Contemporary Acupuncture Continuing education to enhance contemporary chiropractic Michael Prebeg, DC, is a senior clinical instructor with the McMaster CMAP. He is a chiropractor at Athlete’s Care in Toronto and a consulting chiropractor for the Toronto Maple Leafs and the Toronto Blue Jays. H Anthony Lombardi, DC, is a senior clinical instructor with the McMaster CMAP. He is the owner/clinic director of Ham- ilton Back Clinic, where muscle and joint-related pain is treated using a multimodal approach. ow many chiropractors can predict, with certainty, what our practice environ- ment will look like 10 to 15 years into the future? Imagine for a moment travelling back in time, perhaps 100 years or so, and envisioning the mosaic of chiropractic techniques and procedures that we currently have available to us. It would have been more than daunting! In fact, it would have been an impossible task for our forefathers to imagine the current scope and direction of chiropractic practice. As practising chiropractors, it is equally difficult for us to know what lies ahead, as the chiropractic paradigm unfolds into the future. When we enrolled into our respective chiropractic colleges, it never crossed our minds that acupuncture would be a part of our day-to-day chiropractic practices. Even more surprising would have been the thought that we would, someday, be sharing our coupled clinical chiropractic and acupuncture experience as lecturers and clinical instructors in the post-graduate division of one of Canada’s leading institutions and that we would be responsible for educating medical doctors, dentists, chiropractors, physiotherapists and other regulated health professionals in Contemporary Acupuncture. The two themes that have taken our careers into this direction are the themes of this article; the current research and the evidence-based practice of acupunc- ture and continuing education. The current research surrounding acupuncture and the importance of evidence-based practice have been the two factors that have taken our careers into the direction of becoming educators in Contemporary Acupuncture. David Salanki, DC, is a senior clinical instructor with the McMaster CMAP. He runs a rehab-based chiropractic practice, integrating contem- porary acupuncture, in Port Colborne, Ont. THE NEED FOR PRACTICAL CONTINUING EDUCATION For all of us, working in today’s competitive and complex health-care environment makes continuing education much more than a mere administrative requirement by our licensing board. It is both an ethical and a professional duty we acquired the day we joined the ranks of committed, contemporary chiropractors practising in an evidence-based manner. We all experience, in our early years in practice, the excitement and enrichment that comes whenever we are exposed to new knowledge, a new chiropractic technique system or a new practice management tool. It is true that these experiences are exciting as they enrich our intellectual universe, but soon after we implement many of these so-called “clinical truths,” reality often sets in and offers a harsh way to evaluate – and fail – many of our theoretical approaches and techniques. Being frustrated by those patients who can’t be helped with all of the varied chiropractic techniques that we have available – despite our best-intentioned interven- tions – we have no choice but to challenge, and expand, our knowledge, and to look for new tools to be able to offer effective help to those who put their trust in us and our skills. Even though each of us had a very different kind of practice – from sports injuries, MVAs and subluxation-based practice – all of us felt, at some point, the imperative to have a more effective tool with which to treat pain and musculoskeletal dysfunction. Then, somehow, we all found our way into the McMaster University Contemporary Acupuncture Program, and we have remained associated with it ever since. After our extremely successful experience with integrating contemporary acupunc- ture into our very different chiropractic practices, we all can state that continuing education programs of a practical nature – offered by reputable teaching institutions – are the most cost-effective way of accessing new knowledge and developing new skills. Continued on Page 41 30 • CANADIAN CHIROPRACTOR | DECEMBER 2007 www.canadianchiropractor.ca David Salanki, DC Anthony Lombardi, DC Michael Prebeg, DC feature
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