A Typical Treatment

Although every patient is different, and one of the key benefits of traditional Chinese medicine is that it allows treatments and herbal medicine prescriptions to be tailored to the individual’s needs, it’s useful for you to know what a ‘typical’ treatment program would look like.

Initial Consultation

At this consultation it is important for Chris to get a complete understanding of your health picture, starting with the condition for which you are attending, but including a detailed discussion of many of your physical condition(including many things which you may not even think are related to your ‘problem’), your diet and lifestyle  and emotional/mental condition.

Herbs & Acupuncture

Most treatments will involve both herbal medicine and acupuncture, although some conditions require only one or the other. Acupuncture is done in the Darlinghurst clinic, and herbs are dispensed in granule form and are taken mixed with a small amount of boiled water like a cup of coffee. You can read more about acupuncture  (link) and herbal medicine (link) in our practice here.

Program Recommendation & Examples

At the conclusion of this initial consultation, Chris will provide you with an outline of what he expects your treatment will entail. Generally speaking, the more chronic/long standing your condition, the longer it will take to treat. This is simply to give you an idea of what is involved in your treatment.

A patient presenting with back and neck pain (perhaps related to a sedentary office job or a sports injury) might be treated with acupuncture twice a week for 2 weeks, then weekly for an additional 4 weeks. Perhaps no herbal medicine would be prescribed in this case.

A patient presenting with a long standing case of chronic fatigue syndrome might be treated over the course of 12 months. This treatment might involve taking herbs daily for the duration of the treatment. Chris might recommend weekly clinic visits for the first six weeks (at which the patient would be treated with acupuncture and their herbal medicine prescription tweaked as the condition improves). Once the treatment is established, the patient may return to the clinic monthly for acupuncture and physical examination, and have a distance consultation by phone between clinic visits to review improvements and make changes to the herbal medicine prescription as required.

Treatment Costs

For detailed information on treatment costs, click here.