Jeffrey Yuen to Headline the 32nd Annual AAC Conference!
The AAC is pleased to announce information for the 2015 Annual Conference to be held April 25th - 26th at the beautiful Embassy Suites in Colorado Springs. 12 PDAs will be offered (NCCAOM pending).
Conference Presenters
Master Jeffrey Yuen
Jeffrey Yuen is one of the most sought after speakers on Chinese Medicine throughout the world. He is an 88th generation Daoist priest from the Jade Purity School, Lao Tzu sect and a 26th generation priest of the Complete Reality School, Dragon Gate sect. He apprenticed for more than 20 years in Classical Chinese Medicine and other Daoist healing arts with Master Yu Wen, who transmitted his lineage to Master Yuen before Master Wen’s death at the age of 108. He is recognized internationally as a Master of Acupuncture, Classical Chinese Medicine, Daoism, Chinese Herbology, Tai Chi Chuan and Qi Gong. He emphasizes the importance of Daoism in cultivating one's life and spirit to maintain health, and the use of Chinese Medicine for understanding and treating illness.
Master Yuen conveys Chinese Medicine from a deeply spiritual perspective rooted in Daoism. His ability to elucidate and bridge western medical thought within the context of Chinese medicine offers an essential clarity to his students. Currently he lives in New York where he is president of the International Tai Chi Institute, and maintains a private practice with a special focus on helping people with cancer. He will be discussing the Chinese concept of Wind and how it relates to western Psycho-Neurology.
Daisy Dong, OMD, L.Ac.
Daisy Dong is the senior Chinese medicine practitioner and the first hired clinician of the Integrative Medicine Program of the University of Colorado Health Sciences Center. Dr. Dong received her medical training from the Beijing College of Traditional Chinese Medicine and finished fellowship at Dongzhimen Hospital for Acupuncture. She also received three Master degrees in International Health, Health Administration and Oriental Medicine in the United States.
Dr. Dong has been a professor at Southwest College of Acupuncture for 14 years teaching Clinical Herbal Pharmacology and Integrative Traumatology. She has been a clinical faculty member of the University of Colorado School of Medicine teaching Integrative Medicine since 2005. Her background includes training and experience in all components of TCM including acupuncture, herbology, Tui Na, Tai Chi, Qi Gong, in addition to allopathic general medicine. She will be sharing her practical experience for running an effective evidence-based practice.
Butch Levy, MD, L.Ac.
Butch Levy is an integrative practitioner: board certified in Family Medicine and NCCAOM certified in Acupuncture. Dr. Levy has been in private practice for 37 years, including care from obstetrics and pediatrics to geriatrics and hospice care. In the late 1980’s Dr. Levy attended acupuncture school, completing many of the classes, but apprenticed with and was mentored by Miki Shima to complete his requirements for certification.
Dr. Levy’s training in Chinese Medicine is in the Japanese style of herbal diagnosis using abdominal patterns, Fukushin, and his acupuncture style is distinctly toward The Extra Vessel and Divergent Channels. Dr. Levy’s current practice integrates allopathic care with Chinese medicine and Functional Nutritional Medicine, bridging east and west with comprehensive, practical approaches to illness. He sees a wide variety of patients, and his focus of interest is toward complex chronic disease including supportive care for cancer and autoimmunity. Dr. Levy will present an overview of his style of care with a direction toward explaining his approach using the Japanese training he has been most fortunate to receive from Dr. Shima.
Conference Schedule
Saturday, April 25
7:00 – 8:00 Breakfast* / Visit Vendors
8:00 – 9:00 Registration / Visit Vendors
9:00 – 12:30 Jeffrey Yuen
Contemporary Problems: Chinese Medicine & Psycho-Neurology
12:30 – 2:00 Complimentary Lunch / Acupuncture Association of Colorado Annual Meeting
2:00 – 6:30 Jeffrey Yuen
Contemporary Problems: Chinese Medicine & Psycho-Neurology, continued
6:30 – 7:30 Post Conference Complimentary Embassy Suites Evening Reception**
Sunday, April 26
7:00 – 8:30 Breakfast* / Visit Vendors
8:30 – 12:00 Daisy Dong
An Effective Evidence-Based Acupuncture Practice
12:00 – 1:00 Complimentary Light Lunch / Visit Vendors
1:00 – 3:00 Butch Levy
An Overview of the Japanese Approach to Complex Chronic Diseases
*Complimentary cooked-to-order breakfast is for conference attendees lodging at the Embassy Suites.
** Complimentary Evening Reception is for conference attendees lodging at the Embassy Suites.
CLICK HERE TO REGISTER OR TO SEE MORE INFORMATION!
