Posts from — August 2009

Here a cool article on how to alleviate tennis elbow.  I will say I have successfully treated many case of tennis elbow with acupuncture.  It is a fantastic therapy for that type of injury.  The problem is that many people resume the activities that originally caused the tendonitis or rsi without modifying or improving the movement.  Watch the video in the article and it is nothing more than balancing the motion or “undoing/unwinding” of the irritation.  Simple but brilliant.

Give acupuncture its due, it can get you over the hump within a few treatments.  After that it is up to you to do your own rehab.

http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/08/25/phys-ed-an-easy-fix-for-tennis-elbow/?em

It is a big year for the city of Chanhassen.  Opening a new high school, new sports teams, a fantastic theater department, heck Tiger Woods just left hazeltine.  A whole bunch of fun stuff going on in the community.  Sandra and I are super excited to be a part of the #2 community in the country (according to Money Magazine) and ready to grow our Chanhassen acupuncture clinic along with it.  We hope that we see lots of sports medicine type conditions, feel free to pop-in or give us a call to get you back into the game.  Go Storm!  Traditional Chinese Medicine is fantastic for sports-injuries sprains, strains, and pain…we can treat a lot of issues using herbs and acupuncture.

We treat injuries and can provide relief for soccer, cross-country, football, volleball type injuries.

“Trend #1: Deterioration of Medical Philosophy and Practice
Technology has a shadow side. It accounts for real progress in medicine, but has also hurt it in many ways, making it more impersonal, expensive and dangerous. The false belief that a safety net of sophisticated drugs and machines stretches below us, permitting risky or lazy lifestyle choices, has undermined our spirit of self-reliance. The cold fact is that while Americans live more than 30 years longer than they did at the turn of the last century, public health measures such as better sanitation, immunizations, better food and water, and safer and less polluted workplaces account for 25 years of that increase; medical intervention, only five years. A recent study showed that in the 1990s, only about one in 16,000 Americans had his or her life saved or significantly extended by improvements in health-care technology. “Let’s Take the Stomachache Out of Health Care Reform” provides a real-world example of a different approach.”

The rest of the article is here:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/andrew-weil-md/whats-wrong-with-american_b_261365.html

I really like the part that 5/6 of the increase in our life span is due to better sanitation and food supply.  People are now less likely to die of communicable diseases…but the double-edged sword of most deaths are due to chronic disease (most of which are preventable) but that is another story.  Acupuncture and Traditional Chinese Medicine have a lot of tools to deal with lifestyle adjustments and dietary issues that can better help cope with disease.  If you are looking for relief from headaches, MS, obesity, heart disease…we may have some ideas for you to implement that can improve your quality of life without getting acupuncture.

Like the old saying…patience is a virtue.

Have patience with the medicine.  What we do is very effective and we have many methods of acupuncture that we can use local, distal, scalp, auricular, e-stim and some combination of all five.  So if you get a few treatments and we aren’t getting the results…we still have some options.  Be patient, this medicine has worked for billions of people over the last few thousand years.  And do not forget that we have herbals, dietary, cupping, gwa sha, liniments, and exercise.  We will always give you honest feedback and give you the most bang for the buck…but everyone responds differently to the many methods but we will tirelessly attempt to get it just right for you.

Fantastic article–our country is really about disease management and not health care.  No matter how wrong or inconclusive some treatments are…we still spend tens of billions on it.  But god-forbid you do some acupuncture…who knows it may help and how are they going to sell you a statin if we actually get you healthy.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/dr-mark-hyman/why-health-care-reform-wi_b_248937.html

Just recently I injured the tendons in my right elbow and have had a 99% recovery after a few sessions with both Mason and Sandra. One or two more and I’m certain that pain will be gone.

About two years ago I could not play my acoustic guitar for more than a few minutes without experiencing pain and numbness in my left hand and forearm. My pinky and ring finger were both going numb. It prevented me from playing much at all.
After the first session I drove home WITH MY LEFT HAND (without realizing it) and experienced no pain. Two more sessions with Mason knocked out a year or so of chronic pain and numbness and I’ve been actively playing my guitar ever since with no recurrence of those symptoms! HIGHLY RECOMMENDED!!

Dean M., Minneapolis

As we enter the dog days of summer–tempers flare, frustration mounts, and the humidity gets down right oppressive.

The most noticeable effect of acupuncture is the calming experience.   Almost all of our patients report a sense of improved well-being and peacefulness immediately after treatment.  That “acupuncture buzz” can last for many days– improving sleep, decreasing anxiety, and alleviating stress!

Make an appointment, stop-by and say hi, or comeback for a little wellness treatment.  Everyone can use a little down time, and acupuncture might just be the ticket to get you thru these hot, sticky days of August.

Also, Mason McClellan LAc., is now gladly accepting patients having just jumped thru all the hoops necessary to get his license.  So there are now two of us here to help you or your friends/family with their health needs.

In Wellness,
Sandra