No matter what you present with, we always aim for clear improvement. We do this by treating the condition as it appears in you rather than the condition alone.
The list below gives an idea of the various types of problems that people commonly present
with and how we tend to approach them. The conditions are colour coded in to 3 types:
Conditions that we have a great track record with
Conditions which are a little harder to treat so we would need to meet you to see if our approach is best suited for you
Conditions that we suggest you look elsewhere for help with.
Please click on any condition for further information.
Aches and pains
elbow pain/tennis elbow/golfers elbow/anyone else’s elbow
Arthritis
unexplained/undiagnosed pain/aches
Irregular menstruation
PMS
Bloating around the period
Post childbirth health
Urine retention
pain on urination
UTI’s
Water retention
Menopausal symptoms
Fertility issues
IVF protocol
Mental/emotional
Stress
Mood swings
Depression
Anxiety
Bipolar disorder
Sleep problems
Diarrhea
Constipation
IBS Irritable bowel syndrome
Crohns, Ulcerative colitis
Alternating constipation/diarrhea
Bloating
General/systemic
nerve damage
pins and needles
Difficulty walking
Difficulty balancing
Loss of strength
Epilepsy
Dizziness
Meniere’s
Cancer care
facial rejuvination
Pains and aches
We treat all types of aches and pains, in fact this is the main complaint that brings people to our door. Whatever the cause and whether it is a recent injury or something chronic you have lived with for years, treating pain and it’s causes is something we do very well.
Headaches and migraines
We tend to treat this kind of thing very successfully, depending on the causes, especially if it due in part to muscular tension around the neck and shoulders (usually this is a major source if migraine and tension headaches. We can also find people whose tension headaches come from a more structural cause, their body habitually leans forward or backward etc. More chronic, general types of headaches can find their root in digestive problems and the subsequent lack of ability of the body to get blood flow in to the blood greedy brain, or to get waste fluids back out again.
Arthritis
This can be an unfortunate diagnosis to be given as it so often sounds like there is nothing that can be done, but we rarely find that to be true.
We usually do not focus so much on the inflammation that is affecting the joint as finding out why the joint is inflaming and cannot clear that inflammation. Very often this has more to do with the way the muscles are pulling the joints than the joints themselves and so we would look at structure to see how you stand sit and walk. If the condition is affected by heat/cold we will use moxa and hand techniques to cool or warm the area and very likely suggest liniments and poultices as well as drinking herbs to keep the effect going for as long as possible. All of this is with the aim of reducing the need for treatment and herbs in the long run. We would of course give advice and show you, which kind of exercise would be beneficial, and exercise with this condition is not optional.
See details of our specialist Arthritis clinic
Muscular tension/pain
Acupuncture, especially the kind we use is great for this. In fact we would say that this is something that we should be able to do better than most other disciplines. Our preferred treatment for tight muscles that just will not release is to go directly in to them. If you can take this kind of direct approach (which can be like the most intense massage you have ever had), the effects can be dramatic and life changing. The problem with muscles is that they can get stuck in a pattern of tightness and they do not get any other signals to do anything else. This means that, when you try to stretch them out they can end up just pulling harder AND now be pulling even more effectively than the muscles around them that you have just successfully lengthened. When we use acupuncture we can “short circuit” this process by getting the motor part of the muscle to contract even more than it already was, leaving with only one option; to lengthen out. This can often happen in a dramatic twitch of the muscle which allows it to return to a more functional length and bring an end to long term pain.
Stiff neck and shoulders
We are great at this. Nowadays we often find that this is due to prolonged sitting at computers etc (20 years ago you would hardly ever see this in Chinese clinics). There is also a real deficiency of movement in the modern world meaning that we do not use the shoulders to anywhere near their capacity, so we would show you some “chairobics” and lengthening exercises to open up the shoulder and neck.
Sciatica
This is a very common and debilitating condition that we see a lot of in the clinic and we treat very well. We would encourage you, if you had not already done so, to get a full investigation (MRIs Xrays etc) so that you know the condition of your lower spine. That said, we have been able to treat people successfully no matter how grave their condition appears in the cold light of an Xray. Generally speaking, if your pain strarts at the low back and then appears again at the foot, this is going to be harder to treat than if it starts at the bum (on one side) and you can trace a line of reffered pain down the thigh. If we are lucky then you will have pain coming form one muscle on the backside. Of this is the case then a few big twitching releases of the muscle should free it up and already get you in to a better position. Then, if you have had the pain for a long time, you will have to kick yourself for not getting it treated earlier.
