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The Do’s and Don’ts of House Calls

We’re gonna be talking about house calls, do’s and don’ts bringing this straight from my private practice, my extensive experience with house calls, and also other practitioners that I’ve worked with as well.

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.

Hello, and welcome to another episode of To The Point. I am Dr. Nell with American Acupuncture Council. So excited to have you here. We’re gonna be talking about house calls, do’s and don’ts bringing this straight from my private practice, my extensive experience with house calls, and also other practitioners that I’ve worked with as well.

So let’s go to the slides.

So when we think about house calls there’s a few misconceptions that come up and things that we wanna address straight out the gate. And I first wanna tell you a little bit about my experience with house calls in general. I built my practice treating primarily post-surgical patients. So house calls or being on location were really a necessity for the patient demographic that I was working with.

And as my practice continued to build and as I continued to network directly with surgeons and gain referrals directly from. Surgical practices it really grew and grew. And so then when Covid happened a few different things shifted, and I started looking at, all right, how are we gonna continue to build our business?

How do we safely continue to treat patients? Things had shifted quite a bit and started looking at the numbers. Because my lease in Beverly Hills was up for renewal. And a lot of you who have brick and mortars, you’ve looked at medical leases, sometimes they’re a little bit longer trying to make these really big decisions around what to do next when it comes to your practice.

And when we looked at the numbers, we realized that over 80% of our revenue was from house calls. And granted, this was definitely a situation where it was very much based on our business model, treating post-surgical patients, but at the same time, house calls can be incorporated into most practices.

We are gonna go through these misconceptions, but also just know. Having primarily house call patients is not for every practice. Some people are gonna do this about 20% of the time, 10% of the time, and we’ll go through some of those different options. But first, let’s talk about the misconceptions.

There is an idea that house calls are not safe. That they’re not cost effective. You’re gonna be leaving your office and running over to a patient’s house or that they can be cumbersome. You’re lugging equipment, you’re not able to do everything that you would normally do in office, and there is some truth.

To actually all three of these. And so they’re really good and bad ways right and wrong ways. And then with the little bit of ambiguity that’s gonna be around what your business model is what area you’re in. So is it really feasible to be running back and forth? How does that work? So we’re gonna center this around these three different areas and look at some good do’s and don’ts for each one so that.

These misconceptions are not your reality if you wanna do house calls in your practice. So first, let’s look at the safety issue. We have personal safety and then we have the professional or practice safety, thinking about things like malpractice issues, but what we’re thinking first and foremost about our own personal safety.

We’re talking about going to a person’s home, right? So someone that maybe you don’t know very well. Or maybe you’ve seen an office once before who was a referral or maybe even a cold call, and that can be a little intimidating and that can certainly be an unsafe situation. So are there certain safeguards that we can put in place to stay HIPAA compliant in this situation?

But also allow ourselves to be able to safely navigate into someone’s home. And some of that will have some overlap with talking about logistics at the end and how we safeguard some of those safety issues. But first and foremost, we wanna just acknowledge that this is a different environment.

It’s not exactly the same thing as when you’re in the comfort of your office, the comfort of your practice. You don’t get to have everything set up exactly how you want to, you’re not gonna have cabinets at. Someone’s home probably have things at an arm’s reach. So we’re really thinking about what things are we going to bring with us so that we can keep safety paramount.

What we wear to a house call is particularly impactful in this case. So if we were in office and we like to dress. Business casual. Or we like to wear business casual with a lab coat. Might be easier to wear scrubs. I had always worn scrubs for house calls, and then when I was in office I was a little bit more dressed.

And then during C O V I D I was wearing scrubs the entire time for both in-office. And on location. So that’s something to think about, like what you’re physically wearing to someone’s home. Also what are you bringing with you and how far are you traveling safety-wise? So I do house calls where I have to get on a plane and fly to patients.

Now, because I’m between a few different states where I’m licensed. And so when I do that, you’re thinking, okay, safety-wise, like what am I bringing on a flight with me? There are certain things that you might take locally that you’re not gonna be able to safely carry on an airplane. I will tell you I have never had an issue with acupuncture needles, microneedling devices even eim units on a flight for a carry-on.

So just as an aside for those of you who are thinking about doing that but we wanna think about like things like batteries, like being safe when we do that and going to someone’s home I will tell you from my practice, we don’t do just. Direct cold calls. We are primarily referral based, so when a patient calls, they’ve been referred directly from a surgeon.

And this can be a really safe way to do this process because you at least know the referral source. Someone who is Requesting that this person see you, this person is like, Hey, my friend or my doctor told me that I should come to your practice and that you do house calls. So I know providers who don’t even advertise online that they do house calls.

They have their regular practice structure, and they do the house calls on an as needed basis for us, because we were primarily referral based, it was really easy. We always involved the surgeon in that care and in that visit, so that patient knew that someone was going to be reported back to, they were signing paperwork that said, Hey, my information can be shared with my surgeon.

And so we were saying, Hey, like we’re gonna let your doctor know when we’re on the way to your house and let them know how that went. So at least then they know there’s another party involved in that and that gives you a little bit more of that safety. When I was doing this on my own as a sole proprietor and I didn’t have an office staff I was still very referral based, so there was still that communication, but I would always let someone know that, Hey, I’m going to a house call and I would listen.

Someone know Hey, I’m done with that house call, and that doesn’t mean I need to share the patient information. All of that information would be in my E H R, which is HIPAA compliant. But just to be able to let another party know that’s that was happening and that makes you feel a little bit safer.

When we talk about cost I will tell you industry standard from practitioners I’ve worked with and talked two throughout the industry is just doubling the cost of your in-office visit from a cash perspective. I would say that there is no one size fits all approach when it comes to cost.

However, you really have to think about where you are and what it’s going to take for you to get to that patient. For example, me being in Los Angeles, it takes a lot to leave a practice, get in a car. Drive somewhere. It’s very different if you’re in a more accessible city that maybe has public transit or that allows you to pop in and out of the office or, maybe you have a very densely populated area where you’re treating people in super local confined area so you’re not traveling that much.

That’s gonna be different time taken out of your office. So you have to consider when you’re constructing your costs, okay, how is this really gonna work? If I’m normally running three rooms at a time, what am I actually losing by walking out of my practice, the time that is spent away? How many patient visits is that truly?

And as long as you are in compliance with ADA and like people can easily access your office. It’s fine to give people a choice. I would keep my pricing exactly the same for in-office and going to location, and I would charge separately for a travel rate, and that was a way that I was able to safeguard to just.

Be able to say to people, Hey, you’re welcome to come into my practice if you would like me to come to you. This is the travel fee. And so that way you’re keeping your fees the same. And so it’s really a conversation about your time and the money that’s spent with that. So that’s one option and one way to go about it.

But the most important thing when you’re considering cost is what does it cost me to leave? And does that make sense? It might not make sense for your business model when you are looking at. What that is going to cost you leaving your office and going to someone’s home. And then the last thing is logistics.

And the reason that I say this has a big overlap with safety is because look at the picture that we have here, cupping, right? When I do house calls, I don’t do fire cupping. I just don’t I love doing fire cupping in office, but I use suction cups when I go to someone’s home. They are easier to transport.

There’s less of a safety issue there. Logistically it’s a little bit easier to navigate one simple suction cup and maybe an oil or ment rather than having to worry about. Am I going to have a tray accessible? Am I going to be able to deal with fire in this person’s home? Are they going to feel safe?

When it comes to that? We wanna think about things like linens. Really, when you’re thinking about the logistics, you wanna think about that entire experience. What is that gonna look like from you getting in your vehicle or getting in the transportation that it’s going to require? Are you lugging a treatment table?

We’ve. Purchase treatment tables for patients before, when we have a post-surgical patient who’s committing to say 24 visits after a surgery, that is not a big deal for us to then have a treatment table to keep at their home so that our providers are not then lugging that treatment table every single time.

And it’s something that’s a huge value add for patients usually that they really appreciate as. Part of something that is going to make life easier for you but be a value add for them. So it’s set up, it’s easy when you get there. You wanna think about things like sheets. I used to always bring linens to house calls.

And then when C D happened and people were a lot more careful, we started having patients providing their own linen for treatment tables. And it’s about the way you frame that, you frame it, that it’s for their comfort, their safety they know it’s not being reused. They don’t have to trust that you’re washing it properly or disposing of things and reusing, or not reusing.

There’s no guesswork involved there. So that’s another thing that can be done. But really, if you’re thinking about that process from start to finish, how do we make this logistically sound? I like to expect the unexpected anything that has come up in a previous house caller that we could anticipate we do.

So everything from knowing what the gate code is. Do you prefer the provider to stay with you next to the treatment table or would you like them to wait, outside? Do you allow shoes in your home? Cuz you have to think about that from a clean needle technique perspective. Not wanting to walk around completely barefoot.

