Andy Rosenfarb - Healing Your Eyes with Chinese Medicine: Acupuncture, Acupressure, & Chinese Herbs

Copyright 2007 by Andy Rosenfarb. All rights reserved. No portion of this book, except for brief review, may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any meanselectronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwisewithout the written permission of the publisher. For information contact North Atlantic Books.

Published by
North Atlantic Books
P.O. Box 12327
Berkeley, California 94712

Healing Your Eyes with Chinese Medicine: Acupuncture, Acupressure, and Chinese Herbs is sponsored by the Society for the Study of Native Arts and Sciences, a nonprofit educational corporation whose goals are to develop an educational and cross-cultural perspective linking various scientific, social, and artistic fields; to nurture a holistic view of arts, sciences, humanities, and healing; and to publish and distribute literature on the relationship of mind, body, and nature.

North Atlantic Books publications are available through most bookstores. For further information, visit our website at www.northatlanticbooks.com or call 800-733-3000.

MEDICAL DISCLAIMER: The following information is intended for general information purposes only. Individuals should always see their health care provider before administering any suggestions made in this book. Any application of the material set forth in the following pages is at the readers discretion and is his or her sole responsibility.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Rosenfarb, Andy, 1972
Healing your eyes with Chinese medicine : acupuncture, acupressure, and chinese herbs / Andy Rosenfarb.
p. cm.
eISBN: 978-1-58394-469-1
1. Vision disordersTreatment. 2. Low visionTreatment. 3. Retinal degenerationTreatment.
4. Medicine, Chinese. I. Title.
RE51.R68 2006
617.71206dc22 20060359961

v3.1

This book is dedicated to my father Sam Rosenfarb,
my greatest teacher, who guided me toward
acupuncture and Chinese medicine.

M Y EDUCATION AND UNDERSTANDING of nutrition and Western supplementation are based on the work of Marc Grossman. Thank you for your years of research and dedication.

I would like to offer special thanks to Per Otte for teaching me special acupuncture methods for degenerative vision loss. These methods are the nuts and bolts of cutting-edge acupuncture for progressive vision loss.

To my teachers at Pacific College of Oriental Medicine in San Diego and at Zhejiang College of Traditional Chinese Medicine in China, thank you for sharing your extensive knowledge and expertise. I would especially like to thank Dr. J. Min Fan, Greg Bantick, and Steve Levitt for sharing your great insights and clinical applications with me.

Most importantly, I thank my friends and family, who have been my guiding light. Gina, David, and Dalton, thank you for all the love and greatness you share with me every day of our lives.

T HE WORLD IS CHANGING . Our concepts of Western medicine have shifted in recent decades, and the public is demanding much more of our health care providers. The reductionist method of referring each symptom to the domain of a particular specialist, isolated from the whole person, is being replaced slowly with more complementary forms of health care like acupuncture. We are beginning to look at the whole person, his or her dietary preferences, exercise regimens, types of relationships, as well as the particular symptoms that brought them in for treatment in the first place.

We believe that our eyesight does not happen in a vacuum. Rather it has its roots in our total being, our genetic makeup, the food we eat, our work environment and exposure to airborne toxins, as well as our general belief systems about ourselves and the world we live in. Each of us is unique and literally takes the world in through our senses, primarily vision; moreover, the way we take in the world is, to some degree, a reflection of who we are and which symptoms we might manifest.

Using the theories of Traditional Chinese Medicine, this book addresses a wide array of visual problems from myopia to macular degeneration and glaucoma. It will offer a bridge where Western medicine and complementary medicine can come together to help people keep their precious gift of sight.

The body does not work as a series of parts in isolation, but as a whole, dynamically integrated living system. Every cell in the body has receptors for neurotransmitters, so in a real sense every cell is a nerve cell. We do not see with our eyes or think with our brains, but rather live in a minding body. This biological awareness of every cell is really the foundation of visionthe ability to derive meaning and to direct action based on patterns of electromagnetic stimuli that we call light.

The skin of the entire body is covered with tiny electric eyes known in Chinese medicine as acupuncture points. Each is a window of heightened sensitivity of the organism to its energetic environment.

This book is intended to be used as a practical manual to help to understand the eye and vision more comprehensively. Chapters are devoted to eye disorders such as glaucoma, macular degeneration, retinitis pigmentosa, and many more.

As an optometrist for more than twenty-five years, I see Andy Rosenfarb as one of the emerging leaders in complementary and innovative approaches to vision care. His zest for learning and integrating the ancient traditions of eye care with modern scientific knowledge of the body and the eyes is a great contribution to the emerging paradigm of twenty-first-century vision care.

Marc Grossman, OD, LAc
Author of Natural Eye Care, Greater Vision,
and Magic Eye, Beyond 3D

M Y INTEREST IN STUDYING and helping people with degenerative eye conditions began in 1994 when I was an acupuncture student at Pacific College of Oriental Medicine in San Diego, California. As a result of the intense reading, writing, and studying, my eyesight was noticeably deteriorating.

I began a program of self-treatment using acupuncture, followed by a routine screening by my optometrist. The eye exam revealed that the astigmatism in both of my eyes had been corrected. The optometrist was astounded, and questioned me on what I had been doing. I explained that my eyes had been feeling tired and blurry, and that I was getting regular headaches from studying. I had been using acupuncture to try to help with these symptoms, and as a result the health of my eyes had noticeably improved.

As I started my professional practice of acupuncture and Chinese medicine, I took on a few cases of degenerative eye conditions including glaucoma, cataracts, diabetic retinopathy, retinitis pigmentosa, Stargardt Macular Dystrophy (aka Stargardts), and macular degeneration. Some cases were mild, and some were severe (legally blind). I found that I became rather disappointed that the condition of most patients was not improving with our treatment. A few patients showed some minor improvement, but nothing I did led to significant improvement.

Frustrated, I sought the aid of colleagues who had reported success with treating eye conditions. For the most part, everyone seemed to have the same classic acupuncture point combinations, herbs, supplements, and eye exercises. I found them to have a minimal effect.

One day I was reading a health magazine and came across a report about an acupuncturist in Arkansas who was treating people with various degenerative eye diseases, and claiming to have excellent results. Of course I called to find out what his method was. The long and short of that story is that I would have to wait three years before I would train with him. I traveled to his clinic and was amazed at the success rate and the overwhelmingly positive responses given by each patient I spoke with.