While I typically don't give much attention to what I like to affectionately call the "dry needling wars" as I know that PTs don't know the medicine like us acupuncturists do... they might be able to get rid of a trigger point, but can they treat the underlying imbalance that caused it in the first place? Not likely.

 

But this proposal? This is absurd. As a native Virginian who completed my acupuncture training in California, I went through thousands of hours of training (3250). I think even here in VA its 1,850, right? According to Myopain Seminars, if ATs are allowed by their state licensing board to utilize dry needling, they can do so with only 27 hours of training!!! What level of safety training are they receiving? Do legislators understand the high risk of improper needling e.g. pneumothorax, punctured organs, nerve damage, etc? 

This legislation is not only irresponsible in terms of allowing folks with improper training to perform needling, it is potentially life threatening to the folks that they use their needles on. Furthermore, it has the potential to derail our careers, those of us who are properly trained professionals with an acupuncture license, if these under-trained folks begin to cause serious harm as we would likely be lumped in with them e.g. "Acupuncture is dangerous because I know Joe Blow who died when his athletic trainer tried to get rid of a trigger point in his upper trap and accidentally ruptured his lung". 

Beyond the potential for severe health complications, this legislation is an insult to those of us who spent years in graduate school, studying Chinese medicine in depth, so that we can properly treat people with a high level of safety. Why do we even have acupuncture licensing laws if someone with as little education as 27 hours in needling can perform our jobs? 

Frankly, I see this as a form of cultural appropriation to take the needling out of the context of the original culture and guiding philosophies from which it was born and apply it from a western perspective. In Toby Daly's article, "The Extractive Nature of Integrative Medicine" published in Journal of Chinese Medicine, Issue 134, February 2024 he states the following: "I spoke with a biomedical doctor after he completed a weekend ‘training’ in dry needling. He told me that since he used guide tubes to insert the needles, he could retain them for longer than twenty minutes (and I still have no idea what he meant by that). He was also surprised when he experienced syncope after his fellow trainees, also medical doctors, inserted more than 20 needles into his body to practice. Since he had no concept of yang collapse and because there is no known mechanism between increasing bradykinin and syncope, he was at a loss for how this happened." This is but one example of how the needles can be improperly applied and cause damage that is outside the understanding of Western practitioners because they do no understand the underlying Chinese medicinal principles of when, where, how, and why to apply the needles. Why would we in good conscience allow this to take place in this day and age? 

Please do not allow this legislation to pass. It is dangerous and insulting to us practitioners who are properly trained to needle.