Acupuncture for Cancer Symptoms

00:00:00.63
Dustin Mesick
Dr. David Lee has been in full-time practice for 26 years. He earned his PhD in Oriental Medicine from American Liberty University.

00:00:11.51
Dustin Mesick
Since 2022, he has served as President of the Korean Acupuncture and Asian Medicine Association in Los Angeles. Through his own health challenges and years of clinical practice, Dr. Lee has developed an evolutionary medical system combining acupuncture, diet, and herbs.

00:00:31.10
Dustin Mesick
His work integrates traditional oriental medicine with modern understandings of health, offering practical methods for personalized healing. Before we dive in, I want to briefly acknowledge that acupuncture has increasingly entered the conversation in evidence-based supportive oncology care.

00:00:48.09
Dustin Mesick
Multiple organizations, including American Society of Clinical Oncology, the Society for Integrative Oncology, and the National Comprehensive Cancer Network now include acupuncture and guidelines for certain cancer-related symptoms, such as pain, chemotherapy-induced nausea, aromatase inhibitor-related joint pain, neuropathy, and other supportive care concerns.

00:01:14.07
Dr Colin Goodwin
Welcome to the podcast.

00:01:17.11
David Lee
Appreciate it.

00:01:18.45
Dr Colin Goodwin
Wanted to then just ask, you maybe about some... ah Research here, ah one thing we're increasingly seeing in integrative oncology research is that patients often report improvements across multiple symptoms at once. You know, if they're coming into acupuncture for pain or for improved sleep, fatigue, stress, and just overall being. ah Well, wanted to ask from your perspective, why do you think there's a these interventions like acupuncture can sometimes just influence several aspects of that, ah you know, kind of range of symptoms.

00:01:56.34
David Lee
Yes, simply put acupuncture does many things because acupuncture taps into that person's ability t to self heal. The person's ability to self heal is at many layers and many angles.

00:02:14.04
David Lee
Human body is the most complex thing in the universe because human brain is, they say the most complex thing, coupled that with the body, even more complex. And the human body over time has been very good and in keeping itself intact, addressing issues when they come timely and multitude at once.

00:02:36.57
David Lee
And that is the aspect acupuncture taps into. That's why people notice multiple improvement at once.

00:02:47.35
Dustin Mesick
Dr. Lee, so many cancer patients describe feeling like their care can become very disease focused, while areas like stress, sleep, emotional well being, nervous system regulation, and overall quality of life can sometimes feel secondary during treatment.

00:03:03.93
Dustin Mesick
From your perspective, what role can acupuncture and Eastern medicine play in helping patients feel more supported as a whole person throughout the cancer journey?

00:03:15.58
David Lee
Yes, there is a difference between biomolecular medicine and acupuncture. Biomolecular medicine is what you call physical medicine.

00:03:27.03
David Lee
And acupuncture will be what you call holistic natural medicine. And i could refer to the differences in the in both in this way.

00:03:38.34
David Lee
Biomolecular medicine is problem focused. If you don't know what problem you're dealing with, how you going to treat it? Obviously, you got to address the problem, identify it and address the problem.

00:03:52.73
David Lee
That's one model in biomolecular medicine. And the other model is

00:04:01.18
David Lee
the person is in an extreme state is life or death. So then we have to save life. In order to save life, you're going to compromise a lot of things.

00:04:15.10
David Lee
because it's going to require an extreme intervention. So two things problem focused and an extreme intervention. That's the highlight of biomolecular medicine, the what you call physical medicine.

00:04:31.64
David Lee
And it's good. And we need to utilize that. Because there are not much natural medicine that's good at treating cancer.

00:04:42.90
David Lee
But natural medicine is good at promote healing.

00:04:48.92
David Lee
It's good at addressing multiple things that are occurring at once. I could give you an analogy like Lego pieces in a castle.

00:05:01.66
David Lee
Lego pieces are easy to measure. The weight, dimension, color, everything. So precise. Therefore, we know what we're dealing with. But let's say you put Lego pieces together and you get a castle as an example.

00:05:16.98
David Lee
Well, how do you know what castle is exactly? There's no clear definition of a castle. Nobody has a definition that we could all agree on. So therefore, there is no exact shape of what that is.

00:05:31.06
David Lee
However, when we address the whole castle, then we get to address multiple parts in the castle. And Like, for example, one thing does not do one thing.

00:05:44.89
David Lee
One thing does many things. And we combine many things together to be even more many things effective. Example is exercise.

00:05:55.54
David Lee
All right, then you get many benefits. You eat well, you get many benefits. That's clear earth to us because that's our experience. And that's there's also science to that.

00:06:07.35
David Lee
But when it comes to some other natural medicine, how do you confine it in a test tube and measure it? You can't because there's no exact outer shape.

00:06:21.34
David Lee
And people have different views and different definitions of them. They exist. It just we can't measure. But we work with what is actually there.

00:06:32.22
David Lee
And we work with the pattern. That's why it works. And they work together because they're both working at different levels. One is problem focused and the other is person focused.

00:06:49.40
Dustin Mesick
Yeah, you know, i was just thinking as you're talking about some of what you said about working with what's actually there. And it made me think of something you'd said in one of your other interviews on the podcast, Discovering the Wellness Formula, where you talked about the difference between objective and subjective science. Do you feel like that in some ways plays a part in related to the treatment of cancer patients within the Western and the Eastern like lens of a practice.