Things like that. Is there, are there gonna be pets there? If you’re having yourself or a provider go to a home and you’re allergic to dogs or cats, that’s probably something that you wanna be aware of. Some people are very, free with their animals. They let them jump around. You wouldn’t want that to be, become a safety issue, and it’s something to anticipate logistically on the front end that makes that process a lot more simple.

So obviously if it’s just. You can ask a lot of these questions on the front end. It gets even more critical to be clear about these logistics when you have other providers that you’re employing going to someone’s home. So knowing all of those variables upfront can be really impactful and just make for a very simple experience, even knowing if someone, let’s say a post-surgical patient.

I’ve had post-surgical patients that can’t get out of bed, or they’re in a hospital type bed at their home, so there’s no reason to bring a treatment table. Knowing those things on the front end not only help you deliver a better patient experience, but it makes the patient so much more comfortable with what that is going to look like, and it helps manage those expectations.

So as we briefly recap these are the three things you really wanna be thinking about when it comes to house calls. First and foremost, it’s always gonna be safety, your personal safety your professional safety. Protecting yourself against anything that could potentially happen. You wanna think about costs.

Does this logistically make sense as well? Is it cost effective for me to be leaving my business to be doing house calls? And then the logistics of not only that actual house call, but how are you setting that up? How are you framing that? How are you going to fit that in logistically to the way that you practice even considering things like scheduling?

Do you want to. Devote, certain hours of the day to house calls, which is something I used to do. So that you aren’t bouncing back and forth oh, my Monday afternoons and my Thursday afternoons are going to be my house call days. So logistically, how do we make this a sound process? So if you keep those three things in mind, and of course come from a personalized perspective like we do with anything in this medicine looking at your individual practice and how this makes sense for you.

Please do not hesitate to reach out to me if you have more questions about this. I love looking at the safety aspects. Obviously working with American Acupuncture Council safety and that protection is paramount in my mind. But really how could you make this work from a business perspective?

So thank you so much for your time. And don’t forget next week to tune in for another episode of, To The Point.

The Acupuncture Wow Factor – Lorne Brown

And so the Wow factor that I’m talking about is for your patients to have a shift on your table and experience a shift so that they are able to relax and therefore have the trust and confidence to follow your treatment plan.

Click here to download the transcript.

Again, thanking the American Acupuncture Council for this opportunity to share with you my colleagues. My name’s Lorne Brown. I’m a doctor of traditional Chinese medicine. I’m a clinical hypnotherapist. I’m also a C P A. I’m a certified professional accountant, and I wanted to talk about the acupuncture Wow factor.

And I’m gonna set my intention that this will be simple and yet powerful and effective. That comes from the Einstein quote that make things as simple as possible but not simpler. Meaning let’s make it simple so we, it’s easier to implement, but we don’t make it so simple that it loses its effectiveness.

And also my intention is to do a small sound bite here. So you can just take one concept or one idea and run with this in your practice. I have found that sometimes the things that. Help practitioners be the most successful, are the most obvious, but yet they’re not obvious until somebody brings it to your attention, to your awareness that you’re like, oh yes, I want to intentionally do this.

And so the wow factor that I’m talking about is for your patients to have a shift on your table and experience a shift so that they are able to relax. and therefore have the trust and confidence to follow your treatment plan. Now I’m gonna unpack this for us, and I’m gonna talk about this from, I guess materialistic and quantum level here.

So when we have resistance, then we block flow and receptivity things that happen for us in life. And you’ve probably experienced this, where sometimes you just have flown receptivity, synchronicities are happening and things just seem. Easier. They just happen and flow for you as if there’s these invisible hands coming down from the heavens and opening up doors you did not know existed.

You’re probably also aware where you’re putting effort and more effort and the more effort you do, it just seems the higher things get and things just aren’t easy and there is no flow. And on a quantum or spiritual level, when we have resistance, we are blocking. This receptivity and flow, we have a beautiful term for this in Chinese medicine is called cheese stagnation.

In conscious work, I often hear it call as resistance or friction. And this ties into our patient’s ability to heal because the body has this beautiful, innate ability to heal. And I see my role as a practitioner, as a facilitator, I’m not healing, I. The person in front of me. We are learning more and more through really cool research.

Again, quantum physics level research, that it seems to be that it’s the patient’s need that determines the healing. And we as practitioners have to be that clean vessel. But we are the facilitator and even our nervous systems, our parasympathetic nervous systems, our subconsciouses. They’re syncing up.

They’re doing this through FMR, F M R studies where they can see that the nervous systems are syncing up beyond our conscious awareness, and there’s a healing, an exchange of information that happens. And we use our needles sometimes to do that exchange for information. So the wow factor for us now, I want to unpack this and go back into this patient’s innate ability to heal.

That if they have resistance, they’re not sure if you can help them. They’re not sure if it’s worth their money. There’s that trust issue. Do I really believe this? Does acupuncture work? Work? You know what the skeptics are saying, what conventional medicine’s saying? , all this can get into their psyche and disrupt their ability to receive and have flow.

So disrupt that innate ability to heal because that placebo impact, which has such a bad rap placebo, is not inert. We know this in 30% of Western trials, sorry, in Western. Random controlled trials. Sometimes it’s common that 30% and up to 90%, but it’s common 30% they attribute to placebo. From a Chinese medicine perspective, or at least from my perspective, what we are doing is engaging the individual’s capacity to heal.

They have this innate ability to heal. It’s amazing how we try to dismiss this, but I guess from our materialistic perspective, from conventional medicine, we have that ego that we’re doing the healing , but really it’s the individual. They take the medicine and through that medicine, they incorporate it in heal or through our needle or through our communication.

The healing process starts the acupuncture wow factor to allow the resistance to be lowered. So the patient is in that state of receptivity and flow to really accelerate and accentuate the innate ability, heal. That healing process comes from them feeling an a, an experience, a shift on the table. And so I’m gonna give you at least two examples here, and I’m thinking of recent lectures on healthy seminars.com, where I hosted in one week, both Pony Chung and David Uler.

It’s actually pronounced Oiler, but spelled Uler . David Uler, you probably know him if you read his name, but David Oiler and Pony Chung and their style of acupuncture gives the patient this incredible shift. On the table that even if they don’t have resolution on the table in that one treatment, which is, let’s be honest, it’s we don’t get that resolution for chronic conditions in one treatment.

But because they experience that shift, they now have that ability to have trust and confidence to follow your treatment plan. And it’s been my experience in my own clinical practice using their style of treatment and also call my colleagues that. Patients then leave the treatment room and book their 12 to 15 treatments in that two to three month period because of the experience they had on the table.

So when I talk about shift, let’s bring up David Jeweler first as a concept, and then I actually have a video demonstration that I have with Pony Chong that I’ll share with you with David Yuler. He does palpation based acupuncture. He study with Kiko, Matsumoto and her teacher, and it’s a really cool style of somatic acupuncture where you’re palpating tender spots on the body and based on those tender spots, those are called reflex zones, you needle other areas to release the tender spot.

And by doing so, that experience for the patient is an aha moment. So I’m gonna share a story with you, for example, and I’m gonna do the David Oiler idea of palpation, how this works in the treatment room. But here’s one of my. Own clinical stories and I’m gonna share one about Shen disturbance that David shared recently in his lecture.

This woman came to me after two, two months post C-section delivery of her baby, and she had poor quality of life because of the incredible lower abdominal pain that she had since the birth of her child. And she went to back to the surgeon, the gynecologist. They ruled out any infection they ruled out.

anything left inside and they just said, there’s nothing going on there. There’s nothing they can do. Obviously, she didn’t want to take high dose or pain meds because she’s breastfeeding. She had saw massage. They had referred her for some physio for post-surgical to help. Nothing had helped over those.

Two, two months. She came to my practice. She knew of me because I actually was the practitioner that helped her with her infertility, and I guess we have branded ourselves so well at fertility that because she wasn’t trying to get pregnant, she didn’t think to come back to my clinic until later say, do you think you can help me with this?

It didn’t even dawn on her that maybe this is something we can help. . And so she came into my practice with her lower abdominal pain and right away I thought about the tsu. And for those that are not familiar with that term, it’s basically a reflex zone for blood stasis. And when you have this, it can wreak havoc in the body.

Cause remember, it’s a system and we have a serious stagnation. It inf it interferes with the flow and receptivity. And I press down on her tsu and she’s oh. Like incredible pain. And so after pressing in on the tsu, I go to the distal points that are used to relieve that. It’s just two acupuncture points.

And I hold my little device, just the tube of the needle actually. And I try different angles on liver four and asking her as I palpate, does this reduce this pressure? Pain? And she goes, oh, you’re not pressing as hard. So she thought I was trying to fake her out because. She went from like a 10, outta 10 to two outta 10, and I said, I’m pressing the same.

