Qiological Podcast

Part Two
How does a profession begin? Not on paper. Not with licensing boards or schools. Often enough, it starts with a handful of curious people who become convinced there's another way to do things. Part determination, part serendipity, and perhaps a good measure of luck.
Bill Prensky and Gene Bruno were there before acupuncture had a place in American healthcare. In the wake of the Vietnam War, student protests, and a generation questioning nearly everything, they walked away from academic research that no longer made sense to them. Their Tai Chi teacher, Marshall Ho, introduced them to Dr. Kim, who reluctantly agreed to teach a small group that in time became like family.
What followed is equal parts history and improbable story: treating patients at the Crossroads of the World, translating across languages, creating lecture series just to afford tuition, traveling with their teacher, and helping establish the first legal and educational footholds for acupuncture.
Listen in to this conversation on trading a graduate education for a study that didn’t have a syllabus, credentialing or degree, helped acupuncture to find its footing in America.

Part One.
How does a profession begin? Not on paper. Not with licensing boards or schools. Often enough, it starts with a handful of curious people who become convinced there's another way to do things. Part determination, part serendipity, and perhaps a good measure of luck.
Bill Prensky and Gene Bruno were there before acupuncture had a place in American healthcare. In the wake of the Vietnam War, student protests, and a generation questioning nearly everything, they walked away from academic research that no longer made sense to them. Their Tai Chi teacher, Marshall Ho, introduced them to Dr. Kim, who reluctantly agreed to teach a small group that in time became like family.
What followed is equal parts history and improbable story: treating patients at the Crossroads of the World, translating across languages, creating lecture series just to afford tuition, traveling with their teacher, and helping establish the first legal and educational footholds for acupuncture.
Listen in to this conversation on trading a graduate education for a study that didn’t have a syllabus, credentialing or degree, helped acupuncture to find its footing in America.

It’s not news that there are changes afoot in the world of education. You’re probably already well aware of the closure, over the past few years, of schools with a long history. There are concerns with loan debt that have been an issue since Obama was president. Most recently, the changes to student loans that not only fundamentally affect the acupuncture trade, but will change the landscape for graduate education in a notable way.
In this conversation with Bex Groebner we untangle the intersection of education, accreditation, federal student loan programs and professional accountability. We explore how changes in funding will put financial pressure on schools that built a business model based on the higher loan caps of GRAD+ loans. How student debt affects those who are mortgaging their future on loans that many cannot pay back. Along with what could happen if the levels of student enrollment drop to the point where our accreditor (ACAHM) and certification organization (NCBAHM) lose the funding needed to sustain their business activities.
Bex suggests that in an uncertain world, it’s best to have a back up, and that is a large part of the motivation behind her work at the Acupuncture Workforce Alliance. Most of all, she’d like to see an acupuncture education be accessible, affordable and within reach of anyone who’d like to learn this medicine so they can serve their communities, and be able to support themselves and their families.

Some teachings are preserved in books. Others are preserved in people.
In this episode we visit with Johann Hausen, translator, publisher, practitioner, and long-time student of Daoist traditions in the Wudang Mountains. What begins with martial arts and Chinese medicine quickly opens into a wider conversation about cultivation, character, and the responsibility of carrying knowledge forward.
We explore the foundations of internal alchemy, not as a collection of techniques, but as a lifelong process of refining oneself through everyday life. Why difficult people may be our greatest teachers. How attachment can hide in the things we love most. And why the real work often happens far from the meditation cushion.
Along the way we discuss preserving traditional teachings, the role of books in a digital world, and Johann’s work translating and publishing texts that might otherwise be lost. Beneath it all is a simple but challenging question: what does it mean to become a better human being, rather than simply a more knowledgeable one?

We tend to think of the acupuncture profession as something fixed and stable, but the reality is that it is always in motion. The practice of East Asian medicine in North America has been shaped by decades of effort—by practitioners, educators, regulators, and advocates working to create a place for this medicine in the American healthcare system.
In this conversation with Valerie Hobbs, we take a historical look at how the profession bootstrapped itself into being. Along with how the creation of educational standards, accreditation, certification, and professional organizations, helped to give the profession the form it has today..
We also discuss some of the tensions shaping the present moment. Questions about educational requirements, student debt, declining enrollment, professional identity, integration into mainstream healthcare, and the uncertain future of acupuncture education.
This conversation is an invitation to consider the forces shaping our profession and to consider how we might respond. Beneath the challenges is a recurring theme: the future of this medicine will not be determined by any single institution or idea, but by our willingness to listen, engage thoughtfully, and find ways of working toward our shared goals.