00:07:24.02
David Lee
Yes, even natural practice, natural medicine practitioners want objective science. They do in their heart and in their mind, it's just not practical. So therefore, we have to use what we got. Let's give an example. When a person experiences pain, is there a device that measures the amount of pain a person has?

00:07:46.46
David Lee
No such thing exists. But pain is the most common condition a patient sees doctor for. then if you don't have exact objective science, how are you going to address it?

00:08:01.08
David Lee
We address it because they exist. And so then the

00:08:10.07
David Lee
natural medicine acupuncture works in a way that is comfortable with addressing subjectivity. We always question things to make sure we get things correct.

00:08:24.50
David Lee
and we should do that however in subjectivity we could always question it and and the questioner will always be right however in subjectivity there's two things about it one is reflection of what's actually there and the other is just making it up how do you know which is which you don't because you don't have objective of what measuring what that subjective experience is.

00:08:58.49
David Lee
But subjective experience is quite important. We call it gut feeling. Gut feeling is often correct. Gut feeling is often incorrect.

00:09:12.25
David Lee
What about the word well-being? Does it exist? Or does it not exist? Is well-being as important as physical pain and discomfort and dysfunction?

00:09:24.99
David Lee
Well-being is our value. We pursue things in life because we have value to things. We have vision. We have these things that we have a purpose for.

00:09:38.20
David Lee
How are you going to measure those? You can't. But that's even higher than the physical experience. Because we use our body to get to the purpose in life and to accomplish them.

00:09:53.04
David Lee
That's why subjectivity is quite important.

00:09:59.48
Dr Colin Goodwin
One thing that we had talked about prior to recording here was just the the systemic approach to acupuncture and how there isn't necessarily a formula for then treating a like one symptom. Like if a patient comes in And says, well, I'm nauseous, then you're gonna make, okay, well, this is, uh, my mind it almost went to like battleship, like, okay, well, it's B seven, right? here Like, this is exactly where I'm going to place the, uh, then pin or needle. Um, but.

00:10:36.66
Dr Colin Goodwin
What I wanted to then maybe ask here is like, how do you approach ah then those in active treatment, um say if this was that you are seeing them for the first time and they're in active treatment versus someone who might be, ah you know, a ah patient prior who has a new diagnosis?

00:11:00.15
David Lee
Okay, so those are multifaceted questions apply as in various ways as I can. Let me know if there's any gap that I missed out here.

00:11:11.64
David Lee
And I'll start. There are variables, because there are variables, the treatments have to adopt, meaning there are different treatments for those different variables.

00:11:25.34
David Lee
As an example, even medications have different impact on the condition because when we're problem focused, supposed to treat that problem, but people have different responses.

00:11:39.67
David Lee
People have different responses because people don't have one biology. Therefore, some people respond well, other people don't well, and they have to change the medication. It shows that there's even in biomolecular medicine, there's no one way to treat.

00:11:57.98
David Lee
And because people have different biology, it's weak I could compare that to this. All roads lead to Mount Fuji. Mount Fuji is on an island called Japan.

00:12:13.85
David Lee
And there are different paths to get there. Some paths are are more efficient, more straightforward. and Some paths are more relevant to that patient, whether straightforward or less straightforward, it just more applies to that patient.

00:12:33.12
David Lee
Therefore we have different methodologies. Why not a certain acupuncture treat point treat that condition? Well, it's known to treat it. That does not mean it's a hundred percent better than random. Okay.

00:12:47.45
David Lee
But you want it to have a high percentage rate of getting it right at the same time. You don't want to have too many choices either. Okay. And through experiences, people have found different methodologies that work, but we don't know which methodology match up with that individual.

00:13:08.12
David Lee
And as time passes, certain methodologies win because they're time tested. Today, we still have too many methodologies.

00:13:19.00
David Lee
We could be seen as bad according to science because there are too many variables. But a lot of methodology means is that we have flexibility to find things that work for that individual.

00:13:34.65
David Lee
For me, I believe I have the methodology that has the highest rate of giving patients the benefit compared to any other acupuncture methodologies. And for the new patient, I use that methodology, because getting it right for the patient has a high rate of correctness.

00:13:54.74
David Lee
And for the patients who come in later on for the same or a different problem, and the original treatment was helpful, when they come in with different problem, I still give them same acupuncture point.

00:14:10.81
David Lee
Because acupuncture is not problem focused, it's person focused. That's where we go off the rail. We tend to treat problems.

00:14:24.44
David Lee
which problem is good with this acupuncture point and what other acupuncture point does it treat? And it's because we are problem focused. However, that is not the practical model to use.

00:14:39.61
David Lee
The practical model to use is find that acupuncture point that does everything for that individual and come to find out that acupuncture point is genetically set in.

00:14:54.58
David Lee
is relevant to that individual as a child, as an adult, and as an adult, and and ah as an elder. It's that simple.

00:15:05.27
David Lee
If we find that acupuncture point on that individual that does everything and is genetically set, then voila, we got it right at the beginning, then we'll get it right later on too, regardless of what problem it is.

00:15:21.14
Dustin Mesick
You know that what that reminds me of is as a dietitian, like, you know, people will come to me and say, you know, I have cardiovascular disease or i have diabetes. And there is, of course, more specific diets for those conditions.

00:15:35.58
Dustin Mesick
But there's a general eating pattern that if they follow, you know, like a Mediterranean diet style eating, eating more fruits and vegetables, half your plate vegetables, that it's going to help prevent multiple diseases at once.

00:15:49.85
Dustin Mesick
And I think so many I think I actually saw an acupuncturist where they're like, this point helps treat headaches. This point treats neck pain. This point like helps with blood flow. And they were actually an acupuncturist, but their initial ah area of expertise was chiropractic.