How about you press so you take my hand and you push down? So she took my hand and pushed down while I used the handle of the tube. No pain. So I go ahead and I needle those points. I also noticed that her immune reflex was really sensitive, so I did the immune points and a week later I did follow up with her and she was immediately at that treatment.

90% relief. So she had 90% relief immediately after that treatment, and one week following, she still had 90% relief from that treatment. That’s where somebody like that now refers anybody and everybody to the practice and any plan that I would have for her. She is more relaxed, as in con, has the confidence trust in me.

One is she had relief in her symptoms, but I’ll share with you that even if the symptoms aren’t relieved, when they experience the fact that I can palpate an area, a reflex zone and then needles somewhere else, and then that zone is gone, they see that it’s doing something and it gives, it inspires them to now follow your plan.

In his course also, he talked about the reflex zone and the sternum for anxiety and shen disturbance. And there’s points that we do on the back for this. And there’s points that we do distally for firepoint on the pericardium and heart channel. We test the fire points to see if they’re tender as well.

And then we use metal and water points. To relieve that. And again, when patients come in and they’re really anxious, so the difficult trusting cuz they’re sympathetic. They’re sympathetic, is on high alert, that means can’t trust, right? They’re rarely cautious, paranoid, almost really feeling worried and anxious, palpating the sternum and it’s tender for them.

And then going and touching reflex zones on the back. And then if that relieves it, great. If not, then I go to the fire points on the palm and then I check the acupuncture points. And if that relieves it, you can just see the melt on the table. So that’s my example as a shift on the table. And so learning styles by like David Yuler is a way to really grow your practice.

Now, I was trained as what I call a barefoot doctor or Zg Fu acupuncturist, which I think many of you have been trained as well, meaning like if you have blood deficiency, it’s stomach 36, it’s red 12, it’s spleen six, bladder 17. Really? These are my herbalist, acupuncture herbalist from China teaching me acupuncture and.

Because I host healthy seminars. I’ve had the privilege and the opportunity to witness different styles of acupuncture and realizing that there is a really deep history and style of acupuncture more than how we were trained in TCM schools, where you can get really good results. and also there’s that impact on the table.

And so David Oiler is one of those examples of studying with him and being able to just palpate some points, relieve them right there, that first treatment in 20 to 30 minutes with that treatment, and then they continue on for their condition because they’ve seen such an experience of that. Plus, they also are getting resolution for what they’ve come in for.

Let’s talk about Pony Chong. Another style of acupuncture and where they’re in common is he shows a shift on the table. And in the video that we’re gonna bring up is from a lecture he did recently in our community library. And what he’s demonstrating is he’s doing a, an acupuncture point, spleen 12, and he talks about.

In the Canon and the classics, just where it travels on the Sinu channel and how it impacts what muscles, what ligaments went tendons basically in modern day. So he can treat certain conditions in the lower extremities and he’s going to needle the point. And then he tests the point with a pointer plus, and he does this because of two reasons.

One is when you. Test it. It lets you know you’re in the right place, cuz I’ll share that sometimes we always have the right intention. This is where I think SPLEEN 12 is on this individual based on landmarks. But Pony has shown through his style of acupuncture that it’s reproducible, that you can be really precise based on reading the description of what this acupuncture point does on a muscle skeletal level.

And seeing that muscle shift or move or fsic. When you touch it with a pointer Plus from the patient’s perspective, it is a wow factor because they know where their pain is in whatever their leg, and when you put a needle in and it co and they feel that sensation going down, that whole muscle, they now have the confidence that you are in the right spot.

The second reason it’s so important that I went on a quick tangent there about the patient’s experience is sometimes we have the right intention of where we think the point is, but points actually drift. They’re not. The same based on the book location on every individual, there’s a little bit of drifting and pony style of acupuncture.

Teaching shows you that you can actually get exact and know that you’re in the right spot by testing the needle. And I have to share when I use this in my practice, sometimes I have to reinsert the needle two or five times to get it. But now you get better results because originally my intention was this is the right spot for this point, but I can test and show whether I’m really in that spot or not.

This is also gonna be important for research to make research reproducible. Now we know we’ve given them the right acupuncture point for where it is in their body, and so this wow pa factor is crucial in having patients relax. So lowering the resistance, having confidence and trust to follow your treatment plan because they experience a shift, that first treatment, not let’s treat you for the next.

10 or 12 treatments and see if there’s a shift, and then we’ll reassess they believe after that first treatment. So let’s bring up the video. I’ll share with you the first five seconds, the volume’s low or 10 seconds, and then it kicks in. And this is just a discussion that I was having with Pony in one of his community lectures while he was demonstrating this idea of testing a point and how the patient experiences this.

So please bring up that video now.

And pony, this is what I mentioned in our introduction. If you could just go back to that video for a moment. Okay. That when patient experience a shift on the table and in this case when needle, when pony needles, the point and then he stimulates it with his pointer plus the structure of the leg. The muscles watch the leg move in the bottom left eyes, watch the leg move.

Confirming he’s in the right location cuz it wouldn’t move he was in, if he was in the correct. Two things happen. One is he has now accurate needle location because we have good intention and we say we’re putting it in SEN 12. We put the intention, but PONY is showing that there’s an actual real spleen 12 for each individual, and it can drift a bit from how it’s described in the book and based on the person.

And he’s confirming that he has reached spleen 12 based on what he’s seen in the leg. So a for effectiveness preciseness. Two is the patient is seeing what’s happening, she’s late leg and it just her leg gives them the confidence and trust to then pretends machine on the needle lake move. And that’s why I invite you to check out PONIES courses in the library and then really do a deep dive and he has those courses on demand so you can learn how to do this in your practice.

Thanks. No problem. Yeah. Thank you for Lorne. Thank you for mentioning the way intentioned to, that’s something I emphasize a lot when I teach the course is that we taught that, okay, you have to have good intention, right? And then, and your intent drives the cheat. Okay? And so drives the, your cheap, but also to the needle.

You drive the patients cheat. But that’s pretty much the end of the education. I got an intention, it just. But extreme attention’s the same. But the way I see it now, based on my experience in all my research, is that there’s a different intent for each specific point, and now you can predict and agree on that intention if you understand anatomy.

So for example, here, screen 12, the anatomy is the femoral neurovascular bundle. So the intention that we, when I have, when I come to Neil’s point, is that I want. This to activate the quadricep muscle, and if I apply electricity to that, it’ll activate all the quadrant muscle in the new extent. Okay? So it could be a sensory nerve in, in which case we know what that nerve travels, the duchess sensor should be felt to that area.

It’s not a guess word. You should know exactly what that intent for that specific point should be. and know if you got it or not, based on whether it moves what it should, ghost by sensation where it is. So then your intent is actually very clear and precise and it’s not just assuming that intents the same, it’s not just all heavy achy sensation e everywhere, anywhere.

Okay. But also coming back to, to like the buy-in the wow factor, patients are gonna remember. The times that you don’t succeed. But when you, if you tell them, okay, I’m needling this, I’m checking this. I’m, they don’t know what’s what they’re supposed to see, right? Only you know that. But you tell them that I’m, the reason I’m doing this, I’m checking to make sure I’m precise, but you stimulate it.

You tell them, you may feel a sensation going down the top of your quadricep. You might feel a little contraction in your muscles and quadricep. And if you say that and you try it, and if it’s one of those, one of those times that you succeed, they feel that’s instant. Because that’s pro, that’s in a way prophecy, prophesize what’s gonna happen.

And then it actually happened. More average mortal human beings don’t have the ability to prophesize. So that makes you different, that you can do something and make it happen. Exactly what you said, it’s gonna happen. They’re not gonna remember if it doesn’t happen, but they damn remember it when it does.

And that is the wow factor that Lorne is talking about before their. You’re even done treating them. It’s the first treatment. They haven’t solved the result yet. They’re already asking, do you treat this for my brother? Do you treat this with that? Okay, this is from my personal experience.

So I like his term, the prophecy. So you’re prophesizing for the patient and then they experience it. And that is a wow factor. And like he said, can you treat this? Can you treat this for my family members? Because you’re able to predict what they’re going to experience. And so from a practitioner with integrity intention, you’ve got the accurate point.

So you, you want the results, so you know you have the accurate location and then. From the patient’s perspective, they’ve experienced this prophecy on the table, which gives you that guru status and why some practitioners are constantly looking to fill their practice. And like others, like my practice, I usually have a two to three month wait list because of that Wow.

Factor on the table. And then when you learn from like a David Oiler, Or Red Yuler, but pronounce Oiler or Pony Chung. They give you language too to help with the prophecy. So going back to David’s talk where I mentioned he, for anxiety, he’ll palpate the typical area on the sternum. And when I go and palpate these reflex zones and they’re tender, and then I needle elsewhere, and then those reflex zones go away.

