DAVID FOLK THOMAS: Welcome to our webcast. I'm David Folk Thomas. You've heard the expression "being on pins and needles." Well, what about having pins and needles on you? That's right, we're talking about acupuncture today, and as you may know, that's the practice of sticking tiny little needles into the body. We're going to find out what it's all about. Joining me, two experts on the subject. To my left is Dr. Ben Kligler. He's the medical director of the New Beth Israel Center for Health and Healing in New York City. Sitting next to Dr. Kligler is William Kaplinidis. He is a licensed acupuncturist and department head of Allied Arts at the Pacific College of Oriental Medicine here in New York City. Thanks to both of you for joining us today.
Let's take a first-time patient who has been recommended. Maybe they have a pinched nerve or some other problem, and they're coming to you for the first time. Take us through their treatment that you would administer.
WILLIAM KAPLINIDIS: A first visit, just in general for me, might take an hour and a half to two hours. I'd have them fill out a medical intake form, very similar to the ones you might fill out when you go see a doctor, including a whole list of symptoms, which will help me get a picture of what's going on with the whole person, not just that one symptom that they're coming to me for. After I review the paperwork, I'll ask them a series of questions. Oftentimes the questions might have to do with things like their bowel movements or if they're sweating at night, things that they may not understand how it's related to the pain in my lower back, for example. But each point has many functions, so I'm trying to get a complete picture of the person to see what the cause of the problem is. Was it a car accident, or did they use up, for example, their kidney energy through stress and overworking, and now they have a weakness in their lower back, a physical weakness that's causing them to have pain? Once I would do the evaluation, I would have them lie down on the table and I'd continue my evaluation by palpating their pulse, which would give me more information; looking at their tongue, which is sort of a map of what's going on inside of the body; maybe palpating their abdomen to see if there are tender spots. Again, each part of the body is like a map giving you information of what's going on inside. The Chinese didn't take blood tests 3,000 years ago. They looked at your eyes, they looked at your tongue, things they could observe. Once I've formulated an initial diagnosis of what I think was going on, I would choose points on the body and, depending on where the points where, they may have to roll up their pants or roll up their sleeve, or maybe I would drape and they would take their pants off or something like that.
DAVID FOLK THOMAS: Do you do this on the first visit, then?
WILLIAM KAPLINIDIS: Yeah. For myself I include the intake, the evaluation and the treatment in the first visit. Most practitioners do that. If it's a complicated case, a practitioner may opt to sit on it for a while, think about it, and then have them come back for the treatment. I would then explain to them what's going to happen. I also do visualization and relaxation techniques with those patients who are really, really nervous.
DAVID FOLK THOMAS: So they can visualize that it will work and --
WILLIAM KAPLINIDIS: No, not necessarily about the acupuncture, but just helping them relax their body, visualizing their muscles relax.
BENJAMIN KLIGLER, MD: So people get worried about the needle.
WILLIAM KAPLINIDIS: Yeah.
DAVID FOLK THOMAS: Does it hurt? That's my next question.
WILLIAM KAPLINIDIS: In America, I think as children we get injections, vaccinations, blood drawn, those needles are much thicker and they're hollow, so they actually tear your skin, and it's much more painful. An acupuncture needle is very thin, it's sterilized, and there is a range of gauges as far as the thinness, so some of them could be very hair-thin where you won't even feel it going in, and I've put in six needles in a patient, and they've asked, "So when are you going to put the first needle it?" and six have already been put in.
DAVID FOLK THOMAS: How deep do you put them in?
WILLIAM KAPLINIDIS: It depends on the area of the body. You could go in 0.1 cm to a half-inch to an inch to two or three inches, depending on the area of the body. For example, the buttocks you might go deeper, as opposed to on the chest area, where you wouldn't want to go inward. You might just go under the skin.
DAVID FOLK THOMAS: How long do you leave them in, and what patterns? How do you know where you go?