00:16:11.00
Dustin Mesick
So maybe they were coming from that like westernized viewpoint of ah point. that works for specific condition. Have you heard of like different acupuncturists having that more problem focused approach with the different points?

00:16:27.70
David Lee
Yeah, just as human beings are varied, we got different personalities, we got different knowledge, and we got certain level of ignorance, style, and so on, and so on.

00:16:43.10
David Lee
And that means we don't have a standardization. We all have a different attempt to make things happen. Okay, so what lens are we going to use?

00:16:56.57
David Lee
and And we have we have a variety of people. And so the profession does not represent, but the profession plus that individual's set of circumstances, where that person came from, what that person knows, how's that person educated, and so on, and so on.

00:17:15.67
David Lee
That produces a lot of variables. And so somebody's truth is not somebody else's truth. Okay, and then about the diet, there's Two things about the diet.

00:17:29.49
David Lee
There's general good way of eating. We have found out that low-carb diet, military in style, and high protein seems to be good for majority or most people.

00:17:44.28
David Lee
Man, it took us decades to find that out. Why? Because food

00:17:51.88
David Lee
causes has many variables, causes many impacts. Not only that, it's subtle. Food does not give a direct impact.

00:18:02.84
David Lee
Well, sometimes. But there are many indirect impacts on the body. So how do you measure those things clearly? It took decades to understand how food works. And we've been eating food for this long. And this is the amount of knowledge that we have.

00:18:20.82
David Lee
How much more knowledge can we get out of understanding how food works in the future? Okay, so that's one aspect of food. And the other aspect of food is just like medicine, individual varies.

00:18:34.87
David Lee
As an example, we know about top allergic intolerant foods, shellfish, nuts, dairy, gluten, eggs,

00:18:48.57
David Lee
fish, things like that. Okay, and there's more. but less frequent, but there are more. Most of the food are neutral, but some common foods that we consume are detriment for some people.

00:19:04.82
David Lee
If they're not detriment for some people, they're just compromising and people don't know they're compromising because they're always eating food in combination.

00:19:16.28
David Lee
And it's not practical to eat one food at a time and see how they do.

00:19:22.04
David Lee
And that's where matching up with the genetic profile comes. I do body type diet. Constitutional medicine is body type. Constitution means it's something that you're born with and you're the same throughout your lifetime.

00:19:38.36
David Lee
If you're allergic to shellfish, nuts, gluten, just buy that information. I could tell you, i could tell and I could tell you what constitution you have because it's genetic. It's not changing.

00:19:52.06
David Lee
you can reduce it, but you cannot get out of being allergic, intolerant to those foods. And if you're going through chemotherapy and you have all these different problems and you're allergic to, let's say, nuts and gluten and dairy, well, that's going to compromise you even more.

00:20:15.06
David Lee
Those are known to cause problems, but they're not causing just those problems. They're compromising the whole system. Directly and indirectly over time, strongly or subtly over time, it does compromise.

00:20:30.68
David Lee
So then if you're not good with those food ingredients, then you want to reduce them. So that your body has better ability to rebound on its own.

00:20:42.17
David Lee
Don't put a roadblock in its ability to self heal. That's why knowing your body type is important for correct food application.

00:20:55.14
Dr Colin Goodwin
That's why Dustin needs to stop eating Skittles.

00:20:58.10
Dustin Mesick
Ha, ha, ha, ha.

00:20:59.54
David Lee
ah We all have our advice. That's why I said nine one or the other is somewhere just becoming less so that you don't go over the threshold of being bad.

00:21:11.42
Dr Colin Goodwin
Okay.

00:21:12.28
David Lee
So yes, enjoy your Skittles just a bit.

00:21:17.11
Dr Colin Goodwin
Wanted to ask if you could maybe take us through ah you know a case study. I know that you provided us with some ah particular ah cases that you have seen. Wanted to see if you can just like I said, walk us through those.

00:21:29.98
David Lee
Okay. Well, then acupuncture treats variety of different situations related to chemotherapy, radiotherapy, and we know about the common symptoms, neuropathy, pain, fatigue, nausea, vomiting, headache, and so on and so on.

00:21:47.19
David Lee
And people are at different places. However, acupuncture is relevant to them because acupuncture promotes healing. And so then it's measuring oneself against oneself over time.

00:22:03.83
David Lee
With six to eight acupuncture treatments coming in twice a week, they see significant relief in all those symptoms, or at least majority of those symptoms. And they feel like they're doing better.

00:22:16.60
David Lee
And even when the chemotherapy does what it does, and after a few days, their body can recover faster with continuation of acupuncture.

00:22:32.50
David Lee
Yes, six to eight treatments is enough to see how they do. And it'll be twice a week. And then it's less often than that. But it depends if they're getting continuing to get chemotherapy, then they'll need to get acupuncture afterwards continuously.

00:22:49.98
David Lee
If they've already have had it done, and they have residual symptoms the body is not healing as quickly as it should it's been six months after the whole treatment was done or it could have been three years later and they still have neuropathy and ache and pain acupuncture will help them recover faster to a point where they're almost gone or they're all gone i could give you as an example a patient

00:23:20.47
David Lee
was on tamoxifen, which got rid of all the estrogen from their from her system. And she was taking that for four years.

00:23:31.70
David Lee
Normally people take it for five years and she had one more year left and she was having raging hot flashes every night, night sweats every night, still quite severe.