That’s the prophecy, cuz I’m telling them that if we can remove the blockages in the body that are preventing the innate ability to heal, if we can lower the resistance and bring back chief flowing, your body will start to heal regardless of the Western diagnosis. I just gotta remove some of these disturbances in your biofield and that is why I think.

To my colleagues that studying with Pony and David or having that wow factor where a patient experiences your prophecy in the treatment room cuz they experience the shift is important. And the last thing I wanna share for a wow factor, or just what I have found in my 20 plus years, sometimes complicated cases come in.

And I have to remind myself that it’s not my job to fix the patient, and if all I do is listen, really listen and let them know I hear them, then the healing process starts as well. Remember that there is something, and we’re this is being studied, that we know that there’s communication through our facial expression, our eyes, pheromones, and even biophotons light and packets of energy that are.

Transmitting between us that we now know that there’s information being exchanged. And what we’re noticing is that when somebody feels really seen and heard, that lowers their resistance as well. They start to relax, the flow starts to come back, and the healing response is engaged. And so really taking time to listen to your patients.

Let it Showing compassion that you understand and get what they’re going through with is really important as part of the healing process. So really making that time to hear them feel, understand, they feel understood. That lowers the resistance, and again, on a unconscious level, not something that you’re doing or they’re aware of, something is happening between the two of you.

Something has been triggered and there is an exchange of information. Add onto it when you do your treatment and you can prophesize that. When I palpate here. Anywhere there’s certain, there’s points all over the body and they’re tender. And I needle elsewhere, and that tenderness goes away. Then we have lowered the disturbance, the resistance in the body, which will support its healing.

I will share that when I was at the Society of Acupuncture Research Conference, one of the presenters there shared her research where they have. Shown a, what’s the word? They have shown that when there’s organ issues that down distally in the fascia that there’s disturbances. So tender points or even nodules or gunness happens.

So they’re sharing that this is happening. And when I heard this research, it made me think of David Oilers palpation based acupuncture style, because that’s their style is going along the channel and palpating these points. And if they’re. Tender. Then there’s other points to needle, to reli to relieve that tenderness.

And what I suspect is happening is we’re lowering the disturbance in the body, the resistance, and therefore the channel flow becomes free. And then the organs become healthy and the organism us become healthier, and so I just wanted to share that with you. Lectures by both Pony and David are available on healthy seminars in the community library.

They also have C E U proof courses on healthy seminars.com in that area as well. and a good way to just find out what I’m up to. If you like this Quantum idea and biophysics, do check out just my website, Lorne brown.com. Then you can see information about my practice management book. You can hear about my Conscious Fertility podcast, things that are doing at Healthy Seminars.

I created that website cuz I like to do a lot of things. And I decided to create that website so you can find everything in one place. So Lorne brown.com is to just go where everything is, aggravate is collected, and then healthy seminars.com is where the continued education, the community library, the mentorship, and the online learning is for healthy seminars.

So I hope what I shared with you is simple. For you and you’ll find it powerful and effective. It’s been my experience, my colleagues, and for the patients. They have found it powerful and effective. And I wish you the best of luck in your practice. I do believe we need more prosperous acupuncturists because we need more of people like you working in the C communities to help heal our community.

Cuz the world needs lots of healing and this starts with healing ourselves. Obviously. I want to thank the American Acupuncture Council again for this opportunity. To share some of my clinical and business pearls with you.

Are You Practicing in a Vacuum? Nell Smircina

Click here to download the transcript.

Hello, and welcome to another episode of To The Point. I am Dr. Nell with American Acupuncture Council. Thanks so much for having me, and let’s go to the slides.

Hey, we’re gonna be talking a little bit about this idea of practicing in a vacuum, and we pose this as a question, are you practicing in a vacuum? But I feel pretty confident with the experience that I’ve had in this industry to let you know. You might be. We are mostly sole proprietors. We’re thrust out of school and pushed into being small business owners.

A lot of times the mechanism of practice setup is, all right how do I figure out how to afford to rent one room and then scale to two rooms, and when do I get to a. Point where I could bring on an admin assistant or an office manager or another practitioner, and sometimes we don’t even have the time or the bandwidth to look at strategy around this.

And what often ends up happening with this mechanism of getting into practice. We forget about all of the resources around us. The resources that we could be leveraging outside of the four doors of our treat or the four walls of our treatment room, and really say to ourselves, all right, like, how do I leverage these resources around me to grow my business, to be more successful, to welcome more patience and.

To even have resources available that I don’t have to create on my own, whether it’s marketing collateral education resources for patients or for other providers. And so we’re gonna talk a little bit about those industry resources that we should be leveraging today. So first, we have to address the misconceptions here.

Again, we have our tunnel vision. , we’re focused on patient care. We’re trying to figure out how to afford everything and how to grow and how to scale. So a lot of times this mindset that there’s no infrastructure already set up, can creep in. Maybe we’re only familiar with our school. or the school alumni network, if your program even has a viable alumni network available to you.

And so we don’t think about what’s already there, what’s already set up that we can be leveraging. There’s also a lot of confusion around regulation versus advocacy. So what are these different players in the game and how do we fit into that equation? And this idea of limitations to involvement with that.

So we might see these big groups out there and think, oh, we’re divorced from them. They’re so far away. They’re a regulatory agency, or they deal with advocacy and that feels a little too far from. Me and my practice. And just to tell you that’s not true. There are definitely ways to be involved.

And we actually did another show specifically around leveraging advocacy for your business. And you can tune into that one as well and take a listen. Let’s look at first, who are these main players to get a little oriented to our industry and then we can talk about how we’re leveraging them. So the Council of Colleges actually was the creator of Clean Needle Techniques.

So we all had to do that in order to get into internship to then go ahead and get licensed or get our national board certification. And this is actually a collection of. School leadership. So schools join the Council of Colleges. And so in addition to issuing the Clean Needle Technique certification, they also gather multiple times a year, have different committees, and they’re looking at what are common issues that schools are experiencing.

We have had school closures just in the last few years. We’re probably gonna continue to see some consolidation. . So we wanna make sure we’re really tuned into what’s happening on an education level and what goes hand in hand with that is acom. So the Accreditation Commission for Acupuncture and herbal medicine, they’re actually linked up with the Department of Education who oversees what they do, and then they go and accredit the different schools, our education and.

Institutions. This allows for things like financial aid to happen so that we have an infrastructure set up where students can come in and get that federal financial aid support. If we didn’t have that accreditation, that wouldn’t be available to us, and that would really stall a lot of things in our industry.

There’s opportunities to be involved with them. You can be a site visitor. You can serve on their board of commissioners as well. Council of Colleges, if you’re involved with the schools, you can be a part of Council of Colleges and serve on one of their committees and help influence how the more minute details of education and school initiatives are happening.

And then everybody’s familiar with N C A O M. . Even in California, people are getting N C O M certified. So this is really those minimum standards. When we’re looking at getting into practice. For most states, they require these N C O M exams for licensure and a lot of states, Also require you to re-certify every four years.

Now, NCCM has a ton of resources. They have a provider directory. You can look on their website for different continuing education for your PDAs. You could be a PDA provider and be marketing yourself and your courses through them. So even though these are more Organizations that develop standards and are more regulatory in nature, there are still opportunities within them and still resources available to you even if you’re just in private practice.

And I wanna briefly note the difference between regulatory and advocacy or associations. . When I was the president of ciso, which is a state association in California we would get calls all the time for people thinking that we were the acupuncture board who issues licenses, who does the exam, who regulates the profession in California.

And so there are different agencies. We talked about standards and more the regulatory, but then you also have these advocacy organizations. And so a regulatory board who’s issuing your license. Their responsibility is to protect the public, not to advocate on behalf of the profession. So it’s important to be knowledgeable about where are our advocacy resources and how do we go ahead and leverage them.

So here are some really exciting big players in the advocacy, and I like to say advocacy slash. Fun stuff and awareness for the profession. Because some of these organizations, their primary initiative is advocacy and some of them, they’re just doing really good work that help elevate our profession.

And then they have great resources for us as well in private practice. The biggest one we wanna think about is American Society of Acupuncturists. That’s our National Trade Association. You have states like state associations like Selma, like the North Carolina Association, the DC Association, they are all members.

Of asa. So it’s a federation style organization. So states get voting rights and everybody’s an equal player, and that council of states is really powerful and they get to decide different initiatives that happen from a national level. I do have the pleasure of serving on the board for asa. We just had an awesome conference.

