend on the quality of the prompt that you give it. So you need to tell chat GPT about your target market, your ideal audience, your expertise.

You can tell it the things you want it to include. The things you do not want it to include, you can even tell it that this is going to be content geared towards SEO. So you need it to mention a specific keyword or phrase and your location, et cetera. Okay? So this is not to say that you can’t use AI to help you write these pages, either the content or the outline, but what you wanna avoid is.

Content that sounds very basic and generic that doesn’t reference any particular experience or expertise where the examples are really vague and just not helpful. I think you’ve probably come across that sort of content before. That’s probably AI generated content. Instead, what the AI search is looking for is deeper, right?

It wants more detail, it wants more testimonials about the symptom on the page. It wants more information, okay? Because that’s indicating that it’s authentic and it’s relevant and it’s most likely a good answer to the person’s question. So before we move on, I wanna emphasize that search engine optimization.

And really Google’s goal, everything Google is doing. It is about the user experience and we can maximize that when we are creating pages for our website for SEO. And what do I mean by user experience? Google cares very much that the answers it brings up to a search query are authentic, relevant, and useful answers to the actual question that was asked.

It does not wanna be tricked into putting a website at the top of a search. That actually doesn’t answer the question, right? So it’s become very savvy in that way because it wants to provide the best answer to a question. Do you remember Ask j Eves? It still exists. Lots of people don’t even think it exists anymore, but ask j Eves algorithms.

To answer questions we’re simply not as good as Google’s, and so Google really took off and asked j Eves got left behind. Google does not want that to happen. Okay, so it’s like Google wants to help you. It really does. If you are the answer to a question that someone type in, it wants you, it wants your business, but we have to help Google understand.

When our business is the answer to a question that’s been put in the search, that is our responsibility. And so how do we do that? We build out our website with deep rich content that talks about our experience as practitioners, our expertise that mentions our location and. Can include testimonials, et cetera.

All of the things that help Google feel like the content is authentic and specific to the search query. Okay, so you know, one thing I always ask my marketing clients when they are a little resistant to. Adding more content to their website is, is the content that’s already on your website specific enough that Google would know what kind of patients you want it to send you?

And if the answer is no, then we have to write about those symptoms and conditions. Otherwise, Google will have no idea exactly who to send us and it’s gonna send those people somewhere that is specific. Okay. One way of maximizing the potential of your website for the new way that AI is impacting search engine optimization is to write these long form detailed pages about specific symptoms or conditions that you wanna see more of.

Now, there are lots and lots of SEO strategies that you can use that are very effective. This is just one, and I chose it. For today, because it doesn’t require us to have any technical behind the scenes knowledge of our websites, it doesn’t really even require us to have much SEO knowledge. We are just writing a really good, thorough, detailed webpage and including a couple key elements so that.

Google understands when our website is the answer to a question that someone entered into the search. Okay? And so let’s talk about the detailed format for these symptom pages. I’m actually gonna skip ahead. And just run through an outline of this page and then I’ll show you a real time example. So a really nice format and you can pause and take a screenshot of this, is to have the the title of your page be.

Acupuncture four. And then the symptom will say osteoarthritis of the knee, if that’s something you’d love to treat in Rochester, New York, or whatever your town or neighborhood is. And then each one of these bullet points would be a heading section for the page. So what is osteoarthritis of the knee? How can acupuncture in Rochester.

Help with osteoarthritis of the knees. How many treatments do I need? What to expect for osteoarthritis of the knee for acupuncture? Frequently asked questions about acupuncture and osteoarthritis. Why choose your clinic name? Why choose Ageless Acupuncture? Schedule your first visit today in Rochester, New York at ages acupuncture.

Okay, so keeping all of that in mind, let’s look at. And I apologize. I thought I had this, oops. Pulled up for you.

Okay, so let’s look at a real time example of this. For diverticulitis I mentioned I love to treat digestive conditions, so we try to have these pages for the various digestive conditions that I really enjoy treating and want more of those patients. So you can see acupuncture for diverticulitis relief, and son falls.

I’ve got my keywords, which are acupuncture, the symptom. And my location. Okay, and then I’ve got my headings. What is diverticulitis? I’ve got a call to action button here. Make an appointment. How acupuncture might help with diverticulitis. How many treatments? Another button to make an appointment. What to expect.

Why choose our clinic Is acupuncture right for you and ready to make an appointment with of course, another button. Okay, so if we hop back to the slides. I wanna go back one slide here. So really what you are thinking about is. Answering a long tail question that you think your ideal patient would ask, and you can actually like if you think the question is going to be, can acupuncture help with my frozen shoulder?

That could be one of the headings on your page, and then you answer the question, right? It’s okay to have the question be verbatim as a heading on your page. Okay, and what you wanna do to help Google understand that you are. An authentic business to build trust with Google. So it knows that sending traffic to you is a good choice.

You are a good answer to the query. You can mention your professional experience. You can mention testimonials. For example, you could say 10 years in business treating digestive conditions just like diverticulitis. Or we have been in business for eight years and we have 45, 5 star reviews.

Okay. You can talk about a case study, of course, where you’re scrubbing any patient information, but you can talk about the improvement that you have witnessed in similar patients in the past, giving Google an idea that your real person and you, again, you are just a trustworthy source to send people to for the search query.

Okay. And making sure that over and over again you are including the symptom diverticulitis, for example, and your location. Rochester Seneca Falls in the headings going down your page. Okay? And I pointed out that I had multiple call to action buttons saying book now you wanna have. You don’t want people to have to look around and figure that out.

You wanna have multiple going down the page. I also recommend having internal links. This is very good for SEO and can help improve the rank of this page in particular and the pages that you link to. So on your symptom page, you can link to other relevant pages on your website. For example, if you say, why choose Seneca Falls acupuncture and then say our our acupuncturists have a combined 30 years of experience. You could hyperlink that to the about page on your website. Okay? And this just helps Google understand the structure of your website better. And anytime we’re helping Google understand us, it has a better idea of when we are the answer to a question, and it’s more likely to send people to us.

Okay?

And Oh, I apologize. It looks like I didn’t quite finish this page. So to review, why do these detailed symptom pages work so well? So one, they match people’s new search behavior with the long tail keywords or the full question queries, like full sentence. They also position you as an expert, not only for potential patients, but also for Google.

And they improve your local search rank. So it’s not just about including the symptom, but also about including your location over and over again so that Google knows like within what range are you the answer to this question. So here’s what I would love for you to do. I’d love for you to write two of these pages.

The reason I say two is that it can take three to six months for these pages to really, bring you a return on your investment of your time and your energy for Google to start sending people to these pages. So the more pages you can write now, the like the better results you’ll have later on. Okay?

So if you can only write one page right now, that’s fine. Certainly better than nothing. But if you can, if you have time to write multiple symptom pages. Please do think about your ideal patients and two conditions that you love to treat and want more of. It could be it could be anything, right? It could be carpal tunnel and fertility for women with PCOS.

Okay, and just follow the outline that I provided. Ask chat GPT for help. That’s totally acceptable, and publish them so that you get an enormous benefit down the road. So I really hope this is helpful. As always, if you have questions, you are more than welcome to. Send me an email, michelle@michelleGrasek.com and I would love to invite you to a new marketing membership.

I just launched. It is a low cost membership. It’s called the Snack Size Marketing Club. The idea is about taking. Small bite size. I love puns. Small bite size actions every week, which done consistently really add up to practice growth over time. So you can visit the Snack Size Marketing club@michelleGrasek.thinkific.com.

I’d love to have you as a member. And before I sign off today, I would like to thank the American Acupuncture Council. One more time for the opportunity to be here with you today. Talk to you next time.

