What is a Traditional Chinese Medicine Doctor?

You know, I find myself having this same conversation with people where they ask me what I do, and I say that I'm a doctor of traditional Chinese medicine. Funnily enough, there's the great wall on the Apple TV back there, but people then ask me what is a Chinese medicine doctor, right? Is that like acupuncture? Is that like energy healing? Is that like herbal medicine? And I often have to take a little bit of time to explain what a traditional Chinese medicine doctor actually is, because yes, it is related to acupuncture, but it is not just that. So I thought in this video here today, I would explain a little bit about what a traditional Chinese medicine doctor actually is. Hey guys, Dr. Alex Hein, author of the health book, Master of the Day, available on Amazon and Audible. I'm a doctor of Chinese medicine as well as licensed acupuncturist. So let's talk about this idea of what a traditional Chinese medicine doctor actually is. First and foremost, it's a doctor of what is technically, you know, East Asian medicine, primarily Chinese, but has influences with Ayurveda, which probably predates Chinese medicine. I'm not a historian, but I think Ayurveda does actually predate Chinese medicine. And there are some shared similarities there. It's related to Tibetan medicine, Tibetan indigenous medicine, which is also a fusion of traditional Chinese medicine or classical ancient Chinese medicine with Ayurveda itself. So for example, in Ayurveda and Tibetan medicine, they also use the pulse in some ways, similar to how we do in Chinese medicine, but in other ways, very, very differently. Now, there are also other forms of traditional medicines in Asia and Southeast Asia, even practices like cupping. There's wet cupping. I think it's called hijama or something like that in the Arabic speaking countries. There's also, I've even seen pictures of people in Africa using animal horns and Southeast Asia using animal horns to cup. So some of these practices are a fusion of traditional medicines from typically Asia. Now that includes a whole bunch of different practices we'll get into shortly. But the other big difference regarding what a traditional Chinese medicine doctor is, is, is really the medical philosophy, right? Because we're going to talk about other professions that use practices that primarily come from Chinese medicine, like acupuncture, which is now used by PTs, chiropractors, MDs, dry needling is one of the standards of care now in a lot of fields because it works. But that by itself, just because someone puts in an acupuncture needle, doesn't mean they're practicing Chinese medicine. So that's kind of a piece of why I wanted to shoot this video here. Now, the next thing that's very important is the medical philosophy. I mean, what's very interesting is if you look at most ancient physicians, there's a really interesting mix of medicine, mysticism, cosmology, astronomy, astrology, alchemy, all of these different practices that were once a part of every conventional medical education. And it's very interesting that that's also true of Chinese medicine, you know, because ancient people were much more attuned to what was going on in the environment, their livelihood, their lives, their illness, their survival was so much more closely tied to it. Unlike modern people, where we have AC and most people in the developed nations don't have to worry about food and definitely don't have to worry about famine, but in ancient times, famine was obviously closely linked to weather patterns and possibly even the arrangement of stars and the constellations would be noticed at that time of the year. You know, it's winter. So now Orion is coming up and that means these other things for our harvest. So all of these were really, really important to ancient people because they were directly impacting their life. And some of those are still true to this day and others, maybe not so true. Now, typically the great doctors of Chinese medicine talk about various methods of healing, and I shot this video on the four main methods that in traditional Chinese medicine we use for healing, but the four that commonly come up throughout time and throughout history in our field are techniques with needles. So acupuncture, bleeding, and things like that. You also have Chinese herbal formulas as well as moxibustion being the third. And then the last you could say is therapeutic body work, tuina, even things like bone setting, external trauma, you know, prior to the modern hospital system. So the four methods that you see the most really are related to needle skill, herbal formulas, body work, and moxibustion. So all of those go into creating a really exceptional practitioner, a really skilled practitioner, but people individually have their specialties. So most doctors specialize in other formulas or acupuncture in terms of general buckets that they practice in. Now, the reason I bring all this up is because the philosophy of traditional Chinese medicine, the medical theory is what creates traditional Chinese medicine. Right? Because I mentioned dry needling is used by at least half a dozen professions now unrelated to Chinese medicine. As far as I'm aware, primarily as a Chinese medicine practice, acupuncture or the use of needles in that way. But just because a person has neck pain and you stick needles in the neck, which is how a lot of practitioners do it. And honestly, even a lot of Chinese medicine practitioners, that doesn't mean you're practicing Chinese medicine. Right? There's a reason why there are channels and why so many great doctors talk about not even treating back pain at the location of the pain, they may treat it distally at the end of your foot or at the top of your head and it still works. It's the difference between saying, you know, they have lower abdominal pain versus this person has lower abdominal pain because the pattern based on our medical theory, based on a cluster of symptoms is something digestive related to the spleen or pancreas or whatever. And so we're treating points on the spleen or stomach channel, which ironically are relieving that lower abdominal pain. Now, if you go to a PT or somebody else that isn't trained in Chinese medicine, they may just stick needles where it hurts. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. But the point being that, you know, traditional Chinese medicine, the medical theory is what makes it traditional Chinese medicine. You could use TCM herbs anytime you want. You could take needles and stick them wherever you want, but that doesn't mean you're using those fundamental principles that were designed for efficacy in mind to help get the best results possible and help the patient get better. So a doctor of traditional Chinese medicine these days go by many different titles, there's OMD, Oriental Medical Doctor, which I think has since been defunct, no longer used, there's DAOM, Doctor of Acupuncture and Oriental Medicine, DSOM, Doctor of Science and Oriental Medicine, which is my title. But really to me, what that means is that you utilize a lot more of these methods. And of course you can do that without a doctorate title. But for me primarily as a doctor in Chinese medicine, what it means is I primarily specialize in formulas as well as acupuncture and moxibustion as my adjunct therapies. So I try to utilize a broader scope of therapies, primarily focusing though on herbal formulas. So am I an acupuncturist? Yes, but not just that, if that makes sense. You know, the problem is a lot of practitioners are primarily trained in just acupuncture and moxibustion. So most practitioners in the U.S. don't have extensive or specialized herbal training. So there's still Chinese medicine practitioners, Chinese medicine doctors. And so some of the language gets a little bit tricky, but acupuncture, doctor of Chinese medicine, acupuncturist, herbalist, whatever. I think this helps this kind of conversation and this question that seems to come up with a lot of people. Are you a Chinese medicine doctor? What is Chinese medicine? Is that the same as acupuncture? So the answer is yes, but is broad and a lot more inclusive of that as well as many other aspects of classical Chinese medicine and medical theory. So I hope that excessively long-winded rant helps explain a little bit about the difference and the similarities. Again, to stay in touch, if you'd like to become a patient of mine locally or online via telemedicine, the link below this video is actually for a link to my clinic. You can contact me there and reach out and email me to learn a little bit more. And before you go, I have two related videos right here.