WILLIAM KAPLINIDIS: Depending on what the diagnosis is, you look at the different systems-- for example, the kidney energy, the liver energy-- their functions. What functions are not working properly? Which organs or which systems are being affected? Then you would choose your points based on that. You might use six points to ten points, depending, so anywhere from 12 needles or ten needles, depending on how many points you want to use, depending on the condition of the patient. Then they would lie there in a relaxed position. You would put the needles in the points, and they would stay there maybe for 15 or 20 minutes. During that time, you may leave the room, or I stay in the room and I do other things like acupressure and gentle touch therapy just to move the energy, and maybe put on some nice music and dim the lights. Usually the effect is very quick in terms of being very relaxed and comfortable while you're lying there.
DAVID FOLK THOMAS: Do people notice instantaneous results, or is it something that builds over a period of time?
WILLIAM KAPLINIDIS: It really varies on the condition. I've had situations where someone came in with an acute pain, like a back pain or a muscle spasm, and one treatment, they were able to stand up straight, the spasm was gone, and then the follow-up treatment, it was completely gone, the tightness, et cetera.
BENJAMIN KLIGLER, MD: I would say usually people need more than one treatment. That's one, I think, common misconception about acupuncture, that you're going to go once and you're going to be magically cured. I mean, there are a lot of people, especially for acute problems, who will get a lot of benefit after the first time, but people should really expect probably that they're going two, three, four times, typically.
WILLIAM KAPLINIDIS: Depending on the situation, I would tell my patients to expect maybe three or four visits just to see if there's any change in the condition and then take it from there. Sometimes people may need to come for a series of treatments over several months, sometimes longer, depending on how chronic and what state their body is in.
And then some people may just come for a shorter period of time.
DAVID FOLK THOMAS: Very quickly, is there any blood involved? Are people bleeding when you stick these things in them?
WILLIAM KAPLINIDIS: Very rarely do you get blood after you needle someone. Occasionally, you might hit a small capillary and there's a little dot of blood, and it's gone. You just wipe it off.
DAVID FOLK THOMAS: That's all the time we have now. I want to thank both of you, Dr. Ben Kligler and William Kaplinidis, licensed acupuncturist, for coming by and telling us all about what it means to have little needles stuck in you. Acupuncture has been our topic. Thanks for joining us on this webcast. I'm David Folk Thomas.
Let's take a first-time patient who has been recommended. Maybe they have a pinched nerve or some other problem, and they're coming to you for the first time. Take us through their treatment that you would administer.
WILLIAM KAPLINIDIS: A first visit, just in general for me, might take an hour and a half to two hours. I'd have them fill out a medical intake form, very similar to the ones you might fill out when you go see a doctor, including a whole list of symptoms, which will help me get a picture of what's going on with the whole person, not just that one symptom that they're coming to me for. After I review the paperwork, I'll ask them a series of questions. Oftentimes the questions might have to do with things like their bowel movements or if they're sweating at night, things that they may not understand how it's related to the pain in my lower back, for example. But each point has many functions, so I'm trying to get a complete picture of the person to see what the cause of the problem is. Was it a car accident, or did they use up, for example, their kidney energy through stress and overworking, and now they have a weakness in their lower back, a physical weakness that's causing them to have pain? Once I would do the evaluation, I would have them lie down on the table and I'd continue my evaluation by palpating their pulse, which would give me more information; looking at their tongue, which is sort of a map of what's going on inside of the body; maybe palpating their abdomen to see if there are tender spots. Again, each part of the body is like a map giving you information of what's going on inside. The Chinese didn't take blood tests 3,000 years ago. They looked at your eyes, they looked at your tongue, things they could observe. Once I've formulated an initial diagnosis of what I think was going on, I would choose points on the body and, depending on where the points where, they may have to roll up their pants or roll up their sleeve, or maybe I would drape and they would take their pants off or something like that.
DAVID FOLK THOMAS: Do you do this on the first visit, then?
