Qiological Podcast

The 子午 zi wu, “Chinese Clock” that helps us to learn the flow of qi through the channels can give us a glimpse into many underlying dynamics of organ relation, influences of the six qi and the five phases.

In this conversation we take a deep gaze into what Brenda Hood likes to call the Tidal Flow Clock.

There is a lot here when you start look below the surface.

Many of us like to think we are connected with doctors throughout time, that we practice the same medicine in a continuous flow from the days of Huang Di down to this modern moment. It’s a lovely narrative. One that our patients often think about as well when they say “It’s been around 2000 years, there must be something to it.”

But as Volker Scheid, the guest of today’s conversation, points out “The way patients were even 40 years ago, the way they spoke and thought of their issues is already different from how it is now. Within this small time span the changes from cultural already influence the practice of medicine.” And yet even as this is true, we can find a way to have conversations with doctors across the span of time, culture and language.

Listen into this conversation on the yin and yang of diversity and heterogeneity in the practice of Chinese medicine.

Head on over to the show notes page for more information about this episode and for links to the resources discussed in the interview.  

The Saam tradition traces its roots back four hundred years to a monk who as part of his meditative practice received some insight into medicine that allowed him see and work simultaneously with the five phases and six conformations. But monks are not doctors, even if they can relief a lot of suffering with a few needles. And so the methods of Saam have over the years found their way into scholarly and educational traditions of Korea. To the degree that a Pubmed search will find you all kinds of modern research acupuncture using the Saam method.

Andreas Bruch has spent time in Korea and was studying Korean Hand Acupuncture. But there were some aspects of that method that were not quite making sense. That’s when he started studying Saam and all kinds of things began to fall into place.

Listen into this conversation on the more scholarly stream of Saam Acupuncture, which can give you a whole new way to approach thinking about and using the antique transport points .

Head on over to the show notes page for more information about this episode and for links to the resources discussed in the interview.  

Humans have an innate drive to make sense of the world. To understand how things work and see if we can reliability influence the outcome on something. To find a way to get more of what we want, or less of what we dislike.

When you think about it, life is one big research experiment as we are constantly testing out ideas of how things work.

But often when we think about research we are thinking about laboratory controlled environments or double blind studies. And there is a place for those, but those models aren’t that helpful when it comes to using a researcher’s eye to better understand acupuncture.

Lisa Taylor-Swanson fell in love with research before she fell in love with acupuncture. She’s a researcher with the heart and eye of a clinician who is investigating the use of non-linear and complex adaptive systems theory to design research that helps us to go from “does acupuncture” to “how acupuncture helps.”

Head on over to the show notes page for more information about this episode and for links to the resources discussed in the interview.  

The corona virus that emerged in Wu Han earlier in this year has disrupted travel and business and has been a deep cause of concern as doctors throughout the world, and especially in China, strive to understand the nature of this pathogen. Conventional medicine brings it’s modern research techniques to this inquiry. While those of us in the Chinese medicine world seek to understand this modern epidemic disease through the lens and prisms of Chinese medicine.

In this conversation with Cheng Du doctor Jin Zhao we discuss his perspective on the illness induced by the corona virus based on the observations and experience of a number of doctors he’s working with along with his own experience and his perspective gleaned from his long term study of various schools of thought in Chinese medicine.

Head on over to the show notes page for more information about this episode and for links to the resources discussed in the interview.  

It’s easy to think of our skin as the outside wrapper, but really its a mirror of the internal environment. And while topical treatment of skin has it use, it’s learning to adjust that inner milieu that over time makes for the biggest changes with the skin. It’s quite in line with Chinese medicine that we work on the inside to change the outside.

Olivia Hsu Friedman is well studied and practiced with treating skin conditions with Chinese medicine. And beyond that she also works with conventional medicine practitioners and uses an integrative perspective to help those with difficult and recalcitrant dermatological conditions.

Listen in to this conversation on an evolving holistic approach to treating skin problems.

Head on over to the show notes page for more information about this episode and for links to the resources discussed in the interview.