00:23:44.57
David Lee
Even so with six to eight acupuncture treatments got rid of 70% those symptoms. and 68 more got rid of 90% more. So she thought, why didn't I get this started earlier?

00:23:57.94
David Lee
Well, later is better than none. Okay. So for that one year left, she had a pretty good minimal symptoms. So that's an example. And other example, i had a patient, he came in for prostate cancer.

00:24:16.50
David Lee
He was very natural oriented and he refused any type of treatment chemotherapy or radiotherapy and he had bleeding in his blood. He had frequent urination acupuncture and Chinese herbs reduced the frequent urination and bleeding did not treat the cancer. So eventually he he got on to chemotherapy and radiotherapy but helping the body

00:24:47.74
David Lee
does a lot for it the patient. Another example is the patient had lymphedectomy, mastectomy and lymphedectomy. And that can lead to chunkoedema, edema in the whole torso

00:25:08.57
David Lee
or edema in the legs, depending which of the lymphatic vessels were taken out and affected.

00:25:18.99
David Lee
Acupuncture does not help with the lymphedema, but the Chinese herbs do. Okay,

00:25:28.98
David Lee
even lymphedema that are because well, lymphedema is considered not treatable, it's palliative treatments, but not treatable. Chinese herbs reverse the lymphedema by half by 70% or higher, even if they had it for 30, 40 or 50 years.

00:25:48.70
David Lee
That means that those who have who are prone to lymphedema and or not and they had the mastectomy or lymphedectomy and that caused lymphedema. That's very physical damage.

00:26:06.47
David Lee
It's a structural damage. However, gets better. So what we think is not possible, it's not possible with this one method.

00:26:17.85
David Lee
But if you try another method, it can be possible.

00:26:25.27
Dustin Mesick
One of the questions that I get a lot that I just wanted to ah put in here, because, you know a lot of cancer patients I've talked to, I was like, well, have you done acupuncture? I hear treats multiple things.

00:26:36.86
Dustin Mesick
And they say, oh i'm I'm afraid of it because don't they put needles in you? And that's going to really hurt. How is it going to treat my pain?

00:26:45.07
David Lee
Hmm. Yeah, there's a couple of replies to that. One is about the pain and the other is not knowing about how acupuncture works. Okay.

00:26:58.01
David Lee
All right. About pain, acupuncture needles used to be quite thick and blunt. Now with the nanotechnology, they make it very thin and so sharp that you have to use an electron microscope to be able to see the tip.

00:27:17.11
David Lee
of these acupuncture needles. These acupuncture needles are so thin that several of these needles go into the hole of a hypodermic needle. Okay.

00:27:27.81
David Lee
Hypodermic needles are big. They go in and they tear. They hurt.

00:27:31.83
Dustin Mesick
ah

00:27:34.04
David Lee
And these acupuncture needles are just solid. And so they go in and they put flesh aside. even being so sharp and thin people to feel them but it's a sharp temporary sensation.

00:27:49.27
David Lee
And it does not require an amplitude, which means shoving it in and twisting it and making it hurt. It doesn't require like that to make it work.

00:28:01.53
David Lee
Because it's like turning on turning on a switch, you're connecting a switch. You have the infrastructure, you have the wiring, you have the ballast, you got the bulb, everything is there. You got the power supply. You're just connecting.

00:28:19.37
David Lee
That's what acupuncture is doing through penetrating the skin. And so whether large or small, it doesn't matter.

00:28:25.43
Dr Colin Goodwin
So

00:28:27.54
David Lee
The efficacy is the same. So therefore, it's the minimal discomfort to make it work.

00:28:32.89
Dr Colin Goodwin
but electro acupuncture is like jump in a car.

00:28:37.05
David Lee
Oh, that's a good question. that' the Yeah, yeah, yeah, right.

00:28:39.35
Dr Colin Goodwin
So maybe a silly way, but it is.

00:28:41.90
David Lee
Whatever is intuitive to us, we think that's the way it's going to work. But in practicality, we did not need acu, electro acupuncture to make it work. We like to throw in electricity because man, it just sounds so good and it's modern.

00:28:58.47
David Lee
Okay. So yes, you could get pretty good result without electro acupuncture.

00:29:05.24
Dustin Mesick
Yeah, actually, gotta say I did see an acupuncturist, a couple acupuncturists. And it was like they had put like 30 or 40 needles in me. And I couldn't even move. And that time I saw you, I was actually astonished that there was only eight points.

00:29:22.94
Dustin Mesick
And I felt a much more profound experience afterwards than having 30 points put in my body.

00:29:31.64
David Lee
Right. It's because acupuncture is not about lying on a bed of nails and rolling over on it. Yeah, I'm covering everything. Something's got to work. No, that's not the way it works.

00:29:44.98
David Lee
The way it works is you got to hit the sweet spot.

00:29:49.14
Dr Colin Goodwin
You don't use the shotgun method is what you're saying?

00:29:49.14
David Lee
In the hole.

00:29:51.04
Dr Colin Goodwin
You're just like, yeah, I'm going to just spray it, right?

00:29:54.23
David Lee
ah Right, right. Shotgun method or throw a porcupine. Porcupine, throw a porcupine. yeah Yeah, then, then we don't need to know how to a know how acupuncture works. We just need to know the safety of it.

00:30:10.51
David Lee
Okay. And so yeah, it's just got hit the sweet spot.

00:30:16.06
David Lee
And if you hit the sweet spot, and also stimulate the non relevant spot, it's not going to work. because the non-relevant spot is giving the body wrong information or confusing information and muddies the whole thing. Okay.