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Bones and Hormones in Chinese Medicine – Moshe Heller

 

 

for letting me speak today about Bones and Hormones in Chinese medicine.

Click here to download the transcript.

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, my name is Moshe Heller. I am from Moshen Herbs, and I wanted to thank the American Acupuncture Council for letting me speak today about Bones and Hormones in Chinese medicine. And so let’s go to the slides. So I wanted to speak about this subject because I actually had three cases that I had in the my office lately.

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And. Those three cases all had to do with bone and they were different. And we’ll talk about that in a second. But there were also some similarities that I wanted to bring out. So the first case was this 14-year-old little. Guy who came to me with this, with an a genetic issue where his mandibular condyle and the Corona process of the left side were underdeveloped and did not fully grow as much as the other side.

So there was an imbalance, and when he was chewing, it caused him a lot of pain. Actually on the opposite side, on the right side ’cause there was a little more pressure on that aspect. He also felt that he was smaller than his peers. He really had a lack of appetite. And although he and although he gets tired easily.

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He does not really complain of being fatigued or having low energy. He has regular bowels, although he may miss a day here and there and he has some seasonal allergies, but hardly gets sick. So that was the presentation and it clearly shows an. Points toward a weakness in the spleen.

And that is something that we might address in this case as a main sort of issue. In the, in, in the case. The second case was a 6-year-old woman with a fracture. She fell and broke her wrist. Wrist and wanted came in to promote the healing and help in the healing process of her bone.

Although she had hot flashes and reported having gluten sensitivity and therefore bowels tend to be soft and and frequent, she was otherwise healthy. In that case although we might want to address this hot flashes, meaning that somehow points toward some yin vacuity and.

Issues of reg yin regulation and yin and yang regulation. The main point thrust in this case would be probably to promote the movement of qian blood to the area to promote healing. So we’ll see. Some more focus on moving qian blood. And the last case was this 45-year-old woman with osteopenia which means that the bones are becoming more.

Brittle and having less calcium in them. And she did experience early menopause. She was 45 and already had not been menstruating for a couple of years. Having hot flashes, sleep issues, low back pain, and tended to be constipated. So in general, what we see in her in this case is that we would.

Might focus on strengthening the kidney and and and yin in her case. So we see three cases here. All related to, bone structure and in all three cases we might use a different focus focal point to address them. And so I. I wanted to point out the similarities or the ideas similar ideas that we’re addressing in all three cases.

And for that I wanted to review the relationship of the bone to the organ organs and ubstance and substances in our body in Chinese medicine. And I, created these seven idea seven concepts that we need to maintain when we are working on. On Bones. The first one is Jing. We have, and we’ll talk a little bit about Jing in a second and what that means.

Jing and kidneys work together. The spleen is a, is energy needs to be evaluated and making sure that it is strong and effective because in order to build yin. Or Jing, the spleen needs to be strong. Then we also need to work on liver and heart. That also relates to circulation of Q and blood respectively.

So making sure the liver chi is flowing harmoniously and the heart chi is not blocked and therefore chi and blood. Are flowing and harmoniously in our body. That’s really super important to, to support bone growth and also of course, evaluating the chi and blood is sufficient and not deficient in any way, shape or form.

And also the last point. Is the triple burner, which ties everything together. The triple burner function should be very also in in balanced and uninhibited in order for it for the triple burner to control or support the formation of Yin and bone and Jing. And that is also through the relationship of the triple burner.

To the Yuan Chi. So it is the distributor of Yuan Chi throughout the body, and that’s an important concept to remember. I also wanted to make sure that we are remembering that their, the cycles of Jing are really especially significant in the beginning and at the end of our cycles. We have in the females a seven year Jing cycle and and for males of course, eight year cycles, and we can see that we’re the idea, the concept is we’re born with a hundred percent Jing and then we’re at, when we at the end of life, we end with. Zero Jing. So we are expending Jing throughout our life. And by the way, there’s an opposite curve where sheen on the other hand, we are born with zero sheen and end up when we end up our life with a hundred percent.

She. So it’s an opposite curve, but the most important thing I want to say is that. Especially at the beginning and at the end of this Jing Cycles, when we when we have issues with those aspects, we should be thinking of. So when there are issues with a Jing cycle, especially beginning and end whether there’s a somebody born with a weakness of Jing or.

The Jing has not been or has been expanded and there’s not enough jing at the end of life. Always the herb of choice or my thinking is always because it deals, it is addresses these imbalances in the be begin, beginning and end of life. When we’re thinking of building jing, usually it requires a multifaceted approach.

So Jing is very deep. Therefore we cannot just, put a few points and expect an increase in the gene. And although we believe that we are born with a certain amount of prenatal gene, there is a concept of postnatal gene. And postnatal gene is is influenced by or can be created when our life is balanced in all aspects.

Whether it’s diet, rest, activity, emotional, everything is balanced, then we have surpluses usually in production, and therefore we can keep them or make postnatal jing that supports and reduces the amount of the. Prenatal gene that we use on a daily basis. So when we’re thinking about this multi faceted approach, we should think of both acupuncture, herbs, diet and exercise, and emotional balance in life and how we can support that.

Acupuncture wise, we always think of. UB 11 as the point we, it’s influential point of bones and essence. So when we’re trying to bring more essence to the body, UB 11 is a point to we might think of and of for of course also. The influential point of essence is gallbladder 39, and of course we need to think of kidney points.

Kidney three as more of a yin point. Kidney seven is both yin and young. That’s why I always think of her as a supported support that it supports. Jing Postnatal, Jing Production and Kidney Nine helps to also support postnatal kidney Jing production. Herbs. We look at herbs that are usually black and dark.

And because then that points towards this kind of ability to support the Jing. As I said, Sudi Huang is one, but also HW. And Huang Jing. Huang Jing is a very important because it’s actually a chee to, and it allows the spleen chi to produce more jing. It’s a very powerful herb that we should always remember when we.

When we’re addressing Jing, Ruon, GR is another one, and Gu, both are Jing tonics and strengthen the kidney and the Jing. And are very important to, to include also from a dietary point of view, bone broth is extremely important and balancing this activity and rest and emotional state are all part of this process.

If the spleen is weak, nothing happens. Meaning we cannot transform our food and our tea and our thought and our anything. It creates a stagnation. And therefore, when we are addressing Jing, we cannot forget the spleen, especially when we’re talking to kids. Especially in this first case, although he’s 14-year-old, he’s in his moving him to his.

Second, he’s in the end of the second cycle of life. Still his spleen is showing weakness and therefore we need to fortify the spleen and work on, on strengthening his spleen so he can actually, I. Transform the Gucci and make actual excess high quality, separating the pure from the impure and creating high quality product that can be also transformed into postnatal jing.

So we think of points like spleen three, stomach 36, CV 12, and new B 20 to strengthen. The spleen as well as formulas example, formulas like Ong Ichi, tongue to uplift the spleen, qi or ling ba tongue if there’s a dampness hindering the function of the spleen. I. So these are just example. We always need to support diet and make sure that they’re not that they’re eating spleen strengthening food and supportive lifestyle for that.

So we also need to make sure that chi and blood are not deficient and are flowing freely. Chi and blood is something that we should have abundance of, and if there’s anything hindering in the production or the circulation, we need to address it. Making sure that the liver and heart functions are ble balanced and that’s something you need to check.

And we also, in terms of herbs, we might include things in a formula that we are addressing in each one of those cases. For example we could use a thing orb call, herb example is Git, which moves the blood and also can be used for cases in cases of va vacuity or Hui, which is another very important blood mover that helps with bone repair and building.