Lodging
The Embassy Suites
7290 Commerce Center Drive
Colorado Springs, Colorado 80919
- The AAC has arranged a suite room rate of $99/night beginning Friday, April 24. Please make your reservation before Wednesday, March 25 to guarantee a suite at this rate.
- The $99 rate includes a two room suite with one king or two queen sized beds and a living room, complimentary cooked-to-order breakfast, complimentary evening reception, and complimentary parking.
- Check in time is 3PM. Check out time is 12PM.
- To make your reservation, please call 800-362-2779. The event name is “2015 AAC Annual Conference,” or use the following link:
LINK TO EMBASSY SUITE
Please watch your email and snail mail for registration invitations and fun incentives!
Stephanie Shober, L.Ac.
Conference Chair – Acupuncture Association of Colorado
ConferenceComm@acucol.com
WE APPRECIATE OUR EXHIBITORS!
Thanks to Golden Flower Chinese Herbs for being one of our conference sponsors. Golden Flower Chinese Herbs will be showcasing their latest Chinese herbal formulas and a fabulous line of artisan-quality essential oils. Enter the raffle at their booth for a chance to win a $100 gift certificate for the GFCH formulas of your choice during the drawing at Sunday's lunch break!
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We also thank Blue Poppy for being one of our conference sponsors. They offer herbal formulas at a price you can afford! They will be sponsoring Saturday's lunch!
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Message from the President – Working for Change
Happy New Year!!! As we move in to a new year it brings new opportunities. I appreciate everyone's patience as we have worked diligently to resolve the issues surrounding injection therapy. We have started a process that will once again allow acupuncturist to procure substances for injection and hopefully prevent this issue from happening in the future. It has been a long and difficult process that has involved multiple meetings with DORA, the medical society, and the pharmacy board. Again, we have come up with a solution that should permanently rectify the situation. I ask for your continued patience as we work to implement this solution.
Dry Needling has continued to be at the top of our agenda. The AAC considers dry needling to be an acupuncture technique and strongly objects to anyone practicing it who does not explicitly have the right to perform acupuncture within their scope of practice. Again, with this new year come new opportunities to protect our patients and ensure that acupuncture is only practiced by qualified practitioners. But we cannot do it without your help and support.
The only way that we can fight these battles and protect our scope of practice is through the physical and financial support of our members. We have an amazing lobbyist who is helping to educate our state representatives on the problems we are facing. We also have an extremely talented lawyer who has been working with the AAC for years and is very familiar with the legal arguments regarding dry needling. While everyone on the board is a volunteer, our lobbyist and lawyer are not. We cannot effect change without their help, and we cannot utilize their expertise without a strong membership base and financial support.
If you are tired of other professions ignorantly using our medicine and you want to utilize the full scope of your training, I strongly encourage you to come to our conference. Learn how you can take an active role in furthering our profession. Invite your friends to come. Encourage other acupuncturists to become members. It is only through unity that we will survive and thrive.
As always, I am happy to answer questions about what steps we are taking. Don't hesitate to reach out, and I look forward to seeing you in April.
Scott Richardson, L.Ac.
President – Acupuncture Association of Colorado
President@acucol.com
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Vice President’s Report – Council of State Associations
The AAC continues to stay involved at the national level. We will be sending two reps to the annual CSA (Council of State Associations) meeting in March. The collaboration and support that we gain from attending these meetings empowers our board to be more efficient and effective for you, our members.
The CSA began as an informal networking group of state association presidents that met during annual AOM conferences. The presidents would explore issues facing their states and offer support and solutions to one another. This evolved into a more formally structured meeting referred to as the President’s Council (PC). Eventually, as additional state leaders began to join in, the PC expanded to include non-president representatives. It ultimately developed a charter, bylaws, code of conduct, and a new name: the Council of State Associations (CSA). The CSA has grown to be a collaboration among 37 state associations, representing the most inclusive umbrella yet achieved in our profession. The AAC has been involved with this group since its inception and feels it’s important to continue to be involved on behalf of Colorado acupuncturists.
As we announced last fall, the CSA is supporting a peer-reviewed journal, Meridians: The Journal of Acupuncture and Oriental Medicine. As a member of the AAC we are providing you with a pdf download of the Fall issue here: Meridians Journal Fall issue. When updates to our AAC website are complete we will be providing login and password information for future issues in the members’ area.
The editors of Meridians are accepting submissions for their Clinical Pearls section on the topic of Thoracic Pain by February 1st, 2015. Please see their website http://www.meridiansjaom.com/ for more information.
