Career day demonstrator sticks students without school, parent permission

A couple of years ago I was doing an acupuncture demonstration at a high school and some of the kids asked me to "stick them." Being litigiously paranoid, I told them I couldn't do it without parental permission, even though some of the student were 18. I figured it was better to be a stick-in-the mud than sued. Good thing too.  For career day in Yorktown Elementary School, an acupuncturist demonstrated on student volunteers in view of a teacher and now there is an uproar. In my opinion, she was not providing medical treatment (a shallow insertion in a random point is hardly medical treatment - more like "this is how you put on a bandage), so it seems to be a gray area in the school rules. I think the amount of hoopla is excessive. It does go to show you have to be vigilant about...

Pediatrics; Alternative Therapies Can Be Safe, Effective for Children

Ahh, there is nothing like having access to research before it is published. Or in this case, lets call it a position statement. I have been working with more children and adolescents lately, especially with pain and ADHD, so it is refreshing to have a bigwig support acupuncture as a safe and viable therapy.2009 APR 24 - ( NewsRx.com) -- Today, more children than ever are being treated with complementary and alternative therapies. Recent studies indicate that about 30 percent of healthy children and up to 50 percent of children with chronic disease are using some kind of alternative therapy (see also Pediatrics)."There is a huge place for complementary and alternative medicine in pediatrics," says Dolores Mendelow, M.D., clinical assistant professor of pediatrics and communicable diseases...