00:30:37.88
David Lee
So therefore it's better to hit a home run just with a really good whack, with a very small thin needle on the right spot. And so then that's what we're discovering over time. It's not the amplitude. It's not the number of needles.

00:30:52.98
David Lee
It's where are you press the right button.

00:30:59.00
David Lee
And then the about the acupuncture and recommendation of acupuncture by the medical professionals. I think one reason is because yeah, we don't we have a lack of scientific data.

00:31:13.66
David Lee
And the other is that the concept of qi, yin and yang is just like, what, what, what is that? second well What is that?

00:31:24.66
David Lee
get my chi flowing and my mojo going or get my yin and yang balanced. Is that what it's about? the There's a stump kind of statement about in oriented medicine about getting the chi moving and the blood flowing.

00:31:42.97
David Lee
And that's negatively triggering the medical doctors. Does that mean the acupuncture is going to the cancer, spread things around?

00:31:54.10
David Lee
No, it's just a terminology. That's not the way acupuncture works. Acupuncture doesn't affect cancer. It affects the human body to self heal.

00:32:07.19
David Lee
That's the level that it taps into. It doesn't affect the cancer. That's why we need a treatment that directly attacks the cancer.

00:32:21.18
Dr Colin Goodwin
So as an acupuncturist, are you also an amazing dart player? That's a joke, I know.

00:32:29.61
David Lee
I've been doing this for 26 years. In the first three years of my practice, I didn't make darts out of those acupuncture needles. With string at the end, you know, put the ah glue so that it'll weigh, right?

00:32:42.36
David Lee
And then on the back of it with paper, you know, tape it on its wing and just throw them. Show them to the patient, hey, you know, I'm doing darts. But it's too much of a joke. It's snap just not relevant to...

00:32:58.11
David Lee
conveying the right message. But it's funny though. that's That's the first thing that I thought. Yeah.

00:33:04.60
Dr Colin Goodwin
Wanted to see if you could...

00:33:04.86
David Lee
and born out of The target, right?

00:33:05.36
Dr Colin Goodwin
ah

00:33:07.02
David Lee
that That's relevant.

00:33:09.30
Dr Colin Goodwin
Yeah, yeah. that That is targeted, right?

00:33:10.07
David Lee
Yeah. right.

00:33:12.63
Dr Colin Goodwin
um Wanted to see if you could tell us about your your recent trip that you went on to Korea.

00:33:18.25
David Lee
Oh, South Korea. yeah I went to South Korea to teach along with the being with the family. Family was great. really good time traveling seeing and eating all these different things that south korea provides oh my gosh variety and fresh loved it and i'll go back again for more of those foods and in the uh the climate and the mountains and the nature and all and another reason that i went to south korea for was to teach i taught at two places one place was seoul

00:33:56.09
David Lee
in a area called Gangnam, G-A-N-G-N-A-M. You may know the song Gangnam Style, the horse-like dancing guy.

00:34:06.96
David Lee
It got the area being popular because it's a wealthy neighborhood. It's like St. Beverly Hills of Los Angeles. And I taught my method of acupuncture to 10 acupuncturists.

00:34:21.43
David Lee
And it was two hours long. One hour was the method and the other hour was how to practice in United States. The first hour, well, both the hours I started off with Q and A. I gave my information in the first few minutes and then I had people just ask questions and I replied.

00:34:42.04
David Lee
It was good because everybody felt like they were conversing and they were involved. And by the end of the hour, it was all smiles and all fun. And I was very,

00:34:54.73
David Lee
honored to be able to present my data to the top practitioners in Seoul.

00:35:04.92
David Lee
And the other place was in Kyung Hee University, K-Y-U-N-G-H-E-E University, which is the number one oriental medicine university in Korea.

00:35:18.90
David Lee
I presented my data, my finding to two professors who are in the top of the field. They know they regularly interact with the elites in acupuncture.

00:35:32.63
David Lee
They are the directors and they are the professors in the department. And they're also directors of the hospital.

00:35:42.94
David Lee
The conclusion was

00:35:47.54
David Lee
the data is impressive.

00:35:50.90
David Lee
But the interpretation that comes from the data just does not match with the current prevailing theories, nor the original theories.

00:36:03.67
David Lee
The discussion was an hour and 15 minutes long. And yes, it was q&a from the start, because i don't they don't want to have the professor sit in and just listen to my words.

00:36:16.06
David Lee
But by the end of the the hour, it was quite fun, interactive, and they summarized the presentation, they evaluated, and they gave recommendation of future things to do.

00:36:31.48
David Lee
They were very good professors, highly, and very, very good. I really appreciated them giving me time to interact with them.

00:36:42.23
David Lee
But the conclusion was, the data was impressive, and cannot match up with the interpretation based on what we know. Okay.

00:36:53.53
David Lee
And I thought, well, you have to follow the data. Right? That's how we advance.

00:37:02.30
David Lee
And I was encouraged because before I went, that was impression that I had. And it was a confirmation with the response. And those were my career experience.

00:37:27.86
David Lee
Did I say a lot there?

 

 

00:40:00.15
Dr Colin Goodwin
And can you just speak to some maybe quantitative ah than improvements that you've seen in the course of treatment?

00:40:11.64
David Lee
Yes. Although most of the time I get patients feedback on what their experience outcome is, at times people do bring in their lab data.

00:40:18.65
Dr Colin Goodwin
Mm-hmm.