We were just on Capitol Hill talking about. Garnering support for our Medicare bill so that we can direct bill Medicare as providers. So there’s a lot of good work that’s being done at a federal level. And if you go on as a’s website, if you join a committee, if you are involved in your state association, who’s a member of asa, you get a ton of benefits.

There are one pagers that you can send to other medical providers explaining acupuncture. There are templates for advocacy in your state. So if you’re interested in going and speaking to your representatives, looking at a one pager and saying, Hey, how do I need to prepare? How do I find my representatives?

These types of things. These are resources that are available to you as well as like deals, discounts for different vendors in the industry. And then you have the Society for Acupuncture Research. I was also just at their conference last weekend, and this is an international organization, however really strong in the state.

So they had the conference in New York and they’re another organization that has. Tons of resources for you. You can go on their website, you can become a member. You can have access to different databases. See the incredible amount of research that our profession is involved in and how that works and the resources here for you and your practice.

You can easily have access to that research. Sometimes patients are gonna wanna know that information. Sometimes other providers wanna know that information. And seeing how this is done on a global level, it is a little bit different in the states than how other countries practice. And that global and cultural awareness is really important, especially today.

And I did throw on here e b a evidence-based acupuncture. I recently at the SAR conference met one of their board members and I was asking him, what’s the difference here? Because there seems to be a lot of overlap with the research and the good work that’s. Being done. Evidence-based acupuncture is like a little more a little more patient friendly, a little more lay person friendly.

So if you want like quick fact sheets that you can give to anyone, that’ll speak to people in a way that they can understand. Stand, even if they’re not familiar with research or acupuncture, they’re a great resource for you. And so a lot of these things are going to make your practice life easier because you’ll have resources to pull from so you’re not reinventing the wheel.

You don’t have to create a one pager for yourself about how acupuncture works for other medical providers. You get to download it from one of these organizations who’s already done it in a really easy and professional way. And I also like to put APA on here, American Herbal Products Association.

This is an organization that is a lot bigger than just our profession. They do have a Chinese medicine, like a Chinese herbs committee. But as a broader aspect, they’re really involved staying on top of what’s going on with F D A regulations how would this trickle down effect impact our profession?

And so even just getting on their mailing list and seeing what they’re up to, a lot of these quick updates will come out through them. When something around herbal medicine happens. So if there’s a press release that comes out or an adverse event they’ll probably have knowledge about it and be sharing that information in a really tangible way so that you get the entire story.

So let’s talk about, again, back to that vacuum effect. Is that what’s happening? Did. Maybe coming into this conversation you thought, oh no, I’m aware, , I’m not practicing in a vacuum. Were you aware of all these organizations? Are you aware of the resources available to you? Are you reinventing the wheel when you don’t need to be?

I hope that after this really brief 11 minutes that you’ve had a little bit more of an introduction to not only the resources available to you, but the ways that you can get involved. All of these organizations that I’ve mentioned have additional opportunities and some of them. Are revenue generating opportunities, ways that you could go and implement your skillset beyond private practice to help some of these organizations.

some of them are volunteer based, some of them are putting out resources for you. But regardless of that situation, please take the time to look into them, research them, see that they can help you with your marketing, with your collateral, with things that you would be spending your time and energy doing.

And also the networking that you get through this, going to these different conferences, hopping on their different. Portals, seeing the discounts and deals that are available to you. You’re not alone in practice. There are plenty of organizations here for you. We do have an infrastructure built in this industry that we need to strengthen and get more involved in.

And of course, I like to put AAC as this last resource for you. A lot of the opportunities that I’ve been introduced to were introduced to me through AAC. And so whether it’s your following on Facebook, Book you’re calling us up and saying, oh hey, like I have this issue. We’re always here to help. I’m always here to help and so please feel free to reach out with any additional questions.

Thank you all so much for being here, and do not forget to tune in next week for another episode of To The Point.

4 Ways to Use Video to Bring in New Acupuncture Patients

If you aren’t having video as part of what you’re doing, then the reach that you’ll get from things like social media will become less.

Click here to download the transcript.

How can you have more of an online presence so new patients find you well? Did you know that there’s a study done by Digital Sherpa saying that over 80% of online visitors prefer video while only 20% of them will read something? And truly consume it well. So there’s also, in terms of social media, did you know that a lot of social media platforms are also moving more towards video?

For example, Instagram they had talked more recently, like their executives about how it will become more increasingly more of a video platform. And same thing with Facebook executives. They said that a long time ago about how Facebook will primarily be a video platform. And so what that means is that if you.

Sharing video. If you aren’t having video as part of what you’re doing, then the reach that you’ll get from things like social media will become less. And for the amount of time and energy you put in, it’s gonna bring in less bang for your efforts that you put in. And then overall, one thing that if people don’t really know much about how you could help, If you’re able to do if you’re able to educate them through video, people are able to build that relationship with you much faster.

So today we’re gonna talk about four ways that you could use video to, to bring in more new patients in your acupuncture practice. So this is Chen Yen, your six and seven figure practice makeover Mentor at introvertedvisionary.com and your host for our AAC live show today. So let’s talk about the four ways that you.

Used to bring in new patients by video. So the first way is to put it on your home page. So why? Because it’s such a great way to build that kind of connection and trust quickly. Did you know that most people come to website, they leave and they never come back? And did you also know that one of the most visited page.

is what? It’s a page where they find out who is this person, right? So being able to feel whether they connect with you and feel comfortable with you as their provider, as their acupuncturist it, it can speed up the process so much faster when you have a video on your website and it can also help people understand how you can help.

So I used to be very self-critical on video, and I also felt would often feel like, I wasn’t saying things eloquently enough, so I probably shouldn’t do the video, and then I would procrastinate and then just not do them. And then also sometimes I would feel like, oh, I don’t look good enough to be on video today.

So then I would just think, oh, I’ll just do another day and then would never really do it right. . What I noticed was that once I started being on video, Got more comfortable with it, then people ended up coming to us more readily and also were more aligned. When we started putting video on our website, we noticed that people who are coming to us are now they’re more enjoyable to work with.

than ever before, and definitely attribute that to video. And same with our acupuncturist clients who have put video on their website. Now does it have to be professional video or does it not have to be? I would say that certainly, of course, professional video is great, but we’ve had clients who have only posted pretty homemade kind of videos, but as long as the background was professional looking and then they were showing up in a professional way.

It actually still works really well because the most important thing is being able to connect and. Really be yourself. And and then I remember one of our acupuncturist clients who was really nervous about being on video. And I helped him with this what to say and gave him a framework for this.

And then he ended up feeling more confid confident about it. And then he ended up doing a video that he put on his website and more people ended up booking with him. And then now that he has associates, he also. Them do video too. So those of you who have associates you could have them do it of an intro video or you could interview them and as a way to help warm up your patient base to the, your new associate.

Because have you ever had people, if you have an associate, have you. ever had patients say, oh, I just wanna see you. So if you end up being able to introduce your associate to the practice, then make them feel more comfortable make your patients feel more comfortable or people feel more comfortable, then that can also smooth out that transition.

The other thing is that you don’t have to do videos of yourself even. Have you ever thought about this? You could ha post explainer kinds of videos on your website and what is, what does that mean? For example, there might be something about how acupuncture can help with sports injury or acupuncture, how acupuncture can help with digestive issues.

And there are different videos out there, for example, on YouTube that you may share on, can you. Embed their video on your website and certainly, give credit to, to where that came from. And so you don’t actually have to be the one doing the video yourself also. So another possibility is, so the second way to use video to bring in new patients as a practice is to share on social media.

So I already brought up some stats related to how. Video tends to get more views than if you were to post something written on, whether it’s Instagram or Facebook. And it’s because the algorithms are favoring video over the just regular written posts. And so you don’t need to do song and dance though either, right?

, there. , you don’t have to do that kind of stuff. You could do videos in a style that feels comfortable for you. So for some of you that might be more educational and and then it’ll help expand your reach beyond just written kinds of posts and organic social media. The other possibility related to expanding your reach via social media through video is that you can also do paid ads.

You could just create one video, for example, on Facebook. To attract new patients. One of our acupuncturist clients did this and her video was running for over a year and she was still attracting new patients with that one video that we just dialed in. And she just had a wonderful presence and it helped her with what to say and it was really awesome cuz just that one video, imagine just creating one thing and it brings in patience for you for over a year.

So that was really awesome. And the third way to use video. To bring in new patients into your acupuncture practice is to send videos to those who aren’t sure. If they wanna come in to your practice or not. So this could be either in the way of where people are on the fence or it ends up being a video where you share it and with your patient base, and then they share it with people they know or end up referring people to you so that when I say people are on fence, what I mean by that?