Again, once the pain is decreasing, we would want to look at structure and movement to stop the problem from re occurring.
Upper back pain
Very common, usually quite easy to treat
Lower back pain
This is another one of those conditions that is increasing and seems to be only made worse by soft beds, sitting work AND (it must be said) from diets that make our abdomens bloat therefore weakening the structural stability of the lower back and spine. If this bloating, or for that matter difficulty in menstruation that highlights the back pain are real contributing factors, then we would look to treat those aspects as well. This might mean that we put you on a course of herbs to address these conditions.
Again, once the pain is decreasing, we would want to look at structure and movement to stop the problem from re occurring.
mid back pain
A common complaint, but it is quite unusual for people to come to us with this alone. People usually present with upper or lower back problems and then mention what is happening in the centre of the back in passing or after we have examined them . Usually not difficult to treat.
joint pain/aches
see arthritis.
Very commonly we see compression of nerves and tight muscles pulling on joints as the causing factor in the condition diagnosed as arthritis. Acupuncture to relieve these stuck areas can be extraordinarily effective, but we would also use stretching/traction to open up the tissue and the joints as well as compresses, linaments, internal herbs (teas) and we will also want to take a look at the diet to see if you are eating anything the is going to increase inflammation needlessly.
hip pain
The hips, like the shoulders, are areas that we simply do not use enough and they are VITAL to good health in the long term for a number of reasons. Acupuncture and the kind of body work and stretching that we do are ideal ways of opening up the hips, but we would also want to teach you various exercises to get you to open up
Also see sciatica.
Sports injuries
pain/stiffness on exercise
We have treated a lot of these conditions and we love treating them. The practitioners in the clinic have played many sports and tried many activities including
Martial arts like Karate, southern style Gung Fu, Tai Ji, Judo, Cycling, surfing, horse riding, running, hiking, kayaking, canoeing, skiing, rugby, tennis, bowling, climbing. Calisthenics. We do this party for fun, but also so that we can understand more about the particular stresses and strains that you might encounter in each of these activities.
This strategy has its limits though, so there are some activities that we have not tried yet or that we have treated but you may have to take us through the details of the movements. These include:
We have treated but you will have to talk us through: MMA, Golf, roller derby, hurdles, sprinting
foot pain
We love and are fascinated by feet. The training that we do puts a lot of emphasis on the way that the feet set up the flexible structure for the rest of the standing/walking body, so we spend a lot of time on our feet and looking at other people’s. We treat a lot of pain in the foot, although most of our interested in the feet happens when we see a problem in the hip/pelvis or the shoulders and rib cage, as even the slightest upset in the level of the feet can translate to a massive problem for the rest of the body to make up for further up the structure.
We look at bunions, plantar fasciitis, heel pain, foot stiffness etc and have very useful techniques to loosen the muscles, open up and manipulate the joints.
unexplained/undiagnosed pain/aches
we have a very good track record of treating painful or achy and annoying persistent conditions whatever the cause or the diagnosis. If course, if you have no diagnosis and the condition has mystified a lot of people in the past, we would insist that you have further investigations. That said, sometimes a search for diagnosis can often lead you on a wild goose chase and you end up with very feasible explanations as to why you cannot get better. Our approach would always be to try to get you out of pain and then work out what “it” was once you no longer suffer with “it” .
We have various ways of assessing you: structural, (postural) functional movement, and assessing from the Pulse and from examining the abdomen, the spine and the “channels” to cover many aspects of your system to answer the question “what is it that your system is trying to deal with that results in this symptom?”
elbow pain/tennis elbow/golfers elbow/anyone else’s elbow
This is another inflammatory condition that is often caused by the muscular tension pulling hard on the joints. Tennis elbow especially happens to occur on an area (muscle line or muscle group) that inflames very easily due in part to the strong muscular action on that line and a small and very “twistable” joint. We would aim to release the muscular tension above and below the joint and get a “travelling” achy sensation running down the arm when we treat to feel that treatment will be really successful.