00:40:25.27
David Lee
lab data is the count of red blood cells and also the white blood cells and other numbers associated to them. If they bring them after some amount of time they've been treated, and initially they come in because they have a lot of discomfort, neuropathy, pain, nausea, all caused by chemotherapy, insomnia and so and anxiety, of course.

00:40:51.45
David Lee
And so then first chemotherapy is uncomfortable and people usually get six courses of chemotherapy.

00:41:02.78
David Lee
Each treatment may different, but generally people get six courses every two or three weeks. So the first chemo is uncomfortable. Second one is, oh, much more uncomfortable.

00:41:17.69
David Lee
And the third one is unbearable. So they start coming for acupuncture after the second or third chemotherapy.

00:41:28.95
David Lee
Before each chemotherapy is a standard that the red blood cell count is done just in case they need to get an infusion. You don't want the oxygen oxygen level to go down too low because red blood cell count indicates the oxygen oxygen level and chemotherapy.

00:41:50.58
David Lee
destroys anything that grows fast. That also includes the white blood cells too. And people get acupuncture twice a week. They feel better right away. All the symptoms are significantly better. And then they get chemotherapy. Oh my gosh, uncomfortable again. But after a few days they get acupuncture ah and then they, they recover faster.

00:42:12.95
David Lee
And they're done with the six courses and they bring in their lab data. shows that when they started acupuncture at twice a week, the red blood cell and white blood cell count has stabilized at the lower normal level.

00:42:32.95
David Lee
Even without having to have infusion of red blood cell or taking medication to help the red blood cells to grow. And so then there were several people brought those in and And that was an objective indicator that the reason why their symptoms were not as bad because their count has stabilized at the lower normal level.

00:43:07.29
David Lee
And so that will be, i think, evidence-based and perhaps using my methodology, it will be easier to scientifically see that this is relevant for people who are going through chemotherapy, because the red blood cells and white blood cell count gets stabilized, not only the symptoms go less,

00:43:39.12
Dustin Mesick
Colin, did you have anything else you wanted to ask so about that there' that part?

00:43:52.38
Dustin Mesick
ah your Your mic is muted.

00:43:56.03
Dr Colin Goodwin
Nope.

00:43:56.86
Dustin Mesick
Oh, okay. Dr. Lee, in your book, Biosoma, is it Biosoma?

00:44:02.90
David Lee
Yes, it's bisoma.

00:44:04.12
Dustin Mesick
Okay, so Dr. Lee in your book by somacupuncture, two sets of five horary points without a disease diagnosis and the extended abstract published in 2018, you described treating patients without relying on disease-based diagnoses, which is kind of related to our conversation that we've been having this whole interview.

00:44:27.70
Dustin Mesick
But I guess that somebody who comes in who's a cancer patient

00:44:28.83
Dr Colin Goodwin
Thank you.

00:44:31.77
Dustin Mesick
might be expecting more of a ah diagnosis central approach. How do you apply practice with these patients and and what have you seen as like the strengths and limitations?

00:44:44.61
David Lee
Hmm. Yeah, use the word by soma and horary points. Those are technical words related to my field. And but by soma simply means by two. Soma means body by soma two bodies, indicating there are two sets of acupuncture points to use.

00:45:05.02
David Lee
Acupuncture points are what we call horary points, h o r a r y points. And they are a certain type of acupuncture points. And the horary points, what they mean is related to, they're related to five elements.

00:45:26.52
David Lee
In Eastern medicine, there's word qi, yin and yang, five elements. Five elements are wood, fire, earth, metal, water. What's wood, fire, earth, metal, water?

00:45:37.27
David Lee
a Just think of it as, think of it as like a five aspects of a person. So wood is one aspect, fire is another, earth is another, metal is another, and water is another.

00:45:52.95
David Lee
And there's a representative acupuncture point for each of those five elements. For the people are not familiar with it, I could give this analogy.

00:46:06.42
David Lee
What if there's a one acupuncture point that treats all the skin issues? What if there's one acupuncture tree point that treats all the muscular issues and one that treats all the endocrine and one acupuncture point that treats all the nerve issues and one acupuncture point that treats all the circulatory issues.

00:46:26.92
David Lee
That's easier for us to compare. It's like that. There are five points that treat all the five aspects of a person. And that's what we have discovered.

00:46:38.07
David Lee
Like i said, an acupuncture tree point treats everything. And we'll combine everything acupuncture points together to be more everything. Okay.

00:46:49.88
David Lee
And that's why we call it bisoma acupuncture, two body acupuncture, because there are two sets of five points. If one set of five points of work, then they will continue to work on that patient.

00:47:05.98
David Lee
If it doesn't, then we have another set that works for that patient. Holistically, multiple symptoms getting better. So it's like throwing a coin.

00:47:17.46
David Lee
Either get a head or a tail. You're not going to get a third option. So this is bisoma, two option acupuncture treatment.

00:47:28.92
David Lee
Because of that reason, we don't need a diagnosis. We don't need to know why you have these certain symptoms. Okay.

00:47:40.66
David Lee
What we need to know is what points work for that person. There's only two choices. We don't have multiple choices. That's why we don't need diagnosis. And when patients come in with questions like, do you know what's going on exactly with me? What's, well, am I experiencing this?

00:47:57.53
David Lee
Why am I experiencing that? Why do I have pain over here? And why do I have to dysfunction over there? People ask those questions is because we have that habit.

00:48:09.43
David Lee
So I just tell them, I have a different way of approaching. You're here to get better. right And if we have that approach, then we already have acupuncture points to be able to know how to treat your condition exactly according to the way we think.