Woo. Yao is another QI regulator that I wanted to also point out ’cause it helps to move the qi, but it also warms the kidney. And if we want the kidney to be able to support bone building, that’s another herb we might be thinking of. And to conclude all this what we covered the triple burner ties, everything together makes everything possible.

So the it ta it, it plays an important part in the process of regulation, distribution, especially when we’re talking about kidney function. We can use herbs that affect the triple burner open or regulate herbs like WWE Zoo. We can include that in a formula that builds bone to help that things move freely.

Or a point like bladder 22, which is the black shoe of the triple burner. That to help that. Triple burner function and to regulate all three burners and making sure the kidney is gene is distributed where it needs to go. So the relationship between bones and hormones, that’s that’s another link between in the triple burner and from a Chinese medical perspective, there’s a close relationship between those two concepts.

I always think that essence and Jing. Has a relationship to the hormonal balance in our body. And a lot of times when we see hormonal shifts, we’ll see temperature fluctuations. And so it’s really important to understand that the manifestation of imbalances of hormones will. Manifest with heat, usually whether it’s deficient or excess somewhere in the body.

And we see that very clearly in, beginning in adolescence. There’s, we are seeing it in the beginning of life. We’re seeing it clearly in adolescence when there’s hormonal changes in heat, comes up. And we have acne and and a lot of smelly sweating as examples. And then in menopause, again, hot flashes of feeling imbalances in temperature.

So balancing in and yang in the end is what is important for all these things. I would like to again thank the acupuncture council for letting me present this. And I have the information here in the slide if anybody wants to connect with us with more information. And thank you again for the time.

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VA Recoupment & SEOC Updates – Sam Collins

That they’re not paying for exams and they’re also still recouping. We’re gonna talk a little bit about that, but we have to update from what we did in April.

Click here to download the transcript.

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.

Greetings, friends and colleagues. It’s Sam Collins, the coding and billing expert for acupuncture, the profession, of course, the American Acupuncture Council. Of course, I’ve got a little update coming up because obviously many of you have been contacting me, network members, and even others have contacted me.

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Say, Hey, Sam, what’s going on? I notice. That they’re not paying for exams and they’re also still recouping. We’re gonna talk a little bit about that, but we have to update from what we did in April. So let’s go to the slides. Let’s talk about what’s going on with recoupment and standard episode of care specific to acupuncture and frankly non-physician providers.

So you’ll see here is a letter dated June 23rd from Tri West and it says, we received the above claim. Let me bring it so I can blow it up. And it says. Try West. Receive the above-mentioned claim for your offer. And notice I highlighted and yes says evaluation and management procedure codes are not paid for this rendering provider specialty.

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This is the latest thing we’re seeing. It appears, and I’ve seen it absolutely published way that to me would make it more, but it appears they have taken the ability for acupuncturists to be paid. Separate exams when it comes to the va. That of course is very frustrating because of course is an exam necessary thing.

Of course, I to determine the need for care, to determine the continuation of care. So what’s recurring I think is maybe a Leo GE cut here at they’re eliminating the payment for exams. That doesn’t mean you don’t need one, they’re just not. Pay for it. I think it’s probably worth seeing the patient for the overall payments, but they’re not covering it.

We’ll see directly. Now the word that they did this in April, what I’ve seen when their newsletter is not quite clear enough for me. So I’m waiting to see the full publishing standard episode of care, but I’m sure many of you have met. Now. Here’s gonna be the pushback if the exam after April when they published it.

They’re gonna be am behind it because published, however, then I want you all to think of standard episode of Care for Acup Occupy. Whenever you notice the standard episode of care, you’ll notice whether it’s going to be initial chronic follow ups. They include e and M codes. You’ll see really, 9 9 0 2 to 2 0 5 9 9 2 1 to 2 1 5, and I bet pro your authorization has so my argument’s gonna be, they’re saying they’re not gonna cut well, if it’s after April, send an updated authorization, not listed, I’m waiting to see that, then I would say, okay, but if it’s prior dispute’s gonna be, how did you send me an authorization?

Clearly indicates exams and they’re, now, I’m not gonna pay for it. Now, it appears April. This is gonna true. But prior to, it’s gonna be a pushback. Now, is that very frustrating? Of course it is. But I’m gonna ask you, is it worth it to still be part of it? I do, because think of the overall payment on a VA patient.

You’re getting 12 visits to start, probably eight and eight to follow up. Assuming you’re doing three sets of acupuncture and a therapy or two, that’s maybe 110 to $150 of reimbursement. Am I going to take away potentially, three to $4,000 a payment? Because they’re not gonna pay for a couple of exams.

I prefer they do, but I’m gonna say I’m not gonna go that far. It’s something I think though we’re gonna be fighting. I shouldn’t say think. I know we’re gonna be fighting as a profession on a national level along with chiropractors and physical therapists, because this affects them too. Because this goes against the equality provision.

Equality says that if it’s within scope and you pay, other providers have to pay you because this is not Medicare. Now that’s gonna be a little bit of a fight, and that’s not gonna happen in short term. So when you get this, I do think we should dispute it. I would certainly push back if it were pre-AP April, that they should, if it’s after April, not so much.

Of course, if you’re a network member with me, reach out. We’ve got some letters for that as well. But I do wanna highlight also beyond that, just a couple of quick updates. Let’s talk about what’s happening and what’s gone on with doing. Things with 9 7 0 3 9 or 1 3 9, and that’s of course what a lot of offices have used for cupping.

Remember that was removed more than a year ago, so please do not use that code for cupping. It is not appropriate. I. Do not list it. They may pay it, but they’re gonna recoup it. So do not, if you’re gonna do cupping, use 9 7 0 1 6, which is a vaso pneumatic device. It’s not a high payer. It’s about 11 to $15, but at least you are being paid for it.

But again, do not use 9 7 0 3 9 and if they are recouping that, if it’s pre 2024. I would argue they can’t, but if it’s after 2024, they can. Now some people have argued. What about statute of limitations? Statute of limitations, I would argue certainly does apply. Unfortunately, you know what I’ve realized or what I’ve learned, the statute of limitations for the VA is actually six years, so we’re not gonna win on that one as far as this goes.

The other thing here is, and this has come up recently because obviously a lot of you are using pain indexes or similar. To verify how the patient’s improving. I recently had an office, or actually a few that they were denied few further care because they weren’t showing at least a seven point difference on the general pain index.

I really like the general pain index. It’s certainly the similar to the pain interference. Make sure though, if you’re using it. If you’re doing it once a month, there’s gotta be at least a seven point change to be considered significant. Now, most of you, I hope, are getting bigger than seven point changes, frankly, but if you’re not realize it’s going to be a problem ’cause they’re gonna push back, which means you also have to focus in what if I’m using the pain scale?

That also has a limitation, which means it’s gotta be three points or more. Obviously if I say I’m a seven, I go to a six. That means I’m better, but it’s not considered significant. So if they start at seven, the next time you do it to really be considered significant, say on re-exam, it’s gotta be four.

So a three point difference, I would say. Then obviously those two factors are important. If you’re not getting at least one three, you better focus in on something about activity, particularly a home or work activity that couldn’t do before. What they care about is the getting better. Because remember, once they’re stabilized, they have to be on a continua care with flareups.

So keep in mind, acupuncture works well. We need to demonstrate it. Show me on this general PEX pain scale or function, how much improvement there is. Now, this brings me to, for some of you, and I’ve had this question a lot, is being part of the VA worth it? Does it cost anything to join? No. Do the patients sometimes have some hassles getting authorization?

Yes, that’s true. But when you’re paid. Let’s go over it. If you’re getting a standard episode of care for 12 and eight visits, just say the first two 20 visits in a year, considering just the treatment, that’s probably 2000 to $2,500 now, even with taking out exams. Is that worth it to me? Absolutely.

