Businesswoman Kemble du Pont was feeling overwhelmed and anxious about filling the shoes of her predecessor. Mary Lou Purcell was riddled with inflammation in her knees before two knee replacements. Kimberly Oglethorpe needed something done about proliferating cysts, and James Roberts’ Alzheimer’s disease made it difficult for him to find the right words.
Their maladies seemed to have little in common. But after going to their doctors, each wound up in an acupuncturist’s office to get relief.
Acupuncture, an ancient Chinese practice, is based on subtle changes in the central nervous system and progressive increases in the secretion of neuro-transmitters, serotonin and endorphins in particular; and the activation of the body’s natural healing process.
The Eastern explanation for how acupunctures works is that the life energy, or Qi, flowing through the body can be influenced and balanced by stimulating specific points on the body. These points are located along channels of energy known as meridians that connect all of our major organs. According to Chinese medical theory, illness arises when the cyclical flow of Qi in the meridians becomes unbalanced or is blocked.
The Western explanation is that acupuncture is the stimulation of specific points located near or on the surface of the skin. Stimulating those points can alter various biochemical and physiological conditions, to promote pain relief and healing.
Acupuncture can apparently work well for back pain, arthritis, PMS, infertility, allergies and much more.
Substances released in acupuncture not only relax the whole body, but can regulate serotonin in the brain. That is why depression is often treated with acupuncture.
There are some 21 licensed acupuncturists in Indian River County registered in Florida. Licensed acupuncturists hold master’s degrees in Chinese Medicine and require over 3,000 hours of training. The law allows other doctors such as chiropractors and medical doctors to receive 200 hours of training before they are allowed to perform acupuncture.
The expanding use of acupuncture as a viable technique is evidenced right here in Vero Beach. Jill Jaynes, board-certified acupuncture physician and licensed Doctor of Oriental Medicine, who owns Absolute Integrated Medicine in Vero Beach where people can make appointments for private treatments, recently opened a walk-in clinic for acupuncture.
And Angela King’s practice, Indian River Acupuncture & Integrative Medicine, has quadrupled in size since opening in 2006. Several other acupuncture places have opened for business in the last decade.
King, an acupuncture physician and Doctor of Oriental Medicine, says the proof that acupuncture is gaining greater acceptance is in the numbers. “There’s so much demand. The bottom line is if we weren’t getting results with people we wouldn’t be this busy.”
“Nothing is a panacea but on the whole people are getting results.”
With acupuncture now being offered at major hospitals and medical centers across the country, including Sloan Kettering, the Mayo Clinic and MD Anderson, it’s clear the practice, once viewed skeptically in the West, has been somewhat integrated into U.S. medicine, although locally Indian River Medical Center and Sebastian River Medical Center do not offer acupuncture.
“Hopefully what we’re seeing is a move toward the inclusiveness of medicine,” said King. “It’s not a competition between ‘us’ and ‘them,'” meaning East vs. West, but “taking the best of both worlds, and saying, ‘This patient is getting better, is all that matters.'”
Dr. M.L. Richardson, board-certified in anesthesia and pain management, and medical director at Grove Place Surgery Center in Vero Beach, refers patients with pain of various types as well as a multitude of other conditions for acupuncture. He also receives treatments himself. He has been doing so for well over 10 years.
“I am for whatever modality helps people,” he said. “We as traditional medical doctors don’t have all the answers. I feel we must be open to all treatment modalities as potentially beneficial.”
Good results keep du Pont coming back for more acupuncture treatments.
The 33-year-old businesswoman can’t say enough good things about the impact acupuncture and other holistic practices have had on her ability to manage “a high level of anxiety dealing with stress and insomnia. It changed my life,” she said.
After taking over her father’s well-established business, Europa Inc., du Pont had anxieties about managing staff, making decisions, and other aspects of her life. Her mind would wander to the worst-possible scenario.
She tried counseling but after a few sessions at Indian River Acupuncture starting two years ago, using acupuncture and other holistic techniques, she began to feel more empowered. She could handle situations, make big decisions, and not crumble with some disastrous thought.
“I feel balanced and whole,” she said. “Within the first week I was sleeping better.”
With acupuncture, she also got to the root of her allergies, having them greatly reduced from severe to mild or eliminated altogether.
Kimberly Oglethorpe, 41, a patient of Jaynes, also has benefited from acupuncture.
Oglethorpe has a condition in which her body produces cysts or tumors. A recent MRI found a 5-centimeter cyst on her left ovary. She has had six biopsies on her left breast, two on her right.
She credits regular acupuncture sessions, radical changes in her diet and herbal remedies with making the cyst on her ovary go away and shrinking one on her forearm from the size of a large gum ball to a pea.
Acupuncture sessions can be a stretch for someone on a tight budget and those whose insurance doesn’t cover treatments, which can require a single session to frequent ones depending on the person’s diagnosis and response to acupuncture.
To make it more affordable, more community acupuncture clinics are opening up across the country. In addition to her private practice, Jaynes opened a clinic for walk-in clients.
No appointment is needed; the fee is $25. The treatments at Community Acupuncture Clinic last about 45 minutes and are not private. There are six reclining chairs in the clinic and clients rotate into them, as an acupuncturist moves about the room, tending to one at a time. The clinic, adjoined to Absolute Integrated Medicine, is open three days a week and will expand to 12 chairs in the coming months.
This way, she adds, “everyone is able to get acupuncture. It is accessible. It’s affordable. You don’t have to make an appointment and wait for few days.”
Dr. Christine Nielson, a family medicine doctor board-certified in hospice and palliative care, decided to get training in acupuncture because she worked with many frail, elderly people. “It’s a good option to treat people,” she says. “Pain medicines aren’t always an option for elderly who can’t tolerate it, or choose not to take it.” Nielson offers acupuncture treatments at Indian River Acupuncture.
She also finds it helpful for conditions that are not quite a formal diagnosis in Western medicine. Vague complaints about not feeling quite right, or a mood being off, can sometimes be addressed effectively. “Acupuncture can help treat those patients before they actually become sick.”
Some patients, though, are hesitant with the unfamiliar. “It’s an unknown,” she says. “People are scared of the needles. It usually just takes trying it to make people change their mind.”
Although acupuncture is not a cure for Alzheimer’s – nothing is – James Roberts, 76, goes once a week for treatment of the disease. His wife, Gerrie, notices short-term improvement for several days in his word recall and sentence structure.
And for Mary Lou Purcell, who was having severe pain in both her arthritic knees, acupuncture helped reduce the inflammation. Eventually, she got both knees replaced and continued to get acupuncture treatments to keep the inflammation down.
“I think the acupuncture helped with the post-operative range of motion, reduced the pain caused by inflammation and improved the scar. I was able to complete my therapy very comfortably,” said the 67-year-old Vero Beach woman who is back to doing water aerobics and walking.
For skeptics and doubters, King acknowledges that similar to surgery, there are risks.
“When you get surgery, you sign a waiver. You have surgery anyway because you understand the risks and benefits.”
She recommends people go to a quality acupuncturist – someone with a good reputation, good ethics and good practices.
“It’s not the tooth fairy, and it’s not religious,” she said. “Prestigious medical journals describe what happens in the body when an acupuncture needle is inserted. There’s a large amount of quality research on the Western side about it.”