Services
Acupuncture
Acupuncture treatment is a customized therapeutic experience for each patient. The acupuncture points selected for your treatment will be strategically chosen in response to your needs.
Acupuncture is an exceedingly safe therapy when performed by a trained professional.
We use sterile, single-use needles. The needles are stainless steel, solid, and fine enough to be flexible. They are small enough that 8 to 10 acupuncture needles would fit inside the shaft of the kind of needle used to give a shot.
For details about what an acupuncture treatment is like, see What To Expect.
Patients are often relaxed enough to sleep on the treatment table. They commonly leave their treatment feeling calm and invigorated.
Supportive Therapies
Your acupuncture treatments may include any of the following therapies, as well as dietary or lifestyle recommendations.
Cupping
People who love deep massage, LOVE Cupping! Cupping is used to release muscle tension, boost immunity, detoxify, treat respiratory congestion, and relieve stress. This is especially valuable in situations where muscle tension is compressing underlying nerves and causing problems like numbness or tingling in the extremities because cupping breaks up tension and adhesions by lifting the muscle tissue rather than by pressing down on it.
Small “cups” are suctioned onto the skin and used to stimulate the underlying acupuncture points, invigorate circulation, and work the soft tissue in the area. Most often, I put a salve down on a patient’s back, then attach cups and slide them over the cables of muscle that run along side the spine and into the shoulders and neck.
Shiatsu & Tuina Massage
Massage relieves pain, stress, and restricted movement. It can be relaxation-oriented or an injury-focused therapeutic treatment. Shiatsu is a Japanese style of meridian massage wherein pressure is applied to the acupuncture points along a meridian or channel in a constant flow of movement. Tuina is a Chinese style of orthopedic massage, often focused right in or around the area of pain or tension.
With either style, I will communicate with you to find the right intensity to address your pain, relax your body, or to soothe your nervous system.
Guasha
Guasha is used to treat pain from injuries or repetitive stress. This is a “scraping” technique that relieves pain and stagnation and promotes repair in the muscle tissue, tendons and ligaments. Guasha can be done with various tools, the classic of which is a ceramic Chinese soup spoon. Guasha is an excellent manual therapy for areas like the fine muscles of the neck or near joints– areas that cannot be treated with cupping due to the body’s contours or structures.
Sotai
Sotai is an extremely gentle movement therapy used to increase freedom of movement when your range of motion is restricted from pain, muscle tension, injury, or surgery.
Sotai is based on the idea that by intercepting our unhealthy habitual patterns of movement that cause a buildup of tension and adhesions, we can re-educate our body and nervous system so we begin to move in a different way, a healthier way.
Electro-acupuncture
Electro-acupuncture (often called electro-stimulation or e-stim) is exceptionally helpful for relieving joint pain, muscle spasms, whiplash, and for post-surgery healing. It helps to stimulate circulation and relieve inflammation. Acupuncture needles are inserted and then tiny clips are attached, from which a low grade current is run between two needles. This is like a very mild tens unit that connects directly to the needles.
TDP Heat Lamp
TDP or infrared heat is another heat therapy, often used for pain from muscular issues as well as the conditions listed under moxibustion. It also benefits some types of heat-related imbalance in the body. These types of imbalance can show up as fatigue, digestive issues, menstrual cramps, or simply feeling chronically cold.
Moxibustion
Moxibustion treats fatigue, digestive issues, menstrual cramps, and inflammatory conditions. Moxibustion is a well established heat therapy that involves burning an herb—moxa or mugwort, a form of Artemisia– near the skin. When moxa is burned, it gives off a full spectrum heat which is able to penetrate deeply into the acupuncture point rather than just heat the surface of the skin. This penetrating heat promotes circulation and catalyzes a healing response.
Chinese Herbs
I recommend Chinese herbal formulas for a range of concerns when appropriate. I offer herbs in the form of capsules. Granules can be special ordered upon request. I primarily source my herbs from “People’s Herbs” in Portland and “Evergreen Herbs” in California due to their rigorous standards of quality, excellent business practices, and because they are such good people.
Specialties
Pain & Injury Care
Whether you are hurting from arthritis, too many hours in front of a computer, a long weekend in the garden, an athletic event, or that old injury from years ago, acupuncture relieves pain, stimulates repair, and helps you to thrive.
