Welcome to acu in practice! With COVID affecting the entire world, many of us as well as our clients have the same questions: How do we prevent ourselves and our patients from getting the infection? How do we treat or approach viral infections in ourselves or our patients? For prevention, we need to limit exposure which we are doing with the “stay home” concept, social distancing and protective equipment. From a TCM standpoint, we and our patients should 1. Eat nutritious food. 2. Get adequate rest and sleep. 3. Practice regular physical exercise. 4. Support the Wei Qi or Zheng Qi (immune system and factors). When it comes to treatment of viral infections, supporting immunity while expelling the pathogen (wind-cold or wind-heat) is the general approach. However, there are multiple methods we can employ to get the job done! Today, I am sharing feedback from Dr. Kevin May, one of the instructors for IVAS and a mixed animal practitioner in Southern California. Over the next few weeks, I will share from other colleagues in our field so that we may draw from each other’s experience and knowledge in order to combat this health crisis together. The concepts are not specific to COVID, but in fending and fighting pathogens in general, giving us tools to take forward into the future for ourselves and our patients!
Feedback from Dr. May:
One of the basic things for health and thus being able to resist any type of infection is to treat the imbalances in your patient’s/your own body. Balance is key to health (as well as plenty of rest and good nutrition). Balance can be achieved in many ways - with diet (appropriate for you), exercise, rest and acupuncture. To address the acupuncture part, after “treating what you see” here are some points known for helping in immune support. ST 36 LI 4, 11 GV 14, 20 BL 17 KI 27 Lu 7 These are just a few and surely others may have their more favorite points. You might just want to use some of the first few points and treat once a week, unless you start to see clinical signs then include the others. It is not possible to tell you exactly what points to treat, because each patient is unique, but those listed above could be helpful. Balance is so important.
**Thank you Dr. May!**
Next week we will highlight another colleague’s feedback. Please check back in! We need all of the community collaboration we can get. #globalcollaboration
This post was created by Nell Ostermeier, DVM, CVA, FAAVA and is intended for informational use, not to replace medical advice. Dr. Kevin May contributed to this week's content.