RSI, Carpal tunnel
Whether due to pregnancy swelling or computer use, we treat this very well. It can be a little trickier that other muscular/joint conditions that we treat due to the narrowness of the space that the nerve runs through and the fact that we want to minimize the swelling effect that treatment can have, so we tend to go slowly and “chip away” at the problem over a few sessions rather than get a huge release in one go. That said, if the problem is due to tightness in strong forearm muscles up near the elbow crease, we can often get these to shift pretty quickly and bring relief almost immediately.
Digestion
Digestion is vital. Breathing and blood circulation come first in terms of keeping you alive, but having the best digestive system that you can is so vital for medium and long-term health that the Chinese refer to the digestive system as the “centre”. For a people who describe themselves as “the people of the central kingdom “ (literal translation of “Zhong guo ren” or "Chinese people") it shows how valued this aspect of our health is.
Any treatment that we give, whatever we say we are treating, will take in to account your ability to digest and refresh the nutrients in the blood, take those nutrients to the muscles, excrete waste products etc. If you notice us quickly palpating the abdomen, this is usually what we are checking on as the digestion is going to affect your recovery even from a treatment for a muscular condition. With herbal medicine it is obviously even more important that we take into account your bodies ability to process the flavours and tastes that we will be giving you in your formula.
We have a few treatments aimed specifically at the digestion, Abdominal acupressure, Herbs, And obviously we would be focusing on your diet and giving Dietary advice- what to eat, what not to eat and when to eat, when not to. Often people have done a lot of this work already with nutritionists etc and that is great, but Chinese dietary therapy comes from a slightly different approach and will often have a different take on what to try.
Herbal medicine would be an excellent thing to be using as part of your treatment strategy, whether it is in the form of some of our herbal teas, or a fully personalised herbal formal for you to drink. As herbs go through the digestive system to treat the digestive system they are an excellent targeted therapy and they work extremely well in combination with bodywork (DZFA) and acupuncture. Often we might be using herbs to slowly warm and revitalize the intestines, whilst we use bodywork to unblock any such areas and adhesions through the bowel.
Below is a list of the kind of diagnoses we have treated and had great successes with.
Diarrhea
Constipation
IBS Irritable bowel syndrome
Crohns, Ulcerative colitis
Alternating constipation/diarrhea
Bloating: the effects of treatment can be “spluttery “ to begin with as we are trying to re awaken the intestines and the effect can be a little like warm water travelling through heating pipes at the start of winter.
Bloating around the period
Urine retention, pain on urination etc
Women's health
There appear to be so many women who are struggling through debilitating monthly agony in the belief that this is either normal or completely unavoidable. It is not. The easy coming and going of the period is something that is so rare in today's world and yet is a really good sign for the general health for women and a great indicator of good transition in to pregnancy and post menopause.
Pain with menstruation:
We would look to work directly on the lower abdomen and lower back to affect flow of blood, flexibility of muscle and other tissues that might pull or get stuck through this area. Full resolution may take a while as we are treating to affect a condition that only manifest in the body once every four weeks or so, so we are working on a slower cycle than say usual muscle activity.
Herbs are, not a must but a real bonus as they can move old blood through the system so effectively.
This work is really worth doing as successful treatment early on can have major positive effects later on in life.
One of the most powerful realisations on the subject was a question from Arnaud Verslyus to a group of experienced Chinese medicine practitioners. He asked “ how many years do you think it is normal for a healthy woman to expect to have menopausal symptoms?” after a few replies to the effect of one or two years his sobering answer was “none” You only get those symptoms if the blood flow throughout your menstruation was not dealt with”. Please have this looked in to. You do not have to suffer needlessly and the benefits for improving this part of your health are profound.
Auto immune conditions
We would really want to be able to use the full spectrum of our approaches: Acupuncture and bodywork, Herbs, diet, exercise, liniments, poultices. We do not regard these problems as an overly strong immune system but a misdirected one. We do our best to avoid anything that dampens down the immune system as this just seems to lead to more complicated problems occurring later. Rather we try to re vitalize and re direct your system to do the work it is avoiding or not yet capable of taking on.