For example, have you ever had people call and then they aren’t sure about coming in. They’re like, oh but you don’t accept my insurance or x y. Reason for they can’t book an appointment yet and then just hang up the phone and that’s it, and you never hear from them again. What if instead you did what one practice does, which is they end up sending out videos tied into that person’s issue or condition and then say sure, let me sh send you something that can help you also with your, with your.

issue. And then so that video can start educating them more about how acupuncture can help with this. And or Chinese medicine can help with whatever that health condition is. And it could also be a video. So it could be a video that you just pull for them, or it could be a video that you create, which is more, even more ideal because then they will, they’ll get to experience you energetically and see if they resonate with you or not.

So that can be a great way to help. Inspire people who are on the. To actually book with you, and especially those of you who may charge higher fees or maybe an all cash practice or maybe some of you offer packages. It just really depends on your practice situation or you offer functional medicine and and you offer.

Packages. And so if, especially in those situations it will work really well because it helps warm up people who might be on the fencer who aren’t really sure. And to you and also your approach. The fourth way to use video to bring in more patients for your acupuncture practice is to email the videos to your patient base or, and, or.

Have you ever had people come in for one thing and then they don’t even realize you could help ’em with other things, so that can happen, right? They, even your patients who really appreciate you. I remember there, there’s a so I have, I see a naturopathic doctor who’s also an acupuncturist, and I fly to outta state to go see her, and she does some pretty high level stuff in terms of e.

Work not your traditional kind of naturopathic doctor. And her acupuncture treatments are incredible too. They’re I’ve never had acupuncture treatments like how lasered she, she really is when with very few needles in. And and so the, I fly to go see her and I’ve been, I was flying to see her for, it was at least a year at that point in time.

And I love her treatments and and I, she also helped me so much. But it was really amazing because I remember one day I asked her, Hey, do you can you help with X, Y, Z? I couldn’t remember what the issue is at this moment in time, right? But it was I asked her that and she’s oh yeah, of course I can.

And I thought to myself this, how funny, I’m a healthcare practitioner and I also really trusted in her helping me. But for some reason I never put the two and two together that she could help me with this thing. And so sometimes your patients don’t even realize that you can help ’em with these other types of issues.

They might come in for pain and then they have no idea you can help ’em with digestive issues or their Hoag hormone balancing. And so the only way for them to become more educated about it is if you share about that in the practice, which sometimes you may not have enough time. And then sometimes the, it may not be issues they’re dealing with, but maybe it’s an issue that their friends are dealing with and they would be totally happy to refer people to, but they don’t even know that what you, your services could really help their friend with some of their health issues.

So this is where. If you share videos to, with your patient base by emailing out to them, you could also have videos that are, for some of you, this makes sense for, you could put a TV in your waiting area, and then it plays different videos, educating patients more about acupuncture or Chinese medicine, or you could have them.

Periodically if you don’t want to have a TV or don’t have one and to put in there, then you could have a laptop that they watch. And it doesn’t have to be at every visit. But it could be while they’re waiting in the waiting area, then you mentioned to them, okay, I’d love for you to watch this while you’re waiting.

And then the also, would you, we talked a little bit about referrals. Would you love to increase referrals? And some people hear about the practice and even if they, like your patients rave about it to their friends and family, they may not come in right away. And sometimes it’s from having seen a video and then realizing, oh, okay, I get more about what this is and or they also see you if you’re in the video, then they’ll feel like, oh, okay, I actually feel like I, I resonate with this person.

So they’ll be more likely to come in as well. You could also. , if you’re sharing these videos with your patient base or your list, then you could share about upcoming things at the clinic that you’re excited about. You could also do, one of our acupuncturist clients did a clinic walkthrough and then talked about her vision for the practice and then what who she loves to, to treat and help, like what kinds of patients.

And that way people, that, that video can end up being easily shareable also. To people who could be coming in, friends and family who could be coming into referrals. So those are the four ways to, to use video to attract patients to the practice. And then it’s just a matter of, I and I get how sometimes, especially if you are starting or thinking about this it can be easy to feel like you’re either you get nervous or you don’t like to be on camera.

It could feel uncomfortable. And what ha what I’ve noticed is that no, getting, just doing it will help you start feeling more comfortable and then knowing what to say too in a way that not only educates, but also inspires new patients to come in. So having a framework for it can also really help.

What could you say? And that way you feel more comfortable and confident. We actually have a a script for if you would like to, , for example, create a video that introduces your practice and what to incorporate in it so that people would not only feel more comfortable with you and your practice, but also inspire them to come in to also book an appointment.

We have a template for that. So if you want to email me, or, sorry, if you wanna message me and request it, I’m happy to give it to you. And then, so for those of you who are, or, and I’ll also give you our website too. Our website’s introvertedvisionary.com. And if you’re not watching this on a social media platform right now, then you’re welcome to go there and then request the script.

And I’m happy to give it to you. And for those of you who are at a place where you’re at a plateau in your practice or you just know you’re capable of so much more you would love to grow with more ease and flow and bringing a consistent flow of. Then feel free to check out introverted visionary.com.

So til next time.

Can Advocacy Help Build Your Practice? Nell Smircina

I wanna thank AAC for having me here and letting me talk about advocacy and how it can help build your practice.

Click here to download the transcript.

Hello and welcome to another episode of To The Point. I’m Dr. Nell with the American Acupuncture Council, and I wanna thank AAC for having me here and letting me talk about advocacy and how it can help build your practice. So let’s go to the slides.

For those of you who know me you know that this is actually part of why I got involved with aac. So being trained as a practitioner building my own practice and really my goal was always how are there. Gonna be enough hours in the day so that we can focus on building this profession.

And so I designed my practice in such a way where I could also spend time being an advocate. And what I found through that process was that advocacy can actually help build your business. So some of the things we’re going to get into today, really surprising ways that you can be an advocate. We a lot of times all have certain views when we hear the word advocate or the word advocacy.

Might have certain assumptions around that and might think it has absolutely nothing to do with business building or practice building. And that it’s a very separate thing. But we’re also gonna talk about how you can leverage advocacy to bring more. Into your practice. And then, okay, what are next steps, right?

So are you involved as an advocate? Should you be involved? And what do those things look like? Like I was saying, this is a big reason that I did get involved with AAC because as a solar practitioner, there are certain things that you can do, but there was also this really great organization that was helping to advance the profession in really tangible.

And as one individual, we fit as part of a collective in the profession. So it’s an exciting time. We’re gonna talk about a few of those things today and how you can really get involved. But first let’s get into a little bit of what is advocacy and what are those surprising ways? , this is usually this picture or this previous picture is what people normally think about when they hear the word advocacy.

It’s that, oh, I have to be a public speaker. I have to be out in front of a large crowd, or talking to a lot of people, or. Doing some type of pr I have to be visiting legislators offices, and that can feel a really daunting and b, sometimes just unappealing to your general practitioner who wants to be able to sit there and talk with their patients.

And so really the goal is, all right, let’s understand what are some creative ways to be an advocate, because it doesn’t have to look like this. This is what it looks like for me because I enjoy going and speaking at schools, and I enjoy being a part of the national Association on their board and going out and talking to different legislatures.

But that doesn’t mean that’s what you have to do to really have an impact. So really simple ways that you can have an impact is realize that. You as a licensed acupuncturist, anytime you are talking to someone about this medicine, anytime you’re talking to somebody about acupuncture, traditional medicine, how it can help them the education that you have, you are advocating.

for this profession. And so that could be a one-on-one conversation, that could be a one-on-one conversation with a prospective patient with someone on the street. I always use the example of meeting people in coffee shops. I clearly go to a lot of coffee shops cuz that’s always my default on how people must meet people.

But let’s say you’re talking to somebody in a coffee shop about acupuncture and they’ve never heard of acupuncture. and they come and see you or they come and see one of your colleagues. That person can turn into a person who then goes and tells another person that they should come and benefit from this medicine.

So you are helping to grow efficacy. You are part of an effort. To expand awareness around care, to let people know the value that this profession provides. So it’s not always that you have to then go and talk to someone in Congress or at a state level. , although that is something that we’re gonna talk about as well, if that is something that you’re interested in.

So thinking of yourself as really this term of a professional model, professional modeling. We’re showing people who are coming into the profession, if we are more veteran practitioners, showing people the way, helping to advocate for. Effective business practices for being successful in practice so people know, oh, this is a safe profession to come into.

This is a great profession to come into. And so through those different avenues, whether it’s general public, your patients other practitioners coming into the field, you are helping to be an advocate, even if it is on a one-on-one level, and it’s not going directly to our legislature. , but let’s talk about this because this is sometimes the pushback that we get.

Let’s get past the public speaking and I don’t wanna do that. We can do that with our patients, we can do that, on a one-on-one. But, we’re also trying to build a practice, right? And we need to make a living. We need to be able to support the patients that we do have. We need to be able to bring in more patients than who we currently have.

