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Summary of Poor Ovarian reserve weekend seminar - What I took away
Intention Heals - There is always communication between two beings, even on an unconscious level. The deeper and thorough your experience and knowledge the more intention can be transmitted to the patient. One develops their intention through confidence. The more confidence you have in treating a condition the greater your intention. You develop your confidence (INTENTION) by learning a system of diagnosis and treating very well. (this is the tag line of Pro D - Knowledge*Confidence*Success (Intention)
Poor ovarian reserve - It is not only an age factor. There are are many other factors that can cause poor egg quality and high FSH that are not related to age and these variables can be reversed and hence improve egg quality and lower FSH. Egg quality is determined by how genes are expressed and the quality of the follicular recruitment process. We can affect gene expression and follicular recruitment through diet, nutrition, lifestyle and appropriately choosing acupuncture and herbs. Thus we can cheat nature some and turn back time in creating better egg quality.
It takes time to heal - It is unrealistic to expect to change egg quality in 3 months. (yes, so many of our web sites say we need to treat for 3 months). As per Brandon (which comes from any western physiology of text book) "if your very first treatment corrects everything in your patient- completely "cures" her then the impact on her egg quality from that one treatment will not fully show up for 4 months. Considering our treatments (acupuncture, herbs, supplements, etc) with the patient's cooperation (diet, lifestyle, deep relaxation) can easily take 3-6 months to treat the pattern and the "disease" and then follicular recruitment from primary follicle to dominant follicle is about 4 months then you are looking at at least 6 months for a change in egg quality. It really hit home about the time required when Brandon left me with the following thought. If after 7-10 months egg quality has improved you still need a year to see fi you have really affected her fertility. If a woman comes to you with a DX of poor egg quality or poor ovarian reserve and then 7-10 moths later you have helped return her egg quality/ovarian reserve then as a fertile woman she would need to be trying for at least one year to be considered infertile. Basically, to judge out TCM treatment we also need that one year of trying for a pregnancy. For those not doing IVF, the math is about 10 months of treating and waiting for egg quality to change before an IVF. Those trying naturally the match is the same 10 months then 12 months for trying. About 22 months or close to 2 years for natural and one year for IVF.
Testing your treatment - One can use intention/communication in a treatment by testing the acupuncture points while patient is on the table by checking the pulses and abdominal points to see if there is a positive change with your point selection. Basically, the patient and you should be able to see some positive change (release of blockage) during the treatment.
The following points come from my fellow colleagues at Acubalance.
Treatment plan for poor ovarian reserve
1. Remove blockages
2. Clear heat (toxins)
3. Tonify/Nourish
-Mercury can negative affect egg quality
-Garlic helps detoxify mercury
-Do not remove mercury to close to a planned pregnancy (IVF)
-Dioxin in meat blocks FSH receptors (another reason than age causing high FSH and poor egg quality)
Too much of a good thing can be a bad thing - We know this from our basic TCM studies. So many of our patients are self medicating plus many of us practitioners are giving multiple western supplements on top of what they are taking. We can easily put them out of balance and negatively impact egg quality if they are actually not deficient in a nutrient. Maybe those of us not trained as naturopaths or in functional medicine should leave western supplement prescribing to the experts. Those that can test the blood and hair analysis may be best suited.
It was great to learn how there is scientific literature out there that supports that there are many other factors that contribute to egg quality other than age. And that these are reversible. The human body is a natural system and you can not rush it and expect to reverse your patient's poor ovarian reserve in only 3 months.
Thank you for sharing your clinical experience Brandon and Wendy.
Joined: 2007-05-08