I look forward to seeing you all in Colorado Springs for a fantastic conference!
Kimberley Benjamin, L.Ac.
Vice President – Acupuncture Association of Colorado
VicePresident@acucol.com
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Treasurer Report – Technical Difficulties Being Addressed
You’ve heard the saying, “Whatever can go wrong, will.” While in the process of doing some essential website updates that certainly seems to have been true for us. We are still working out some kinks including issues with processing credit cards through authorize.net. PayPal is working fine. This should all be fixed soon, but we are so sorry for the inconvenience this has caused many of you. We are grateful to have you as fellow members, and we thank you for your patience as we diligently work within our budget to correct the problems.
Here are some of the improvements we are making: We've updated our current website as a temporary fix until we can budget in a new one that is "more responsive," as our developer likes to say. We've also switched one of our payment processors to BancTek, who is giving us excellent rates and customer service. Another update is to our membership software, which was very outdated and starting to cause problems. Last but not least, we've hired a new bookkeeper, who specializes in non-profits and will be a great asset to keeping the AAC running smoothly.
Again, we are sorry for the inconvenience, and we thank you for your patience as we continue working to improve your state association. See you in April at the conference!
Katie Robinette, L.Ac.
Treasurer – Acupuncture Association of Colorado
Treasurer@acucol.com
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Legislation Report – 2014 Election Recap
The AAC would like to thank all of the members who contributed their hard earned money in the waning days of the election. With your help and that of our friends at Blue Poppy and CSTCM we raised a few thousand dollars in a very short period of time. It enabled us to make a strong statement to officials that we deeply care about the advancement of the profession of acupuncture. And, we all voted—right?
The AAC would also like to congratulate all of the candidates who won state house and senate seats in the November 4, 2014 election. Of the 20 candidates we supported, 15 retained or gained seats in the house and senate. We look forward to productive and meaningful relationships with all of them. Though many obstacles have been overcome by acupuncturists, many challenges lie ahead in this legislative session. With your continued membership support and participation our voices will be heard. Please don’t hesitate to introduce yourself to me at the conference in April!
George Graf, L.Ac.
Legislative Committee Chair– Acupuncture Association of Colorado
LegislativeComm@acucol.com
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The 9News Health Fairs Are Coming!! Educate Your Community and Grow Your Practice!!
One of the best ways to create awareness of our amazing medicine is to reach out to our communities. Yes, it is that time of year again. The 9News health fairs run from late March through April in various locations across Colorado. These fairs are Interactive Educational Centers (IECs) that are comprised of many different local and statewide organizations. They provide a wide range of health, wellness and safety information and education for the community. They draw thousands of participants—prospective patients!—every year.
This is an excellent no-cost opportunity to get your name and face out into the community. I encourage everyone who has not reached full capacity in their practice to seek out the 9 News Health Fair in their area and volunteer to represent your profession through the AAC. I will be posting available health fairs both on the AAC Yahoo group and the AAC Facebook page as I receive invites. Donating your time to this worthy cause will help people understand our medicine while gaining valuable exposure for your practice. Sign up with a friend and make a fun day of it! The AAC will equip you with a 9News Health Fair Kit. Please contact me if you are interested. Then you can tell me your success story at the conference at the end of April!
Jacqui Strike, L.Ac.
Public Relations Committee Chair – Acupuncture Association of Colorado
PRComm@acucol.com
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Student Rep Report – Student Survey Forum at CSTCM
ATTENTION STUDENTS!!
We have created a brief survey for the acupuncture student population of Colorado. We are trying to get an overview of how the students perceive the AAC as a whole and what types of services you expect from your state association. There will be a forum on Saturday, February 7th, at the Colorado School of Traditional Chinese Medicine in Denver at 12:00 p.m. to introduce the survey. Lunch will be provided as well as an opportunity to ask the president of the AAC any questions you may have. If you can't make it to the forum do not fret, there will be a copy of the survey on Survey Monkey that you can take to help us in our quest for understanding. The link will be released in a few weeks. Thank you in advance for giving us your time and opinions as the more students who respond, the better the AAC can endeavor to meet your needs. Have an excellent semester and stay sharp!
Brittney Chowning, CSTCM Student
Student Representative – Acupuncture Association of Colorado
StudentRep@acucol.com
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AAC Membership
There are options to becoming a member of the AAC. You can make a once yearly payment or use our automatic monthly payment option. Click on the link below. The PayPal option is fully-functional and we appreciate your patience as we continue to work to rectify any difficulties you may experience with our other payment options.
BECOME A MEMBER!