However, am I frustrated with the exam part not being paid? I am. But at the same token, that’s not gonna stop me, but this is where if you’re not part of your state and national association, this is where we need to belong. ’cause this is where we need to push back because how are they treating us differently?

Now the downside is they are doing it to chiropractors. I. To physical therapists as well as massage therapists. So it’s not just you. But at the same token, I think it’s valid to say that it should be covered. ’cause how are you supposed to determine care without an exam because they’re doing this based on a Medicare rule?

Medicare only sets the fees for the va. It’s not the protocol. ’cause if that were true, they shouldn’t pay for acupuncture at all unless it were chronic low back pain and under supervision. So we know that they’re just. Choosing and picking certain ones. So I think we’re gonna have a pretty good pushback, but I do still, it is worth it if you’re thinking, I’m not so sure we are doing next month in August, a whole seminar on the va, what to do, how to make it work for you, make sure you tune into that.

Otherwise, I’m gonna say to everyone, we always want to be resource. If you’re having issues, reach out to American Acupuncture Council. The next specifically, we highlight updates right on our website. And if you’re a member, it allows you to have direct interaction with me via calls and zooms. And otherwise, until next time to my friend, be well.

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Treating The Face, Healing the Whole Part 2 – Michelle Gellis

So there are quite a few neuromuscular conditions that affect the face, such as Bell’s Palsy, Ramsey Hunt Syndrome, synchronic cys, stroke, TMJ, trigeminal Neuralgia,…

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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, my name’s Michelle Gellis. I am an acupuncture physician, and I would like to thank the American Acupuncture Council for this opportunity for me to present to you today on treating the face a multidimensional approach. So today we’re going to do part two. And you can go ahead and go.

So a little bit about me. I’m currently on the doctoral faculty at Jossane University. Before that, I was a faculty member and clinic supervisor at the Maryland University of Integrative Health from 2003 until 2021. I am a published author and contributor to the Journal of Chinese Medicine and I’m a regular columnist for acupuncture today.

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And I’ve been treated teaching facial acupuncture classes internationally since 2005. My book Treating the Face was released in November of 2024. It is a 500 page 15 chapter, hard cover book, and it covers all aspects of treating the face. I’m going to talk mostly about the information that’s in chapter six, and that is neuromuscular facial conditions.

So when we think about facial acupuncture, we tend to think about cosmetic facial acupuncture. But facial acupuncture is really about a holistic approach to not just treating the face. Cosmetically, but also all different aspects of treating the face. So there are quite a few neuromuscular conditions that affect the face, such as Bell’s Palsy, Ramsey Hunt Syndrome, synchronic cys, stroke, TMJ, trigeminal Neuralgia, Ms.

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Whoops. Ms. Ptosis, HEFA spasm, myasthenia gravis, shingles, and facial ticks, just to name a few. And many of these are very unique to the face itself. And. Since I specialize in treating the face, after a few years of doing cosmetic acupuncture, I started getting people calling me, asking me if I could help them with a lot of these neuro conditions.

And through studying and doing a lot of research. I and some trial and error. I learned that the best way to really manage these conditions is through a multifaceted approach using scalp, acupuncture, submuscular needling, facial motor points, facial cupping. And so I’m gonna touch on these, the.

And so Scalp acupuncture is based on neuroanatomy. It is not based on acupuncture points. And you have to measure the scalp appropriately. And there’s a motor area and there’s a sensory area, and the bottom two fifths of each one of these lines, the sensory area is not shown on this picture. The. The bottom two fifths corresponds to the face, and so you would needle this area and stimulate it either with electro acupuncture or with manual stimulation in order to help with either motor conditions such as Bell’s palsy or with sensory conditions such as trigeminal neuralgia.

Facial motor points. This is from an old medical textbook. These are the motor points that have been discovered on the face, head and neck. And in part one of this talk I talked about using motor points for cosmetic concerns, but facial motor points are wonderful for neuromuscular concerns because what a motor point is the most electrically acceptable part.

The muscle where the motor neuron goes into the muscle, and by stimulating it, you can cause the muscle to get back into normal functioning. And the reason why this is important for the face, besides the functioning of opening the lid or closing the lid, the. Skin on the face is directly attached to the muscle.

So if someone’s face is paralyzed and is drooping in one area by getting the muscle back into normal functioning, by stimulating the motor point, the skin itself will. Snap back and be working in a more normal fashion with the muscle. So I do have examples of a couple of motor points. This was a student of mine in class and she had.

Had Bell’s Palsy many years ago and was still having trouble cursing her lips, whistling spitting like when she’d brush her teeth. And so I did the Mentalis Motorpoint and as soon as I put the needle in. Her chin started to twitch and then when I stimulated the point, it really started to jump.

And then after the treatment, she reported that she was able to make a lot of facial expressions that she hadn’t been able to make in the past.

Next example I have is a student in a class I was teaching in London and he had been in a bike accident and he had some neuropathy and a little ptosis on his left eyebrows and. I put this needle and stimulated it. So this is the motor point for the frontals. It’s gallbladder 14.

Sorry, that was so loud. But you could see the needle moving back and forth when, once it was put in the muscle, which meant it was starting to wake up. Submuscular needling is another technique that I use, which involves needling underneath and in some instances through a muscle in order to.

Blood and cheese circulation into the muscle itself. And I have a little demo here, which I.

Facial cupping and GU can also be very beneficial. For neuromuscular facial conditions, as long as your patient can tolerate it. These techniques are very gentle if done properly, and can help with blood and cheese circulation into the face. It can help with any sort of fascial adhesions. That is because over time.

If a muscle in the face isn’t used, the fascia can become stiff, and by using the cups it can help with lymphatic, the lymphatic system of the face, and it’s also very relaxing and very enjoyable for your patients. I am gonna talk really quickly about Bell’s Palsy. Bell’s Palsy is the most common cause of facial paralysis, usually temporary, and it’s caused by a disruption of the facial nerve, which causes either weakened or paralyzed facial muscles.

So here’s one patient you can see. This entire when asked to smile, they can only, she can only smile on one side of her face and the other side is completely paralyzed. This was a patient of mine. I only focused on her eyes, but I asked her to close her eyes. You can see one eye closed and the other one.

She could not close it at all. And then I did some submuscular needling and some acupuncture points and used gallbladder 14 as a motor point, did some scalp acupuncture for the face, and, after one month,

you can see she can close her eyes. Still a little difficult, but she had complete recovery.

So I do offer many different classes on. Facial and cosmetic acupuncture, you might wanna check those out. You can scan the QR code or go to my website, facial acupuncture classes.com and you can find me on social under my name, Michelle Gellis, or I have a Facebook group called Facial Acupuncture.

Very active group. Thank you so much.

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7 Networking Tips for Introvert Acupuncturists – Michelle Grasek

 

 

So before we begin, I’d like to talk really briefly about why it’s worth it to try networking as an introvert.

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Hi there. My name is Michelle Grasek. I am a practicing acupuncturist and the host of the Acupuncture Marketing School podcast, as well as the lead instructor for acupuncture marketing school, the online class. And today I am looking forward to sharing with you some really helpful, practical tips to make networking more.

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Comfortable and effective for introverts. And before we dive in, I’d like to thank the American Acupuncture Council for the opportunity to be here with you today. All right, let’s get into the slides. I.

So before we begin, I’d like to talk really briefly about why it’s worth it to try networking as an introvert. I have found over the years, I’ve been teaching marketing in our industry for about 11 years, and I found that. Most acupuncturists are introverts, at least the ones that come into my orbit, which is maybe not surprising because I am also an introvert.

