I want to broach the subject of my recent journey to Europe. I presented three workshops – in Italy, the Czech Republic and in Portugal. The Czech Republic was probably the most intriguing of the tree settings, primarily because my host, Dr. Jiri Bilek, was the Inaugural president of the Czech Republic Traditional Chinese Medicine Association and is also a very experienced obstetrician and gynaecologist, a fully qualified medical practitioner.
As well as being my host for the workshop in Prague he was also my interpreter and a colleague in the field of acupuncture. What has really captured me about Dr Bilek is his ability to also utilise the Western medical framework, which he is extremely experienced in – having delivered in excess of 700 babies. He has been able to bring this experience to align it with Eastern medicine – he uses his Western medical strength but utilises traditional acupuncture as the primary modality in helping many people to regain better health.
He specialises particularly in the area of fertility acupuncture because of his background as an obstetrician and gynaecologist. He also works a lot with women looking to prepare for labour. I am inspired and it opened my mind to see Dr. Bilek in action and understand the possible marriage between the two paradigms, between Eastern Medicine and Western medicine. The harmonious marriage between these two relatively distinct and different modalities into a very effective treatment regime is wonderful to see.
As a lay acupuncturist of 33 years’ experience, it is indeed a pleasure and a privilege to have an association with and to teach Dr. Bilek many of the nuances of traditional style acupuncture, especially the Japanese style acupuncture that I specialise in. I would hope that as time goes by that the medical profession will wholeheartedly embrace the practice of traditional acupuncture as an ally to the practice of Western Medicine (and I believe things are opening up in this direction).
For different situations both work brilliantly. I’m obviously extremely biased towards traditional acupuncture. Having been in practice for 33 years, I have seen some astounding things occur in relation to the practice of traditional acupuncture.
That’s my story for this morning – I had a wonderful time and amazing experience in Europe training people in Japanese acupuncture, many of whom were medical practitioners. I worked with wonderful people and experienced great hospitality but certainly the highlight for me was presenting Japanese acupuncture workshops in these three different countries and the reception I received was outstanding.
So if you would like to try acupuncture for your medical condition, please do not hesitate to contact us at our Brisbane acupuncture clinic or our acupuncture clinic on the Gold Coast.