So how can advocacy. Potentially build our practice. . A foundational concept of being an effective advocate is communication. So we’ve done a couple different Facebook shows around this topic, storytelling your elevator pitch, how are you articulating the value that we provide? One, using those skills in any of those avenues as an advocate, helping to hone those skills is going to make you more effective when it comes to building your practice.

But also, I have to tell you as I got more and more involved in larger skill advocacy work, so I was the president of my state association and now being on the board for asa, which is the National Trade Association, my patients really loved this. , I was a little nervous at first that, oh, I might not be in on this particular Friday because I’m gonna be going to this conference and speaking, or because I’m going to go and do a meeting with my representative.

I’m gonna have to block some time off and let patients know oh, you can see me Monday through Thursday next week because this is what I’m doing. Actually sharing that information with patients is critical in how it can help build your practice. I had more patients when I was practicing in LA who would refer people in and they would say, oh, my friend sees you, and he said, you’re the president of the state association.

That’s so cool. So patients get really excited. You’re knowledgeable about your craft, that you know the industry that you’re part of, that you’re part of a community, and you are, versed in how to leverage that community. Because resources that you have as a provider, that you have as an advocate then trickle down to your patients.

And when it comes to blending those two concepts of how do we get really good with our communication? . And then how do we articulate this information to patients that we are involved in our profession because we love it so much and we wanna see it succeed, and we want this medicine to reach as many people as possible.

When you blend those two things, then you get to the point where, You’re better at articulating that treatment plan and you have more credibility when you’re telling your patient that you are involved. So not only are we practicing the communication not only are we truly involved in our profession and know what’s going on but.

then we can fully articulate that to our patients. Have the credibility to be able to say, I know this medicine. I know other people in this medicine, and if you need an additional referral, I’ve got you. That gives patients a lot more confidence and a confident patient, a trusting patient. An enthusiastic patient.

Those are the patients who are going to help you build your practice. So then you’re not stuck in that one-on-one referral machine. You have people who are then out there advocating for you as a provider for your practice. So last question we wanna answer quickly is, Are you involved and should you be?

And what does that even look like? Like I said, for some of you, your involvement is going to be, I’m gonna get really effective at articulating the value of this medicine to people, and I’m gonna be an advocate on that level so that on a, in a one-on-one conversation, more people are gonna come into acupuncture.

You could take that a step further. You join your state association and there’s so many different levels of involvement there. You can simply be paying dues to help support the mission of the association. And I have to tell you, we’re like the only healthcare profession that makes this optional.

Every other healthcare profession, you get your license and you’re a member of an association and they have very powerful associations for that reason. They’re able to pass more legislation, they’re able to get the attention of representatives in a more effective way because of the strength of those associations.

We’re the only ones who just say, ah, if you wanna be involved. So to make it really easy for you all, you can simply be a dues paying member. What does that. It helps support the mission of the association. It helps advance the medicine, the people who are working on those boards, on those committees who are working so hard.

Those dues help that mission continue. But at the same time, you also get to be kept in the know. So maybe you’re like, I don’t have time to serve on a committee. I don’t have time to serve on a board. I wanna focus on my practice. At least you’re getting that information via email. Webinars that come up where there’s information available you can attend.

And you have the option to get more involved. You could be on a committee for your state association, you could be on the board. And then state associations in turn are members of a national association. So you could get involved with the national Association, through the state association as well, and work on things on a more federal level.

So there are conferences coming up for the asa as the National Association in. I will be there. AAC will be there supporting as always. One of my favorite things about this company is, man, do they show up for these associations and trade shows to make sure that the organizations are well supported.

And then you have. Organizations like the Society for Acupuncture Research, if you’re really into research, that could be a great organization to get involved with, to know what’s going on in an international level. They have a conference coming up too in May and. AAC will be there as well. So I’m hoping that as you’re going through this, you see it’s not just a one size fits all approach.

This is not something where you have to be out there doing public speaking. This can go anywhere from, I’m getting really good at communicating the value that this medicine has to provide to, Hey, I wanna be on the board of a national association. There are so many things in between that. So many ways to start honing your skills so you can help grow this profession, grow this medicine, and help improve the experience for your patients and your practice as well.

As always, if you have any additional questions for me please feel free to reach out. It’s nell@acupuncturecouncil.com. Loved seeing you all, and don’t forget to tune in next week for another episode of To the Point, tons of value to be offered for you guys. Have a great day.

5 Ways Speaking Can Help Grow Your Acupuncture Practice

So today let’s talk about five ways that speaking can help you with growing your practice.

Click here to download the transcript.

Billionaire Warren Buffet has said that this skill is something that can help raise your value by 50%, and is a skill that any person who is running your business should learn. So it can also help you grow your acupuncture practice and without having to always be constantly posting on social media or spending money on ads or seo.

So this is Chen Yen, your 6 and 7 figure Practice Makeover Mentor at introvertedvisionary.com and your host for the AAC live show. So today let’s talk about five ways that speaking can help you with growing your practice. So that way you have an avenue that helps support you bring in a consistent flow of patients you enjoy working with.

Now, the first way to use speaking as an avenue of growing your practice is to set yourself apart. So when you speak, people will get a better sense of what it’s like to be in your presence and especially when acupuncture is something that’s such a hands-on experience and people are wanting to know what kind of a practitioner this person is and what they’re like when they’re in front of you.

When you’re in front of them, then they can suss that out. So much better than any kind of a written post or marketing or ads or anything else like that. They might see online because they get to see you and experience you and see if they resonate with you. Also. By educating more people about how you can help them, it sets you apart from other acupuncturists who may not do that.

And so I would say that, and from all the different I’ve talked to thousands of practitioners at this point. acupuncturist and other holistic health practitioners, and of all the different approaches that I hear from them about what’s working, what’s not working in their practices, hands down, speaking still one of the fastest ways to, and most effective ways to grow a practice without having to always be Constantly feeling like you need to be doing all sorts of song and dance and think things for marketing

And when it’s also the, it feels it has one of the highest impact of all the different kinds of marketing approaches because one of the reasons why people may not be coming to you yet is because they don’t really know about you and they don’t really know the scope of what you can help them with.

Have you noticed that many times, even if people do understand that acupuncture can help? Many times they just associate acupuncture with pain, and that’s about it. So when you’re able to educate them about much more beyond what they likely know, acupuncture can help with, and you’re more likely to.

Be someone they’ll think of when they have a certain kind of issue or when their friends or other people they know have the issue, they’ll then they’ll think about you. So it totally sets you apart. That’s the first way speaking can help you with growing your practice faster. And the second oh, and also the other thing too is that it’s also a way for you to get known and recognized in your community as a go-to acupuncturist and amongst your peers.

When people just see you in a different limelight when you are speaking. For example, if you were a guest speaker at a particular organization, they don’t, it’s not if you were to advertise or post on social media. It’s Hey, I’m here. I’m here. It’s a different kind of a feeling because when you actually show up and speak, people automatically already see you as a go-to expert.

So it’s such a great way to, to get known and recognized in, in your community as a go-to acupuncturist. The second way speaking can help you with growing in your acupuncture practice is by helping grow you more personally and professionally and, business, having in your own business is one of the best personal development tools we could ever have on ourselves, for ourselves.

Have, do you agree? Have you noticed that? It will, having a business will put a mirror up to your triggers. , it will put a mirror up to your insecurities. It will put a mirror up to your inner strength as well. And speaking is a reflection of that. I. And also how clear you are about your vision and what what really aspires you to have this practice and be able to communicate how you can help people and communicate that effectively.

I know that for the longest time I used to hide. I used to hide behind mainly writing because I felt very inadequate when I would speak. In fact, when I was little and it came from this experience that I felt was traumatic when I was little. So my dad’s a PhD, research scientist, engineer, so very left brain, very analytical, and When you’re younger when I was about eight years old Sunday mornings, I used to dread when other I used to think, oh gosh, I’m so jealous of other kids, because when the Sunday paper would come, I imagined that other kids would get in.

They get all excited about reading the comics. And every Sunday my dad had me do a current event talk and I hated it so much. , I did so much that because I would always be in tears. My dad was very strict and he would critique me in the style that he felt was best. And it was very, left brain analytical just, and not my style.

Totally. And I would just cry and I would feel like when I grow up, I will never. Speak in front of an audience if I could help it. And over the years I would feel a lot, a big sense of dread come over me when in class we would be asked to present. I felt like I had to I felt like if it wasn’t perfect, then I would get criticized and I would feel really bad about myself.

And but then also, I would blank out. So even as I got older and I thought, okay, I could do this right and because one of the reasons why I decided to speak and educate is because I like to teach. As a little kid. I would grow up in my I would grow up, I would bb in my neighborhood, and the funnest thing for me was to.