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So I’m speaking from personal experience as well as what I’ve been sharing with my marketing students and clients over the past more than a decade. And most introverts will say, why? I don’t want to do that. Why would you suggest networking? So first of all, if you, if you’re watching this, you’ll probably have some level of interest in trying networking, but I always tell people to think about your marketing, like an experiment, try new things.

You might be surprised about what’s a good fit for you and what’s effective in your community. And if you try something and it doesn’t work for you, that’s okay. You don’t have to do it anymore. Commit to other ways of getting visible in your community. But the reason I always recommend that introverts at least try networking is that, especially using these tips I’m going to share with you to make it more comfortable.

Networking is an incredibly effective way to build trust in your community. And really, marketing for acupuncture is about building trust. It’s about helping people understand that acupuncture can help their symptoms and trust. Trust you to put needles in them, trust in making a financial investment feel safe, sharing their personal health information with you their story, their background, et cetera.

So we need to build a lot of trust in our marketing as acupuncturists and any sort of in-person interaction builds trust very quickly. And I think we, we really can’t, we really have to acknowledge how significant a referral is from someone who knows you, right? That’s a very trust building type of marketing, a personal referral, and that’s our goal with networking, is building relationships so that people get to know us so that they feel comfortable referring people to us and also so that we are top of mind.

If they’re speaking to someone about acupuncture or maybe our specialty or something we’ve discussed, so they can say, oh wait, I know an acupuncture from my networking group. Okay. So that’s why I think it’s worth it for introverts to try networking because it really is very effective because one-on-one conversations and getting to know people in person, that’s what builds a strong referral network.

Okay, out of all of these seven tips I have saved my personal favorite for last, the one that I think can make the biggest difference in how comfortable you are with networking. But I hope that all of these are really useful for you. So let’s dive in. The first tip is to always bring a friend with you.

If you are an introvert, going to a networking meeting, there’s absolutely no reason that you should torture yourself by trying to go alone. Most of my. Introvert marketing students and clients have told me that they’ll say they’re gonna go to a networking, they’ll make the commitment and then it will approach and they’ll feel pretty nervous and bail at the last second.

So bringing a friend. It has two purposes. One is there’s accountability because if you’re meeting someone there or if you’re gonna drive together, this person is expecting you to show up, right? So it makes people much more likely to show up and go to the event. And of course, bringing a friend or an acquaintance gives you.

Kind of a fallback so that you know at any point during that networking event, there’s always someone that you can talk to that you can find or turn to. So you’re never just standing there alone awkwardly with a drink. ’cause that’s the thing people tell me they’re afraid of the most, is walking into this big space filled with strangers and a lot of people, and having to stand there by themselves until someone approaches them and introduces themself.

Or having to get up the gumption to approach a group of people who already seem like they know each other. It can feel a little cliquey. It’s really hard to just walk up to them and introduce yourself alone, right? So bringing a friend helps soften all of these things and gives you accountability and also helps you have someone to talk to in case maybe you’re having a nice discussion with someone you just met and they see someone else they know and they have to go.

You can always turn and chat with your friend. Now, I would say the one thing you wanna be careful of if you bring a friend is do not only speak to each other. That is also very common, right? So you have to make a pact, make a commitment beforehand that you are going to try to meet other people and you’re not just gonna stand in a corner and only talk to each other.

Okay. Bring an extrovert friend if you can, because obviously they are going to be a little more comfortable in the situation and probably get you introduced to more people. And lastly, when I say bring a friend, it doesn’t, it could be just like a. Personal friend most networking events, you can bring a plus one, but it could also be your receptionist or it could be a fellow business owner.

Okay? So just someone that you’re already familiar with makes a huge difference. So tip number two is a big mindset shift that matters a lot. It helps a lot. Often people tell me they don’t wanna do networking because it feels pushy and salesy and they’re just expected to hand out business cards to as many people as possible and try to get someone on their calendar.

And if they don’t schedule a new patient, they feel like it was a waste of time. So this is way too high pressure, I think. It’s much more useful to think about networking as a long-term game in which you are becoming a member of this community. If it’s the Chamber of Commerce or BNI or Toastmasters, whatever it is, your goal is to build relationships, which is building trust so that people get to know you well enough that they wanna refer people to you and that you’re top of mind.

And. I think that approaching it from this perspective takes a lot of pressure off because you get to be yourself. You’ll probably make some. Fellow business owner friends, and you can also think about how can I be a resource for other people in this community? How can I get to know them and understand like what are the things that they might need help with?

Who can I refer them to? I just had my roof done and then I hear so and so is talking about getting their roof done. I have someone who did a great job for me, and I can share that, right? So think about this as. Taking time to become part of a community where you can be a resource and other people can be a resource for you.

You can support each other and refer to each other. Okay. But it doesn’t have to be the kind of thing where you’re just throwing your business cards out at everybody who walks by and you’re trying really hard to convince people to get on your calendar. I will say, if you are speaking to someone and they seem really interested in acupuncture.

Do ask if they wanna get on your schedule and pull up your app on your phone and say, oh, I could put you in right now if you’d like. Don’t miss that opportunity. I’m just saying that, if you go to a networking meeting and you feel like I didn’t get a new patient from this event, that is normal.

That’s not really how we are thinking about the purpose of this exercise. Okay. Which also brings to mind that, relationship and trust building. Takes not only time, but repetition. So it is very important to try to go to these events regularly, right? If there’s a monthly meeting, trying to go to most of them is really helpful for building relationships.

You become a familiar face. Tip number three is I think it can be very fun. You can host your own event. Now, most introverts prefer to be in control of the environment, we’ll say. So let’s say that really big noisy meetings with a ton of strangers. Are just not your cup of tea, but you still wanna get to know some people in your community.

You could, for example, host a networking event in your office for fellow wellness providers. You could invite, I don’t know, four to 10 very specific people. You could keep it brief, maybe 45 minutes. And this works for a lot of people because you’re in control of the location. The duration, the number of people and the specific guests.

And that helps a lot of people just enjoy the event more and feel like it’s not so overwhelming. I. I also think it’s really a great idea to host this kind of event in your office because then people can see what your space is like. It’s gonna bring up questions about acupuncture for them, and it helps build trust because now they can picture themselves being comfortable in your office space, and they can easily extrapolate that to getting a treatment or referring someone to get a treatment there.

So again, ideally if you’re gonna host your own networking event, you’d want it to be repeated so that you can build relationships with these specific people that you’re inviting. I know some wellness people who do this, and it’s a book club. So they invite, like the wellness business owners, the wellness entrepreneurs in the area, and everybody reads like a wellness oriented book.

And then they discuss and then. It’s very casual. It evolves into other conversations between people. Okay. So think about how you might make this event something you’d actually enjoy going to. Most of my introvert friends and colleagues really like reading, so that could be a nice way to make this something that you actually look forward to.

Tip number four is to practice some conversation starters before you get to a networking event. And I, this is one of those tips that is actually so helpful and effective, but it’s so basic that people don’t do it. They’re like yeah, that’s not gonna help me. It will really help, especially if you’re an introvert and especially if you practice your sentences out loud.

And again, I know it sounds lame, just give it a try. I before your next event come up with a couple questions that you can ask. We’ll say just two questions to have in your back pocket that you can ask new people. Say, if you are standing next to the buffet. Or if you are maybe you’re already eating and you’re standing in a corner and there’s a group near you and you wanna get an in with them, come up with two questions that you can start a conversation with.

And these are so basic, they just need to be open-ended. So no yes or no questions and focus on the context that you share with this person. So if you are just meeting them, probably the only thing that you know that you share is the event, the location. The food, if it’s a charity fundraiser, then you’re both here for that reason.

