Holistic Mental Health: How Acupuncture and Herbal Medicine Can Help Your Mental Health
Most frequently people think about acupuncture being beneficial for pain, fertility, and other internal conditions. However, it often gets overlooked how much Acupuncture and Chinese Medicine can do to treat mental health conditions as well. Every day I am treating people with anxiety, depression, and other mental health concerns.
Even the World Health Organization (WHO) and the National Institute of Health (NIH) have recognized this. In a report released by the WHO and NIH, titled “Acupuncture: Review and Analysis of Reports on Controlled Clinical Trials” it lists 31 symptoms, conditions, and diseases that have been shown in controlled research trials to be treated effectively by acupuncture. Included on this list is depression, anxiety, OCD, PTSD, sleep disorders, and somatization disorders.
As many of you know, my background is in mental health and thus, it was a natural evolution to have one of my specialties remain in holistic mental health. With this background, I have treated many people struggling with a variety of mental health issues including anxiety, depression, panic attacks, Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, as well as supporting people through grief and other emotional imbalances with acupuncture and Chinese herbs. This can often include other physical symptoms like insomnia, digestive issues, and pain conditions, that often go hand in hand with stress and other mental health concerns. People often think that their only options for treatment include counseling or seeing a doctor for medication. This is not that case as acupuncture and Chinese Medicine are great alternatives or adjunct treatments to combine with Western medicine.
I can’t tell you how many times someone has shared one of the following scenarios:
They want to try a holistic non-medication option to address their mental health concerns before trying medication.
Their medication isn’t quite doing enough as they are going through a difficult time but they are hesitant to make changes to their medications as it was hard to find medication or dosages that worked without significant side effects
They are wanting to get off of medications they were on as they have been doing better for a sustained period of time after going through life transitions that caused their depression or anxiety.
Their medication has helped with some symptoms but not others.
As a retired Licensed Clinical Social Worker with over 24 years of experience in assessment, diagnosis, and treatment of various mental health issues, I possess the unique skill set to treat mental health conditions with a high level of competence. It also affords me the level of respect necessary to work collaboratively with other providers and to support their ongoing treatments including counselors and psychiatrists/MDs providing medication management.
As an Acupuncture Physician, I combine Chinese Medicine with my western knowledge of mental health in an integrative approach to the treatment of mental health conditions, while providing the highest quality of care. Treatment will generally include a combination of both acupuncture and herbal medicine.