6420 N Central Avenue, Tampa, FL 33604
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6420 N Central Avenue, Tampa, FL 33604
Welcome to our natural medicine practice! We offer a range of holistic services aimed at helping you optimize your wellbeing and address the root cause of your health concerns. Led by our experienced acupuncture physician, Gigi Khalsa, we provide personalized care that includes acupuncture, herbal medicine, nutritional supplements, holistic nutrition counseling & meal planning, and advanced functional medicine lab testing.
We empower our patients with the knowledge and tools they need to make the lifestyle changes that support their health goals. We are committed to helping you achieve your optimal health and wellbeing.
The English word ‘Acupuncture’ comes from the Latin ‘acus’ (point) and ‘punctura’ (to prick)
From Webster’s dictionary:
acu·punc·ture
Pronunced: ak-yoo-puhngk-cher
Entered into English: 1684
“An originally Chinese practice of inserting fine needles through the skin at specific points especially to cure disease or relieve pain.”
This seems as good a quick definition as any. We’ll offer up another with a little more detail:
Acupuncture is one of the oldest, most common, and dependable medical therapies used in the world. It is by nature simple, safe, and effective health care. Acupuncture practitioners use thin, sterile disposable needles inserted superficially into specific areas of the body in order to help the body’s ability to heal itself.
Over the three decades or so in which acupuncture has gained popularity in the United States, it has been proven by an increasing body of scientific evidence to be not only exceptionally safe, but statistically effective as well.
Not really…
Here’s what we’d like our patients to know: You may feel a bit of a pinch when the needles are tapped in, but this should ease right away. If you continue to feel a pinching or a burning sensation at the needle site any longer than this, let us know. It means we haven’t placed that needle real well. If on the other hand, you are feeling a slight ache or heavy feeling near the needle, this is usually a good sign – a clue that the body is reacting in a productive way.
The bottom line is that as long as the feelings around the needled areas don’t keep you from closing your eyes and napping for a little while, we say let them be.
Likely not, but this also depends on the reason(s) you’re getting treated in the first place.
For short-term issues, a handful of acupuncture treatments should do the job. For chronic or long-standing issues, a maintenance schedule of some sort would be in order to keep systems running smoothly and steadily after the initial period of relief and change.
For example, patient Melissa comes in for help with pain and swelling from a new ankle sprain less than 24 hours old. This type of injury responds best with acupuncture treatments two out of three days, which would probably be plenty to help Melissa’s body sort out her injury completely.
On the other hand, David gets acupuncture treatments to work toward better management of long-term anxiety and insomnia that he’s struggled with for five years. Chances are good he’ll start to see clear changes in the pattern and intensity of his symptoms with steady treatments over four weeks or so. After this time, his acupuncturist will likely recommend regular but less frequent treatments for another stretch of time to help make sure the process of change continues moving forward. Once David finds himself in a place where he’s consistently happy with his sleep and anxiety levels, we’ll know it’s time to dial back the frequency of his treatments even further. The aim here is to provide as few acupuncture treatments as possible while maintaining gains made.
The bottom line is that as long as the feelings around the needled areas don’t keep you from closing your eyes and napping for a little while, we say let them be.
When people ask this, we think there may be an assumption that we are re-using needles. This is not the case at all. For the last 20-25 years, acupuncturists have used one-time-use, sterilized, disposable needles as the industry standard. So there is no re-using of needles, even from one part of the body to another.
Sterile package opened, needle in, needle out, and put into a bio-hazard box to dispose of responsibly and that’s it.
To be honest, we’re not sure. There have been many attempts at explaining why this happens and why acupuncture works in general. Our sense is, the presence of the needles causes our central nervous system to move into a clear pattern of rest (parasympathetic), allowing for our quickest healing and recovery to take place. Not unlike when we sleep at night.
This may explain why acupuncture is so effective at helping people overcome the many troubles associated with high-stress levels – a state we can find ourselves in which is characterized by our nervous systems staying in a “fight or flight mode’ (sympathetic) for extended periods of time.
Remaining in this state for long periods of time can keep us from recovering in an ideal way, leading to nagging injuries, sleeplessness or illness.
We can tell you, helping people get into a sleepy state is one of the most predictable and best effects acupuncture has to offer.
Nothing. And we couldn’t if we tried. Needles that acupuncturists use are a filiform type, which means they are solid, not hollow like the type of needles ‘shots’ are given through (hypodermic syringe).
In fact, a standard-sized hypodermic syringe can hold about a dozen average-sized acupuncture needles inside of it.
Absolutely. Acupuncture acts like a re-set button for the entire body. Often, patients who come in for one issue – say for back pain – will notice an improvement in something apparently unrelated, such as a chronic lung problem. This can happen even when the patient doesn’t tell the acupuncturist about the apparently unrelated problem. Acupuncture “side effects” include reducing stress, promoting better sleep and more energy.
Yes. We get lots of referrals from midwives and obstetricians because acupuncture is effective for many pregnancy-related conditions. Also, there’s a rumor that women who get acupuncture throughout their pregnancy tend to have calm babies.
Do you treat children?
Yes. Acupuncture is often very effective for children and teens, and many of them love it. We ask only that the child in question is willing to try acupuncture; we don’t want to treat unwilling patients of any age.