So you share that. But you could start a conversation simply by making eye contact with someone and then just saying I see you got the shrimp. Do you recommend it? So basic, right? You can also think about, let me back up. I would have two of those types of questions, right? If it’s a charity event, your other icebreaker question could be, why do you support the Boys and Girls Club of America?

Or something like that. But practicing those questions out loud and mentally preparing to have them helps you actually say them out loud when the moment comes. ’cause I know that a lot of introverts. It’s, they have a hard time being the first person to speak, okay. Which is necessary for meeting new people at these events.

Okay, so pick two super basic icebreakers about something that you have in common with this other person, and then just go for it. Okay? The other thing is that. People love to talk about themselves. So an icebreaker question that I like to use, and this maybe isn’t an icebreaker because it’s not like the first question, but when I’ve been introduced to someone new I like to ask about their history in their career and also.

What is their favorite part of their job? So for example how did you get into real estate or what inspired you to become a chiropractor, or what’s your favorite part about being a massage therapist? People like to talk about themselves. These are open-ended questions and they help. They’re memorable questions because it’s not every day that a stranger says to you, what’s your favorite part about your job?

It really requires them to think and hopefully they like their job and they’re gonna feel enthusiastic and passionate as they’re answering you, and they are going to remember you. This is a memorable question, and again, our goal is partly to stay top of mind. We want to be memorable. Okay, so again, I know these are basic.

Give it a try. Tip number five is to try speed networking. So hear me out. I always think this is a little funny, but can actually be an enjoyable experience even if you are an introvert. It’s just like speed dating, but it’s just to meet new business owners locally. Or professionals locally. So you spend three or four minutes with someone, you exchange business cards and then a bell rings and you move to the next station.

So just like speed dating, but for professionals. And the beauty of this for introverts is that it is structured so you don’t have to walk into a big room and try to introduce yourself to strangers. You know that you’re gonna sit in this spot. And then other person’s gonna sit with you, you get to talk, the bell rings and you move on, right?

There’s no awkward standing around or introductions. And because it’s fast paced, there is no time for awkward silences. So the downside of this, of course, is if we’re trying to do relationship building, this is quick and superficial for that to happen. So what I recommend is when you are done with the event, if you met 15 people.

Pick the ones who you are really interested in getting to know, or you think you could be supportive of each other. You wanna build a relationship with them and send them an email, ask, do they wanna collaborate or could you buy them a coffee? Okay. And then that really can get the ball rolling to build that connection.

Okay? So tip number six is to ask. Anybody that you know at the event for an introduction. So people love to, be connectors and introduce us to other people that they think will genuinely enjoy. It’s like it gives them an endorphin hit to be helpful in that way. So let’s say you go with your receptionist, they’re the friend that you bring to the event and you say to them, do you know anybody here?

And they’re like actually I know one person. They’re standing over there oh, could you introduce me to them? And usually that one introduction has this ripple effect where, you’re gonna talk to that person in a group, you’re gonna meet other people, and then you’ll be carried along that wave for the rest of the meeting, whether it’s like an hour or 90 minutes.

So just one introduction can really help start that process. And let’s say that you get there and you don’t know anybody right away, but you manage to introduce yourself to one person. Even if you just met this person, you can say, Hey, thank you so much. It’s been so nice to get to know you before you, go mingle.

Would you introduce me to someone that you think would be interesting or can you just introduce me to one person? And they trust me, they’ll be happy to do this. Okay. They’re never gonna say no watch and see how their eyes light up and they’ll be like, oh yeah, I’d love to. Okay. So the last tip, and one that I find incredibly helpful is to get to know the people who are hosting the networking event.

So this is assuming that you are going to regular events. For example, the. Monthly Chamber of Commerce small business mixer event, whatever they call it. I’ll share a personal story with you. Since I’m an introvert as well. I have always felt very uncomfortable going to networking events by myself and walking in the door and just being confronted with these groups of people who know each other very well, and they’re.

Standing together, it feels very cliquey and I just stand there awkwardly with my drink. So it occurred to me that maybe it would be helpful to get to know the employees at the Chamber of Commerce. So what I started doing was when they were hosting fundraisers, I volunteered with them a couple of times and just through volunteering, I think three times.

I became such a familiar face to them and they’re, they’re so appreciative when you’re volunteering to help them at a fundraiser that whenever I go to a networking meeting now, I always am greeted by them like an old friend. And. It makes it that there’s always somebody at the networking event that I know I can speak to.

’cause there’s five employees at the Chamber of Commerce. So even if they’re not all there that day, I know at least one of them will be there running the thing. And I can approach them and I can say hello. We can have a nice chat. And I usually ask them. While we’re here, can you introduce me to someone new today?

Which they love doing ’cause that’s literally their job. But I found that getting to know them through volunteering with them was really helpful because, I walk into a Chamber of Commerce meeting now and they’re like, oh, hi, how are you? And that has really expanded with each person they’ve introduced me to.

Okay. They, and it’s I’m a regular. You know what I mean? That makes the pressure to go by myself so low because I know when I get there, there’s gonna be people who are basically my friends now. Okay, so don’t underestimate this tactic. I guarantee if you message the Chamber of Commerce and ask if you can volunteer with them a little bit, they’re going to say yes and be so grateful and always happy to see you.

Okay, so I hope this was helpful. Just keep in mind that networking is a long-term game and you are there to build trust, build relationships, make business friends, become part of a referral community that is genuinely supportive. And I think this will make the experience more enjoyable, less stressful, and overall more effective.

Okay. So as always, if you have questions, I would love to chat with you. My email is michelle@michelleGrasek.com and I really hope you’ll listen to the podcast, acupuncture Marketing School. And before I go today, I would like to thank the American Acupuncture Council, one more time for the opportunity to be here with you today.

Have a great day.

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Qigong and the Internal Branch of the Kidney Channel – Brain Lau

 

One of the things we were doing is evisceration and kind of exploring those internal branches of the channel. So this is gonna be a very anatomical perspective of that internal branch of the kidney channel. We’ll go over the anatomy.

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Hello, thanks for joining and thanks to the American Acupuncture Council for having me again. My name’s Brian Lau and I teach with the Sports Medicine Acupuncture Certification Program. I also have a YouTube channel, Jingjin Movement Training, where I go over a lot of channel oriented approaches to movement, especially for the Jing J or channel Send You Perspective.

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So check out my YouTube channel if you get a chance. You’ll see some very similar ideas that I’m gonna be presenting today. So what we’re gonna be looking at today is we’re gonna dive into the internal branch, or at least a portion of the internal branch of the kidney channel. In sports medicine, acupuncture.

We have some three day cadaver dissection classes, and I just finished one. I. One of the things we were doing is evisceration and kind of exploring those internal branches of the channel. So this is gonna be a very anatomical perspective of that internal branch of the kidney channel. We’ll go over the anatomy.

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We’re gonna look at some netter slides. We’re not gonna look at cadaver images, but they’re drawn from, or they’re illustrated from cadaver dissection. Very good illustration, so we should get a somewhat of a clear idea. What those internal branches look like. There’s really no substitute to doing it in person though, but this will be pretty good.

We’ll get a little bit of a window into that internal branch of the kidney channel and then we’re gonna look at a very simple movement exercise that will kinda stretch, move some of those fossil planes engage that internal branch of the kidney channel. This is something you can do for your own cultivation and development.

It’s also a very easy exercise to give to patients. So I’ll give some thoughts on prescribing it to patients. So a lot to look at, but it’ll be a fairly easy and straightforward exercise that we can we can extrapolate from that to be able to put movement into that portion of the channel to really be specific in our thought process for the movement through that plane.