The, these worksheets for my third grade teacher and then end up giving them to, to all the people I was, the kids I was playing with. And that was my sense of fun as a kid. And so the, because I’d love to teach, I ended up deciding, you know what? I would love to learn this. I would love to learn how to speak and help more people, reach more people at once.

But I used to blank out a lot. and I would literally say things that didn’t make any sense when they came out of my mouth and my face would turn red. I would feel so livid. I would want to hide under a rug. And, but and I felt judged like. , all the eyes were on me. And but if I am, if I was able to, the reason I bring this up is if I was able to go from that to now being invited to speak nationally and even internationally, then you can too, and it doesn’t.

Have to feel intimidating and each level of growth as you speak is you will grow your ability to be very concise and impactful and engaging and inspiring, and it is a skill that no one can take away from you and to the extent that you grow. this yourself personally. This way, it’s going to help you with growing in your business too, without you even realizing it until one day you look back and you realize that, that you start to attract people who you enjoy working with.

Have you ever felt like of all the people you work with currently, the people you absolutely love working with, you would love to work with more of those people. Have you ever felt that way before and. , when you are able to sharpen your saw with speaking you, you will naturally start to see that more and more people who are more in alignment with you will end up being attracted to you.

And it’s such a different feeling than just helping everyone and then having people who may not be as much in alignment. . And the third, and by the way, I also wanna say , at the beginning of this I mentioned that Warren Buffet and billionaire has said that speaking is one of the, like num, it taught a nu a one skill that can really increase your your value so much.

And, he also had, when he first started speak, , he actually ended up he did this Dale Carnegie course thing, but he actually ended up dropping out of it because he just wasn’t very like, . It wasn’t his second nature, a second nature kind of thing for him. It’s not like he was great at it and he got nervous and that kind of thing, and it took him the second round and it’s, you’re not alone with it.

And at the same time, the, those of us who feel like we have a voice and. And we want to share something really awesome and amazing like acupuncture, Chinese medicine with people. Then it, as we grow this way, we’re gonna just help more and more people. Third way speaking can help you with growing your practice is this.

, it’s to, you’ll be able to reach more people at once instead of feeling like you need to network or one-on-one or which can also be good. But then you could be, imagine reaching 20 people at once, or 50 people at once, or even a hundred people at once or more. And this could be virtual or it could be in person.

So for example, for myself, I feel. What it can feel less intimidating when you’ve got, a bunch of people listening to you virtually compared to in, in person, a huge dorms room in person, right? So you could find what feels comfortable for you and start there. And then as far as, what’s really cool about this is that you could, it’s one of the few things.

When you’re marketing your acupuncture practice, you could say something once and then repurpose it in different ways. So for example let’s just have a look at even social media. So if you were, if this is a platform that you have an interest in also supporting you with growing your. Did you know that most of the platforms are going more towards video?

For example, Instagram, their executives came out more recently and had said that we’re going towards video in the upcoming years. And what this means when they say that is that algorithms will favor if you favor you if you do video and. Similarly before Instagram had, their executives had years ago they had brought up, this is going to be primarily a video platform.

And so if you are not interested in doing video, for example on social media, that might be okay for now, but down the. , you’re, you will likely not get the kind of reach that you’re used to getting right now without doing some kind of video or unless you wanna be spending money on ads. And so if you were to do a video, the good part about it is that you could end up repurposing that.

So the video could be, Put on other platforms. For example, if you do a video on Instagram, you could put it on Facebook. You can also put it on YouTube so it, you can end up expanding your reach with just one video. You could also put it on your website. You could also. , email it to your patient base.

And so there’s so much that you could do with that one video, plus that video can be turned into something that’s written, for example, a blog article or you get published somewhere and in a paper or some kind of publication where people are reading about you and learning about you. So there are many ways where you could just take one video.

Do the work once and then everything else ends up getting distributed to, to share about your practice. To promote about your practice, so you don’t have to do that work many times. Now it, you can’t do it the other way around. You can’t go from writing to. You can’t do it writing to video, but then you would need to hire either somebody to say the things for you, , or do some kind of animation, which requires you hiring also or paying a additional money for that kind of thing.

So it’s harder to go from written to video, whereas it could go from written to video to written, and so many different aspects of where you create one asset and you can use it over and over again in different ways. . So now the fourth way to use speaking to, to grow your acupuncture practice is to.

Communicate more effectively to your potential and existing patients and clients? It’s interesting because we have clients who come to us because they would love to educate more people in the community and get known and recognized as a go-to acupuncture clinic. And then as they’re working with us to for example we help them get their.

A talk dialed in a signature talk that they feel really good about and that people wanna hear about. And then we help ’em dial that in. We also help them with getting booked and invited to speak. And then also be, be attracting patients from what they’re saying too. And in this process it’s always fascinating to me that sometimes people don’t even get to speak yet, and then they’re already really busy with patients.

We had an acupuncturist client of ours. This happened too recently actually. So we got started pretty early on in this process and he didn’t even get. Be speaking. He’s oh my gosh, my, my practice is so busy. It’s already doubled. And it, and it’s when you can communicate more effectively to your potential patients or clients in a such a way that it lands for people, then it, they’ll get it and they’ll actually come and see you or they’ll refer, and , according to Ted, Ted Talks the curator Chris Anderson.

So he said, as a leader or as an advocate, Public speaking is a key to unlocking empathy, stirring excitement, sharing knowledge and insights, and promoting a shared dream. And as an entrepreneur, as someone who owns your own practice, it’s one of the most. Important skills to, to have so that you could share your dream, your share your vision, share your excitement in an inspiring way to people so that more and more people are help.

More and more people are part of your also a part of your vision. And then love to also come and get treated by you too. And Being able to do this effectively, speaking effectively is one skillset that can help you achieve all of those results that we just talked about. And so it’s like he talks about how it’s like a superpower, to share your ideas and accomplish your dreams, and also offer your services.

So the fifth way speaking can help you with growing your acupuncture practice is to bring more patients in the door and even another stream of income. So we, when we know, when we think about this in terms of speaking for one, there’s one thing to just educate people and it’s another to. , educate and inspire new patients to come from it.

So it’s a very different skillset, which is why a lot of our clients come to us for help with this. And then as far as speaking can end up bringing patients in if you have a a way, a system that supports like what you’re saying, for one, that inspires new patients to come from it, and a system in place that supports them coming in.

Even after the talk itself. And also it. Bring in other streams of income. Why? Because you could offer other kinds of things. You could offer supplements, herbs, products, other services. You could also offer things like some of our clients are offering acupuncturist, clients are offering an automated online course.

Have you ever thought about that? Where do you ever say the same things over and over again and you end up feeling like. are a broken record sometimes and you don’t mind that, but then it still takes up a lot of energy and then it’s not like everything always, like your patients don’t always remember everything you share with them.

So what if you could put it together in such a way that helps them? And be able to understand in their own time and listen to it in their own time, they can benefit from it. And your, it’s it’s not just your patient base, it’s also beyond your patient base too. Imagine all the people who are too far to drive to see you.

They can actually benefit from what you’re teaching them, and it can help them with their health. How good would that really feel? . So then you could offer automated online courses and you could charge anywhere between, we have clients charging anywhere between, it could be, $50 to hundreds of dollars to even a thousand dollars or more.

It just really depends on what topic it’s about. And it could be for the lay public audience. It could also be for other providers. Have you ever thought about how all the things that you figured out over the. That it could really benefit other acupuncturists or practitioners, whether it’s clinical side of things, whether it’s workflow efficiency, whether it is with marketing your practice.

There’s certain things, maybe something very key that you figured out and you could make that available as an automated online course or and you can, it can also, PDFs or that kind of thing and sell it, right? And or you could offer group workshops virtually or group programs virtually.

And so there are many ways that you can end up bringing another stream of income beyond just seeing patients. And how do you get the word out about it? How will people know about you and sign up for your automated online course, for example? That’s where you can use speaking as an avenue to educate people about.

And also develop a connection with you. So they feel I would love to, to sign up for this automated online course and of yours. So that’s just one example. And so speaking can help you with Growing personally and professionally and help you become more confident and also communicating effectively your vision, your aspirations, and can help you bring in another stream of income plus more patients, consistent flow of patients into your practice.

. If you are at a place in your practice where you’re at a plateau and you would love to, to have it grow in such a way that feels like it’s more an ease and flow and or you would like to explore this as an avenue of growing your practice, cuz you just, you’re bubbling up inside where you feel like, oh, this is something that, that I’ve been wanting to do and I want to share acupuncture and Chinese medicine with more people and then, but you’re not really sure how to get going, how to get things going so that you get invited at places to speak and then also be able to attract new patients and another stream of income from it.

Then feel free to go to introvertedvisionary.com. So feel free to go to introvertedvisionary.com and till next time.