00:48:26.10
David Lee
And that's intuitive to us, but that's not working. So we have to do something that actually works. And this is by just tapping into your body's ability to self-heal by stimulating spots that do everything because your body is supposed to do everything.

00:48:41.35
Dr Colin Goodwin
Thank you.

00:48:44.33
David Lee
At least that's the idea. And when we do that, we get maybe not everything, but we get so many benefits out of it. That's how I explain to the patients.

00:48:55.99
David Lee
And because it's known to be good and people are here, the patients go, okay, then do what you need to do. It doesn't hurt. Yeah.

00:49:08.70
David Lee
It doesn't make sense, but logically they could follow this explanation.

00:49:26.10
Dr Colin Goodwin
I thought you just answered or question or ask number six, Dustin. I'm getting like really confused or where we are in the end view here.

00:49:34.52
Dustin Mesick
Oh yeah, you said I don't think we need to talk about number seven, so I said you could skip to number eight.

00:49:42.06
Dr Colin Goodwin
Oh gosh. My, my apologies there. Um,

00:49:53.69
Dustin Mesick
Did you want to just ask number eight Colin since you said you said we didn't need to ask that because we basically talked about number seven already.

00:49:56.53
Dr Colin Goodwin
Yeah.

00:50:01.78
Dr Colin Goodwin
Mm-hmm. Well, and this is, mean, like you go into ah like another specific like example here and talk about, you know, nutritional needs. And I think we've already kind of had that conversation.

00:50:16.38
Dustin Mesick
Yeah, that's fine. you You could go into dr Lee. Did you have anything else you wanted to add ah in relation to you know some of the dietary recommendations? You have your book in Tetrasoma Diet for the Four Body Types um that was published in 2015.

00:50:35.70
Dustin Mesick
And I know that we are in the context of cancer. you know People have to worry about you know, cancer, or cachexia, or like malnutrition. Is there any ah additional things or comments you have about dietary recommendations in the context of cancer treatment?

00:50:53.44
David Lee
Okay, I'll reply. he You want to ask it and then I'll reply or?

00:50:59.45
Dustin Mesick
Yeah, I mean, Colin, are you asking number seven or not?

00:51:04.38
Dr Colin Goodwin
My whole point is like, i don't know if we need to.

00:51:07.77
Dustin Mesick
Okay, well, yeah, then if that's the case. Yeah,

00:51:11.03
Dr Colin Goodwin
But I mean, like like i put in the chest, like, is there something else that he would like to comment on? Like, I think that we could just have him speak to it and and again, edit out this part.

00:51:21.91
Dustin Mesick
we'll add out this part. Do you is there anything additional that you think that would be beneficial to the conversation in regards to diet or Dr. Lee?

00:51:35.42
David Lee
No, now that I think about it, I did say, did.

00:51:39.06
Dustin Mesick
Okay, yeah, that's fine.

00:51:39.85
David Lee
Yeah. Okay.

00:51:41.34
Dustin Mesick
Alright, so then we're, we're obviously adding out this all and Colin's gonna ask you question number eight, like, right as soon as I stopped speaking.

00:51:49.34
Dr Colin Goodwin
Okay. Have you seen acupuncture evolve from being more symptom or problem focused into an approach that can potentially support multiple aspects of the patient's health and quality of life simultaneously, especially in cancer care?

00:52:05.88
David Lee
Your question was, have I evolved from symptoms and sign focused care to

00:52:16.73
David Lee
repeat the question, please.

00:52:20.57
Dr Colin Goodwin
yeah, I'm not a big fan of the question either. so

00:52:23.26
Dustin Mesick
Ha ha ha ha

00:52:24.47
Dr Colin Goodwin
And that's why i was like, hesitating to like, well, maybe ah one thing that I wanted to maybe circle back to is, uh,

00:52:27.11
David Lee
Okay.

00:52:31.10
David Lee
Well, I think that's a good question. I could repeat what I said because some people may want to hear a little different angle.

00:52:40.22
Dr Colin Goodwin
it It does seem like we're we're seeing asking like the same question. where We're going back to like is like how can we then talk about this being problem-focused or diagnosis-focused rather than system-focused?

00:52:55.00
Dr Colin Goodwin
Yeah.

00:52:55.64
Dustin Mesick
Yeah, I think we kind of talked about this too, like earlier on in the conversation.

00:53:00.89
Dr Colin Goodwin
One thing i maybe we can pivot to is like, oh I'm curious if there are other barriers to then ah acupuncture that you see, you know, we had used the, rather you had used the example of like, okay, you'rere you're on two, then ah think of the system as like a castle and something that came to mind is like, okay, so if, uh,

00:53:24.25
Dr Colin Goodwin
A common feature of a castle is a moat, like just preventing you from even getting to the castle. What is that you know like that moat feature for acupuncture?

00:53:37.75
David Lee
Yeah, acupuncture. Yeah, I gave an example of a castle. And I did want to refer to a castle as something that is not having a common definition.

00:53:53.94
David Lee
So people will think of a castle in a different way. Like for example, having a moat around the castle. I could give another example like a car.

00:54:05.56
David Lee
Some people will think of it as a sports car or a truck. Or I could say there's a picture and a picture is made up of pixels. There's no picture in the pixel.

00:54:19.34
David Lee
There's no castle in the Lego piece. There's no a car in a single pixel either.

00:54:31.00
David Lee
It's the whole that is greater than some of its parts. The whole is ah another entity that arises because things are working synergistically. And when we're addressing the whole,

00:54:46.62
David Lee
were not clearly talking about what's within it because what's within it is at another layer of reality. And so when we use language, with the words such as qi, yin and yang, and spirit of an acupuncture point, or element, we're referring to the whole that are experienced subjectively.

