Chinese Medicine Notes

Community Acupuncture in Israel

Posted on November 11, 2009 by Yael

First- a short explanation
The lack of posting is mainly due to a lot of work.
For those who might not know, I have a big website in Hebrew about Chinese medicine, it’s name is Sinit (which means “Chinese” in Hebrew), and it’s been running for the past 4.5 years.
The website has grown a lot over the years. What started as a little thing is now huge with a blog and another site where the community can share notes from their years in school and from various lectures.
All the work is being done by me, and normally I will not complain about it (ok, maybe just a little…). But in the past month we- my husband and myself- started a huge make over fort he website: logo, layout, target audience- almost everything is going to change. The things that will not change will still grow.
The make over+ keeping the website up and running as usual take up all my work time, which is limited to begin with. So what I’m trying to say is- I don’t blog not because I don’t want to!

Community acupuncture in Israel
Having said that, a very exciting thing is happening in Israel, and I can’t help but feeling like I had something to do with it:
Last year I uploaded an article on my Hebrew website about community acupuncture, written by Roy Green Pach.
Roy talked about the struggles he had with being out of school and trying to make it as a practitioner. He also talked about deciding to adopt the principles of community acupuncture in his hometown Jerusalem.

That article was one of the most popular articles I ever published on my website.
It created so many comments and echos- it felt like something happened in our little community- something positive and good. Something that can actually help people in their struggle after 4 years in school and realise their dream of being practitioners of Chinese medicine, and not throwing in the towel.
People were shocked, amazed, overwhelmed by the new concept, something that is very different from what we are being taught in our schools. But mostly- the whole community was inspired.
Yep, I can safely say that we created a little revolution.

Since the article was uploaded and created this wonderful buzz, I heard of at least 4 new community acupuncture clinics that opened up in different cities in Israel.
Suddenly, many people started debating if this new concept can work for them, and even one school that I know of is about to announce their opening of a new community acupuncture clinic on their grounds.
At the same time, Roy started writing regularly on my Hebrew website, on his own blog, and he continues to create debates and provoke thoughts about treatment, community acupuncture and Chinese medicine in general.

Proud Jewish Mama
Yeah, I feel like a proud Jewish mama.
I know, I didn’t write about it, but I provided the stage for a very refreshing debate for the Israeli Chinese medicine community. And apparently, the debate lead to a change.

I feel proud to have been able to contribute something to this positive change.
I love the fact that the Internet made this change happened- people were exposed to the option of community acupuncture through a website, a change that helped them fulfill their ambition of being practitioners in Chinese medicine.

I would like to give a round of applause to Roy, who writes great posts, so great that they get people’s Qi flowing in the right direction!
Roy can say that it’s not him, that it’s really Lisa Rohleder.
But as far as Israel’s concerned, if Roy wouldn’t have talked about it, none of this would have happened.