WILLIAM KAPLINIDIS: Yeah. For myself I include the intake, the evaluation and the treatment in the first visit. Most practitioners do that. If it's a complicated case, a practitioner may opt to sit on it for a while, think about it, and then have them come back for the treatment. I would then explain to them what's going to happen. I also do visualization and relaxation techniques with those patients who are really, really nervous.
DAVID FOLK THOMAS: So they can visualize that it will work and --
WILLIAM KAPLINIDIS: No, not necessarily about the acupuncture, but just helping them relax their body, visualizing their muscles relax.
BENJAMIN KLIGLER, MD: So people get worried about the needle.
WILLIAM KAPLINIDIS: Yeah.
DAVID FOLK THOMAS: Does it hurt? That's my next question.
WILLIAM KAPLINIDIS: In America, I think as children we get injections, vaccinations, blood drawn, those needles are much thicker and they're hollow, so they actually tear your skin, and it's much more painful. An acupuncture needle is very thin, it's sterilized, and there is a range of gauges as far as the thinness, so some of them could be very hair-thin where you won't even feel it going in, and I've put in six needles in a patient, and they've asked, "So when are you going to put the first needle it?" and six have already been put in.
DAVID FOLK THOMAS: How deep do you put them in?
WILLIAM KAPLINIDIS: It depends on the area of the body. You could go in 0.1 cm to a half-inch to an inch to two or three inches, depending on the area of the body. For example, the buttocks you might go deeper, as opposed to on the chest area, where you wouldn't want to go inward. You might just go under the skin.
DAVID FOLK THOMAS: How long do you leave them in, and what patterns? How do you know where you go?
WILLIAM KAPLINIDIS: Depending on what the diagnosis is, you look at the different systems-- for example, the kidney energy, the liver energy-- their functions. What functions are not working properly? Which organs or which systems are being affected? Then you would choose your points based on that. You might use six points to ten points, depending, so anywhere from 12 needles or ten needles, depending on how many points you want to use, depending on the condition of the patient. Then they would lie there in a relaxed position. You would put the needles in the points, and they would stay there maybe for 15 or 20 minutes. During that time, you may leave the room, or I stay in the room and I do other things like acupressure and gentle touch therapy just to move the energy, and maybe put on some nice music and dim the lights. Usually the effect is very quick in terms of being very relaxed and comfortable while you're lying there.
DAVID FOLK THOMAS: Do people notice instantaneous results, or is it something that builds over a period of time?
WILLIAM KAPLINIDIS: It really varies on the condition. I've had situations where someone came in with an acute pain, like a back pain or a muscle spasm, and one treatment, they were able to stand up straight, the spasm was gone, and then the follow-up treatment, it was completely gone, the tightness, et cetera.
BENJAMIN KLIGLER, MD: I would say usually people need more than one treatment. That's one, I think, common misconception about acupuncture, that you're going to go once and you're going to be magically cured. I mean, there are a lot of people, especially for acute problems, who will get a lot of benefit after the first time, but people should really expect probably that they're going two, three, four times, typically.
WILLIAM KAPLINIDIS: Depending on the situation, I would tell my patients to expect maybe three or four visits just to see if there's any change in the condition and then take it from there. Sometimes people may need to come for a series of treatments over several months, sometimes longer, depending on how chronic and what state their body is in.
And then some people may just come for a shorter period of time.
DAVID FOLK THOMAS: Very quickly, is there any blood involved? Are people bleeding when you stick these things in them?
WILLIAM KAPLINIDIS: Very rarely do you get blood after you needle someone. Occasionally, you might hit a small capillary and there's a little dot of blood, and it's gone. You just wipe it off.
DAVID FOLK THOMAS: That's all the time we have now. I want to thank both of you, Dr. Ben Kligler and William Kaplinidis, licensed acupuncturist, for coming by and telling us all about what it means to have little needles stuck in you. Acupuncture has been our topic. Thanks for joining us on this webcast. I'm David Folk Thomas.