00:55:18.21
David Lee
That's why natural medicine is not compatible with biomolecular medicine in the theoretical approach. But biomolecular medicine could verify the efficacy of things given there's enough or enough less variables so that you could distinguish one from another.

00:55:43.58
David Lee
Yeah, two different ways of thinking and those two are valid because the outcome is good for both with both.

00:55:52.50
Dr Colin Goodwin
Well, maybe to ask in a different way. I was using your analogy to then ask a you know question on what gets in the way of treatment. you know What prevents them from getting to the castle? So if you're you're treating the castle, you know I'm talking about, okay, well, one feature is that you know I've got to mow with alligators. Yeah. So is that like, I don't want to be in pain or, or this is too different.

00:56:19.16
Dr Colin Goodwin
ah You know, one thing you brought up with this, the, you know, the, the terms that are used or the theory behind it might be ah foreign, ah you know, or just not, ah not known.

00:56:32.89
David Lee
I think there are two things about two major barriers for people getting acupuncture. One is that it's Yeah, let me let me arrange my thought here.

00:56:56.76
Dr Colin Goodwin
Is it all the Enya that you play in the office?

00:57:00.44
David Lee
I didn't hear what you said?

00:57:02.71
Dr Colin Goodwin
I made a joke. is it Is it the music that you play in the office?

00:57:07.39
David Lee
All right. and the right good There are different reasons why people elect to get acupuncture, not elect to. I think main reason is because the acupuncture people don't know that is safe because the patients who come here tend to ask question, is acupuncture safe?

00:57:33.37
David Lee
But over time, more and more people are understanding that acupuncture is safe. because they do their own online research or speak with people before they come. Okay.

00:57:46.87
David Lee
That's one reason of ah safety related with acupuncture. Is this compatible with the treatments that I'm getting, things like that. Okay. And yes, it's compatible because it's working at a different layer.

00:58:01.91
David Lee
See, we got problem focused treatment and we have person focused treatment. Therefore you have two distinct approaches. And there is no conflict. And besides, acupuncture does not have an adverse effect.

00:58:17.08
David Lee
It either works or it doesn't. It's that safe. Acupuncture is a unicorn because it does not cause adverse effect. If you say ah bleeding, bruises, discomfort, is that an adverse effect?

00:58:32.98
David Lee
Or is it just something that's uncomfortable, but it's just not a problem over time? because it heals. Even when people are taking blood thinners or those who are prone to blood, I think you call it thrombosis, the blood coagulating.

00:58:52.95
David Lee
Even so, acupuncture does not increase more coagulating or it does not increase more bruise or bruise or bleeding because they're taking blood thinners.

00:59:04.92
David Lee
Okay, so acupuncture is that safe. It doesn't make anything worse. People don't go out with a headache, a bigger headache, where people don't go out with a bigger low back pain. Okay. So I think it's the ah the unknown of what acupuncture is, especially using different languages. And is this like, ah you know, like a spiritualism or is this like, what what does moving the energy mean? It's just so he so unclear. Okay.

00:59:33.88
David Lee
So there's a lot of mystery in it. And so then they go to their doctor and go, can I, should I get acupuncture? What is the doctor going to say? They have to tell the patient something because they should know everything. Right.

00:59:46.07
David Lee
And so that's a, one type of a barrier that the acupuncturist need to properly convey message to the public.

00:59:57.21
David Lee
And so far we have not because our language has been too poetic. Okay. Another reason is because our efficacy should be higher.

01:00:11.42
David Lee
It's good enough to be good. And therefore, it's known to the people that acupuncture is helpful.

01:00:22.71
David Lee
And it's quite yeah anecdotal, my friend, my family. But if you if you knew your family for that long, your friend for that long, and the in And that person swears acupuncture is helpful.

01:00:36.79
David Lee
And that is that is a data that's something not something to to listen in on. And but overall, acupuncturists need to have a higher efficacy in treating more variety of conditions, but more number of people.

01:00:58.78
David Lee
Let's say out of 100 people, acupuncture is good with 30 people. That's different from acupuncture is good for 70 people. It has to meet it the threshold of being, yeah, clearly acupuncture is good and it's here to stay. And I'm willing to try because there's a good possibility that I'm going to get better too.

01:01:21.62
David Lee
So then acupuncture as a whole has to do a better job than they're doing now.

01:01:39.21
Dustin Mesick
Colin, I can't hear you.

01:01:40.67
Dr Colin Goodwin
Is there anything else you wanted to wrap up with?

01:01:43.74
Dustin Mesick
um Well, I think that this has been a great conversation. And I think that our our listeners are going to really enjoy ah listening to you.

01:01:49.01
David Lee
Mm-hmm.

01:01:53.40
Dustin Mesick
And hopefully they'll have, they'll be more open to trying acupuncture for, you know, their treatment management. Because, you know, cancer is a really, cancer is a really exhausting process.

01:02:07.12
Dustin Mesick
Jason Lassen, experience for most patients so to know that there's something out there that can really help them it's I think it's it's great. Lassen, Colin what about you anything you want to add.

01:02:19.28
Dr Colin Goodwin
Just want to thank you for being here.

01:02:21.91
David Lee
Well, I thank you. I feel honored.

01:02:24.44
Dustin Mesick
Jason Thank you, dr Lee.

01:02:25.56
David Lee
Okay.