Dear Patient,
When I was in my final year of acupuncture school, my classmates and I started talking about life after school, what our careers would look like.
Acupuncturists operate within a scope of practice dictated by the licensing body of wherever they practice, with statues and rules to follow. But there were unwritten rules too—about the most desirable kind of patient, how much to charge, how a healthcare professional was supposed to act.
The unwritten rules included charging a lot of money for services, only treating patients who could afford to pay a lot, and justifying the cost to patients by telling them they should value their health.
Those rules didn’t work for me. I tried. But I couldn’t make a living as an acupuncturist, and it wasn’t because I was a bad acupuncturist. It’s because they were bad rules.
So I broke those rules and tried something else: charging a price nearly everyone could afford. And it worked. I finally started earning a living wage, and I was helping more people. I’m a lifelong rule follower; it was scary to break those unwritten rules, but I’m so glad I did.
Some rules are meant to be bent or broken or temporarily suspended, and some rules were just bad ones to begin with.
Love and gratitude,
Your Acupuncturist
I used to go to Working Class Acupuncture in Portland, they wrote a book about how community acupuncture clinics work https://working-class-acupuncture.square.site/product/acupuncture-is-like-noodles/36