Enhancing Health: Our Personal Wellbeing Plans

It is sometimes said that in ancient China people only paid their doctors when they were in good health; if they were ill they did not pay until they got better again! This may not be historically accurate, but it illustrates the important point that the primary role of any form of health care should be to stop people getting ill in the first place; as the old adage goes, ‘an ounce of prevention is better than a pound of cure’. This is something we have perhaps lost sight of, so that we see health care in terms of curing illness rather than preventing its occurrence. Perhaps also we have a tendency to delegate responsibility for our health to someone else, rather than take responsibility for it ourselves.

Most people in the West turn to acupuncture or other forms of Chinese Medicine because they are ill. Often they have been ill for a long time, and have tried various other forms of medicine before arriving at Chinese Medicine. However, some people who find Chinese Medicine effective choose to continue treatment once their symptoms have improved, as they recognise how important it is to  proactively preserve their health. A percentage of people also come to Chinese Medicine solely to maintain and optimise their health, without experiencing any specific symptoms.

We have a growing number of people who use us proactively. They understand the very direct relationship between a human being’s health and their creativity, productivity, mood, and sense of general wellbeing.

A skilled practitioner of Chinese Medicine is able to assess the areas of imbalance in the Qi of any patient. Whilst for people who are ill, these imbalances are quite marked by physical or emotional symptoms, even a fit and healthy person may have them; these imbalances may be inherited, or gradually acquired through life and they represent a tendency towards, or a potential for, a particular illness.

For instance, one person may have a slight deficiency of the Qi of the respiratory system, which manifests as a mild shortness of breath or a propensity to catch colds a bit more frequently than most other people. This deficiency may perhaps be congenital, or might develop from long hours of office work hunched over a desk so that the chest is constricted. Whilst it is not a problem at present, this tendency may over the years develop into something like asthma or  sinus problems.

Someone else may be relatively healthy, but their Qi may not flow quite as freely as is optimal; this is a common occurrence in modern life, the stresses and strains of which have the effect of stagnating our Qi. Again, this may not be a problem at the moment causing nothing more serious than the occasional mild headache or a little mild indigestion, but if unchecked it could develop into severe migraine headaches or irritable bowel syndrome.

TCM allows us to pick up these minor imbalances before they become serious and restore harmony; in the first example by strengthening the respiratory Qi and in the second by promoting the smoother flow of the Qi in general.

Thus health enhancement in TCM begins with a diagnosis of the subtle imbalances which each individual is subject to, and proceeds to develop a health care plan to restore harmony. This plan may include regular acupuncture treatments (perhaps a short course of treatment to begin with followed by regular ‘top ups’) , some gentle Chi Kung exercises we can do at home, and some adjustments to our diet and lifestyle if appropriate and possible. The emphasis is on the partnership between patient and therapist, the two working together to restore the balance.

Each Personal Wellbeing Plan is tailored to the individual according to their own aims and objectives. Your therapist will work with you to achieve these objectives.