B.A.M.

What is B.A.M.?

BAM is Bringing Acupuncture Mainstream – One Talk at a Time

The standard protocols offered by health care plans do not normally incorporate Acupuncture and other holistic and “alternative” methods of treatment. There are many reasons for this, though the effectiveness to treat disease and many common ailments is not one of them. As a result, most Americans will never experience the benefits of Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) and its “alternative” status will continue to subordinate Acupuncture, for instance, to the allopathic-based care most Americans typically receive.

If you want to reduce the cost of prescription drugs, there are a couple of common sense ways:

1) Reduce the cost.

2) Reduce the prescribed amounts by offering non-pharmaceutical treatment methods.

The latter reason can also play an instrumental part in reducing the addiction and adverse affects associated with many prescribed drugs.

Despite the fact that Acupuncture was introduced to Americans in sensationalized ways when President Nixon and his entourage traveled to China in the early 1970s, Acupuncture remains  mostly known (if at all) for pain management in Western Society.

Acupuncture is the best known modality of Asian Medicine, though it is part of a comprehensive medicine system which also involves, cupping, moxibustion, massage (tuina), dietetics, herbal medicine, energy (QI) cultivation (Qi-Gong, Tai-ji), and life style guidance.  Acupuncture alone and/or in conjunction with the other modalities are often effective to treat many conditions without the toxic adverse affects of using multiple drugs.

I am proud to say that the American military has used Acupuncture with good effect in combat zones, and that is causing the VA to begin adopting Acupuncturists in some East Coast VA facilities. In general, Acupuncture throughout the United States is being recognized and supported by VA programs. WHY? In my humble opinion, because it has been proven to work and desired by those who have little time for red tape and non-sense in dealing with frontline conditions and getting back into the fight.

On the home front, we also live in a remarkably complex world and the generally immediate therapeutic effects of allopathic treatment are often welcomed. But as a society and as patients, we need to understand that problems that build up over time, must also have a strategy to heal them over time if we expect the body to work as it is programmed to, to bring the body back to vitality in as much of a naturally self-balanced way as possible. TCM, good nutrition, and many natural holistic Western therapies can help aid Americans in that endeavor.

CKY