While neck, shoulder, and back pain are the most common conditions that bring people into my practice, I work with many people rehabilitating after injuries from work, play, auto accidents, and surgeries, and I offer healing and maintenance for repetitive stress injuries. I am continually inspired to witness the resilient healing capacity that emerges when acupuncture is utilized in recovery and maintaining mobility.
Here are some types of pain that I frequently treat with acupuncture:
- Mechanical injuries (sports injuries, auto accidents, sprains and strains)
- Inflammatory pain (arthritis, bursitis, tendonitis, carpal tunnel issues)
- Nerve-related pain (sciatica, neuropathy, numbness or tingling sensations)
- Headaches
- Fibromyalgia
- Menstrual pain
- Chronic pain conditions
- Post-surgery pain & recovery
Acupuncture relieves pain and promotes healing by increasing circulation and decreasing inflammation in muscle tissue, tendons, ligaments, and joints to treat spasms, sprains, strains, stiffness, numbness, tingling, and limited mobility.
Care For Athletes
Optimal health equals optimal performance and acupuncture supports optimal health from the inside out.
I am deeply familiar with the joy that movement brings us and the not-so-joyful ways our bodies can be impacted by it. Acupuncture is an excellent support for the athletic lifestyle.
Allow acupuncture to help:
- Relieve pain
- Improve stamina
- Speed up recovery time
- Maintain your best mobility
- Support your immune system
- Strengthen your stress response
- Invigorate your energy level
- Accelerate healing from the wear and tear on your body
When your chiropractic adjustments won’t hold or when muscle-guarding is limiting your progress in physical therapy, using acupuncture to release muscle tension and physical congestion can make the critical difference that catapults your healing forward.
I work regularly with professional dancers, competitive cyclists, avid tennis and volleyball players, kayakers, swimmers, equestrians, and distance runners. I see acupuncture support them to be more sustainable through intense training, peak performance, and quick recovery. I weave an anatomy-based orientation with my knowledge of Chinese medicine to offer an uncommonly integrated approach to your care.
Stress, Fatigue & Anxiety Care
When you are hurting, stress and anxiety nearly always become a part of that experience at some point. More generally, stress and anxiety are among the most common concerns impacting people in today’s hectic world. When we are chronically stressed, we become depleted. Our sleep can be impacted, as can our digestion, immunity, mood, ability to focus, and our stamina.
Acupuncture influences the nervous system to ease that burden and improve your sense of well-being and quality of life.
This capacity is one of the first things that inspired my personal love of acupuncture.
This kind of treatment is designed to …
- Settle your nervous system and calm your mind
- Strengthen your stress response
- Improve sleep
- Restore your body
- Enhance immunity
- Replenish your energy level to relieve fatigue
There is an increasing body of positive clinical research on acupuncture for treatment of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder indicating acupuncture is an excellent tool for re-balancing the overloaded nervous system.
I understand that we are complex, that healing can be multifaceted, and I welcome the full terrain of your experience.
Patients commonly leave their treatment feeling relaxed and centered.
Home Care for Seniors & Hospice Patients
Susan offers home care independently for hospice patients and other limited or chronically ill patients.
Acupuncture and acupressure are gentle and effective therapies that can offer support for overall health and relief for a range of symptoms, including but not limited to those listed below.
- Pain Relief
- Anxiety
- Nausea/Digestive Distress
- Relaxation & Calming the Nervous System
- Support of Mobility
- Immune Support
- Support of Energy Level
Susan has worked in Hospice Care since 2010, providing acupuncture and acupressure to ease uncomfortable symptoms and support patients to have the best possible quality of life. She has worked with both Providence Hospice and Kindred Hospice (formerly Odyssey Hospice). Read more here about her experience as a hospice acupuncturist.
Susan can come to one’s home or facility to provide treatment. Treatment is provided wherever the patient is most comfortable– usually on their bed, couch, or recliner. Acupuncture sessions often include some acupressure or massage as well.
Home treatments are 50 minutes.
Home Care Rates
* This is an out-of-pocket service. Insurance billing is not provided for this private home care. (If you already have a hospice or palliative care service, they may or may not offer acupuncture as a covered service with their own providers.)
* You must call or email to book your home care treatment. You can NOT schedule a home care appointment through the online “Schedule Now” button. That is for office visits only.
* $105 base fee for acupuncture treatment + travel fee based on location. Please ask about your location for an exact quote.
Susan is licensed in both Oregon and Washington.