So let’s start with looking at the channels. We’ll go to the presentation. And start right away from one that you’re very common and familiar with is this Deadman image from a manual of acupuncture. We know the kidney channel, so you know, the kidney channel coming up, the medial portion posterior or medial portion of the thigh up into the abdomen.

I would say at the level of the transverse abdominis when you’re needling, that, that would be deep to the rectus abdominis and getting the deepest abdominal layer. Then it goes up into the chest and terminates, but. We’re gonna look at this internal branch, especially in the abdomen area. So let’s zoom into this area that goes from the urinary bladder and to the kidneys.

Many people think this follows the ureters that makes sense, but we’re gonna be looking at a whole fascial plane. First off, let me say from this Deadman illustration that from an illustrative standpoint, he draws or not whoever the illustrator is, they draw this much bigger. The kidneys are very large and it looks like this.

Whole internal branch is very anterior, but that’s not particularly it’s useful for the illustration to see the structures, but it’s not very informative of where this actually lives. It would be just posterior to the midline. So if you think about this internal core, this portion of the internal branch is gonna be on the back portion of the core.

And by core I don’t mean core musculature, I’m talking about the central. The the peritoneal cavity, this is in the back. This is retroperitoneal, so it’s closer to the front of the spine, closer to the back, but it’s pretty center back center. So keep that in mind from this illustration. When you come back and use this as a guide, understand that this is not forward as we’re seeing in the illustration.

So let’s look at some netter images and get a little clarity. So first thing, this is the anterior, the ventral portion of the peritoneal cavity. This isn’t the target we’re looking for today. I just wanna walk you in. This would be pretty much the approach we do when we do eviscera evisceration, where we’re taking the ventral cavity.

We’re taking the contents of the peritoneal cavity out of the body, putting them on a table to study. They’re still connected through their peritoneal connections. They’re still all, it’s all one piece. It’s still organized. You just have to put it on a table and you can study it out of the table instead of trying to look in the ventral cavity.

But when we first start, everything’s intact. So we’ve, reflected back the abdominal muscles. We’ve cut open the peritoneum. This would be the first thing and what is the stomach. You might see a little portion of the liver, but it’s a little more buried under the ribcage, the stomach, and the greater omentum hanging off of the stomach.

It’s not the subject of this of this presentation, but I can note that this, in my opinion is what’s being described by the internal branch of the lung channel because this greater momentum hangs off the stomach much like it’s described as connecting with the stomach. It hangs off the stomach if you lift the greater momentum up, which you can do very easily unless there’s been a lot of peritonitis and scar tissue.

You’ll see that the transverse colon is attached intimately right to the back surface of that greater momentum. And when you look back at the lung channel, it comes off the stomach and links with a large intestine. I think they’re not describing a channel per se, but a plane they’re describing anatomy with this particular internal branch.

We could go more into that another day, but just to highlight the start of what we’re looking at, because once we have that ventral cavity open. We’re gonna start to come in and gently cut away the abdominal contents from the parietal peritoneum from the peritoneal wall. So that’s gonna be our first access.

And over time it’s gonna maybe look something like this. I’ll tell you when we do evisceration, we’re cutting the intestines out also. But we’re gonna come around the intestines and go behind them to the posterior abdominal wall and eventually. You’re gonna see the strong connection of the small intestines to the root of the mesentery that goes basically from the jejunum all the way to the ileum.

So I put this slide in here just to highlight how stronger bound the abdominal contents are to the back of the abdominal wall compared to the front of the abdominal wall. But it also gives us a window in how we would do the evisceration would be coming around the intestines. Maybe this image doesn’t quite show that as well as this image.

This image is showing a cross section so I can see where I might bring that scalpel around the intestines and cut it away from the abdominal wall. I’m gonna follow in front of the kidneys and in front of the perren fat, which is generally much thicker than what in this in this image.

I’m gonna come around the inferior vena cava. Generally, when we do evisceration, we go behind the pancreas. The pancreas, at least a majority of it is retroperitoneal. So you could go in front of the pancreas. We usually go behind the pancreas, take the spleen out, and take the whole abdominal contents out.

So you know, you have one person lifting up. Pulling everything to the right while there’s gentle cutting, maybe move, pull to the left. Gentle cutting. Eventually we bring the whole abdominal contents up, bring the liver away from the diaphragm, clamp the bowels, cut those so we can eventually lift everything and remove the abdominal contents.

And once that happens, this is what something like this. This is a pretty good illustration that doesn’t quite. Look like it would be in, in a a real body. It’s simplified a little bit to make it a little bit easier for, for study for med students and such. But we’ll see that the intestines were removed.

Some things were kept in this case, the pancreas was kept in this netter image. Like I said, I usually go behind the pancreas and bring that out. The kidneys are left in though there’s a lot of perren fat around them. You don’t actually see the kidneys until you remove that fat. The adrenal glands are left in.

A lot of the vasculature is left in so we can study. In dissection, we can study this posterior retroperitoneal space, which is basically what we’re looking at. Especially if the peritoneum was cut off in this illustration, it’s left on. So imagine this film of the peritoneum off, the pancreas out.

That’s what we really end up with, is that retroperitoneal space. And this, in my opinion, is that internal branch of the kidney channel. It could follow the ureters. There’s the ureter. To the kidney from the urinary bladder. So urinary bladder to kidney. So the ureters are in there, but I don’t think of it as necessarily like a line or a space.

I think of it as a plane. I think they’re talking about this retroperitoneal space. And when you’re doing this dissection, it’s amazing how loosely held all of this is. You’re using a scalpel, but sometimes you can just tease it apart with your hands. You have gloved hands of course, but you can tease it apart with the hands and break up.

Some of those little cross links that are connecting the peritoneum to the retroperitoneal space. It’s very loosely held. Now. It’s a large space, so collectively there’s some integrity there, but individual spots of that are pretty loosely held, or at least we want ’em to be fairly loosely held. We want a little bit of movement in that plane.

And this is what I wanna explore with the exercises I’m gonna show is not to think of the movement exclusively as musculoskeletal movement. Yes, the muscles are gonna be active. Yes, the spine’s gonna be moving. But can we sense, can we bring our attention and our awareness to that space that’s in front of the spine and let that sort of elongate and come back up and move.

Can there be some movement there to increase circulation in this internal branch of the kidney channel? So what is in this retroperitoneal space? We have the kidneys. That’s gonna be a big part. The SOAs, you can see a little shadow of the SOAs. Right in here. It’s covered by a lot of the fascia in this retroperitoneal space.

So to view the SOAs, you’d have to remove that fascia, but you can see the outline of it there. The kidneys are intimately tied to the SOAs. So the SOAs would be a big part of it. The ureters going down to the bladder. A lot of the blood vessels. So if we can get movement in this plane what’s gonna happen with the aorta and the inferior vena cavas, those can create a little bit of a stretching and elongation to help for their suppleness because that’s very important that they have a certain amount of suppleness in those vascular structures.

There’s lymph nodes, pancreas is in there, but I’m not sure if that’s relevant for the internal kidney. Channel as much as it is, maybe other aspects. But the pancreas would be in that retroperitoneal space. A lot of nerves coming through there. The perren fat that covers the kidneys, but there’s a lot of other fat back here that has a lot of implications for health.

It’s a very metabolic tissue. So there’s some hormone production from that. I don’t know if movement would help that, but I think that just getting circulation and free movement in that area can’t hurt. I think it has a lot of implications for health, not in an area that’s been explored much in terms of how we understand movement, but I think there could be a lot of implications for improved health, and maybe that’s one of the mechanisms of Qigong and those types of practices is to introduce movement into these internal cavities of the body.

And this one, the kidney channel in particular. All right, so just some, quick sample of some distortion of those. Internal branch of the kidney channels. I could have picked a whole lot of other types of images. But overweight is people who are obese a big portion because that abdominal wall is less tightly held in the front than it is in the back.

So oftentimes that extra weight pulls everything forward. And you can picture how compressed that internal branch of the kidney channel that retroperitoneal space was. How. Close that area is, and how little movement is gonna occur in that retroperitoneal space. Not somebody who’s heavy, but this is not an uncommon posture.

It’s a kidney deficient posture where the pelvis moves forward. We look at this in sports medicine, acupuncture. See a lot of correlations with various types of kidney deficiency, kidney in deficiency. Commonly with this, you see this with older people. This person’s not particularly older, but you see it a lot with elderly too, where the body starts collapsing, where the pelvis shifts anterior and the rib cage collapses down onto the pelvis.

And again, you can imagine that region of that retroperitoneal space. Just posterior to the midline, how compressed that area is, how compressed that area is, and how potentially little movement there is. So we wanna introduce movement, build core strength for this person, which is also involved with the kidney network, but also to start to introduce movement into that retroperitoneal space.

So that’s the last slide. Why don’t we look at the movement. It’s very much a squatting exercise. It’s a Qigong exercise, a type of spinal wave. Very simply, it’s a squat, but I’m focusing on getting an expansion and compression throughout the spine, particularly in the space we’re talking about.

You’ll still be an arm motion, it could be interpreted as a macrocosmic orbit. You know that circulation up and down the spine is the microcosmic orbit. That’ll be inherent in this movement, but then that expresses out into the arms. So you’ll see that there’s an arm component. I wanna start though, on parallel bars and just show this dropping.

You can see it a little bit better when I’m off the ground. You can see the pelvis in that area drop a little bit more than you’ll see in the squatting exercise. That’s not the exercise I’m showing. That’s just for demonstration. So we’ll show a static hold on parallel bars so I can let the pelvis drop and you can visualize that area elongating and softly, gently stretching a little bit.

Then I’ll show it in the squat activity. So let’s move to that position and we’ll look at the exercise today and keep in mind that that kidney channel internal branch. So I wanna start off with an exercise that’ll let you see what I was talking about in the slides with the anatomy.

This isn’t the exercise I wanna show, but it’s a little bit more visible. The next exercise is a little bit more subtle. So this is gonna show just that ability for the lower pelvis to drop and that internal branch of the kidney channel just elongate and stretch and have a little bit of movement and just coming up.

Into a hold on the parallel bars. I wanna initially pull the pelvis up, so I’m engaging my core to pull them, pull the pelvis towards the shoulders, and then let everything relax. So just letting gravity take the pelvis down. So it’s that initial drop sinking of the pelvis. Elongation of the pelvis and the spine, especially the lumbar spine, but that internal branch of the kidney channel will stretch.

So one more time just to see that I’m gonna do this while I’m sitting in just a moment. I just wanna let gravity take the pelvis down so I can get that stretch on the internal branch of the kidney channel. All right. I’m gonna move these.

Move that out the way. Do you want me to move it all the way outta the way, Alan? I guess it’s fine. Fine there. As long as it’s a little more.

So let’s look at the full exercise. So maybe I’ll start with a little bit of a spinal wave motion to warm the spine up. I’ll show this from the side in a moment. I’m just getting things moving. This will start to engage that internal branch of the kidney channel, but a little bit more of the musculature of the front and back is engaged.

I’m just warming up. So just a little bit of spinal wave activity. Let me show that from the side. So if you’re working on these exercises and following along with this, I just wanna initiate that from the pelvis tuck. The pelvis under chest comes down, so rectus abdominis is engaged back, muscles are engaged, front muscles are engaged.

I’m creating a circulation up and down the spine.

Exhale, if I wanna bring my breathing into it. Inhale, exhale, and inhale. I could do other variations of that to get the chest involved, but I’m gonna go into the main exercise now, so I’ll show it first from the side. I wanna get about a pelvic width stance outside of my pelvis could fit on the inside of my feet.

And elongate the spine, chest relaxes, and here’s that part. Whereas on the parallel bars, I want to drop the pelvis down. A little less visible, but it has a feeling of that elongation that you got on the parallel bars. So chest softens, pelvis sinks. Drop the pelvis down. Gauge that internal branch of the kidney channel by letting it just relax and stretch.

Sink. Let it go. I’ll do a few more from the side, and then we’ll look at it from the front.

All right, so chest softens, everything comes slightly in. I have a very slight hollow shape to the spine. Then the next part is I wanna let the pelvis sink. Let the pelvis sink. Let the pelvis sink. Everything’s getting longer inside. Eventually the whole body’s gonna start coming down, but there’s a moment where my pelvis is moving away from my head as I push up, everything’s coming together as I fully stand up, everything’s spreading apart.

Chest is coming higher than the pelvis. Chest sinks down towards the pelvis. Pelvis sits away. Pelvis comes up, chest expands away, chest softens down, pelvis sits away. So I return length to the body. There’s like a compression, a lengthening. I don’t wanna go down all compressed. I don’t wanna lean forward.

I wanna let everything drop, stretch, elongate, relax, soften inside, and just let it go. Okay, so a couple times from the front. So again, the setup is hips can fit between my two feet. So about the inside of my feet are about as wide as my hips. I’m going to open the chest, press up, relax the chest, sit down,

press up, get taller, soften the chest, sit the pelvis away.

Sink down, push up.

And up.

All right, that shows the main exercise, very subtle, quiet exercise. You can show it for patients quite easily. Easy to work with, easy to work with for yourself. But a couple highlights is that you can watch out for is sometimes people don’t have enough strength on the adductors, or excuse me, the abductors, so when they go down, the knees collapse in.

So that might be something to work with. Of course flexibility in the spine. You don’t want ’em to be like you saw from the side, very rigid or sticking their behind out. A lot of that can be strength and flexibility. So I’m gonna take just a quick step forward and note that I might use something to hold onto.

Especially if I’m giving this to patients and they’re new, I have a TRX in my room, so TRX might even be better if there’s a slight angle where they’re holding onto. But even just kitchen sink, parallel bars, a door, something like that, just so they can go down in a controlled manner, let the pelvis sink down and just having something to hold onto can make it a little easier so they can concentrate on not letting the knees pull in.

They keep the shape open, they can. Work on just letting everything soften and just having that extra little support can be very helpful for ’em pushing up. The other thing is they don’t have to go super low, right? If it starts getting distorted, going farther than that, maybe that’s where they stop for now, push up, et cetera, so they build the leg strength, build the flexibility.

Build the relaxation to let the spine go and holding on is a perfectly acceptable way to do it.

So simple exercise, but it offers a ton for patients and even just for your own self practice. All right, so I hope you found that informative. It’s one exercise. I particularly like that exercise and I use it a lot in my own practice, and I do show variations of that to patients. But I think the bigger thing is to start thinking about therapeutic functional type movement patterns and considering that visceral component.

How does that move the inside? How does that move and engage these internal branches of our channel network? It gives you a different perspective on movement instead of just thinking about the muscles that are involved. And I think there’s a ton of implications for health and development and wellness from that.

So play with the ideas. You can use this exercise for this particular internal branch, but it’s not tied to one exercise. It’s a. It’s a thought process that, a change in paradigm, a paradigm shift for movement. So give it a thought, put it into your own practice and see see how it goes.

So thanks again to the American Acupuncture Council. I always appreciate having the opportunity to come on and present. Hope you found this informative. Again, if you wanted some more information, you could look at my YouTube channel, Jingjin Movement Training. I cover a lot of these types of exercises, and again, from a channel perspective but there will be other times we’ll be here with the American Acupuncture Council.

We’ll look at some other ideas with it at that time. So thanks again.

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