Most people begin their study of martial arts from some type of Eastern martial art tradition.  Many students would have seen their Master, Sifu or Sensei treat their fellow student’s injuries from training and sparring.  What they witnessed was usually called Kung Fu Medicine, in actuality it was a form of Traditional Sports Medicine. Injuries in martial arts belong to the specialization of Dit Da Medicine (Cantonese for Fall and Hit), which is the common name for traditional Traumatology.  In this area of Traditional Oriental Medicine, muscles, sinew (tendons & ligaments) and bones injuries are repaired and rehabilitated through a combination of ancient physical medicine modalities such as acupuncture, massage, bone-setting and topical herbal medicine.  Herbal liniments and plasters are used to improve healing of bruises to the skin and muscle, or to mend torn/injured sinew.  Sometimes internal medicinal teas are combined to help mend sinew and bone injuries from the inside out.

 

Common Martial Arts injuries

 

Groin strains are common in kicking oriented martial arts such as Muay Thai, Tae Kwon Do and Karate.  But sometimes they are injured not from kicks, but from sudden quick changes in direction when the muscle is still in contraction and not in full extension.  A groin strain typically involves the adductor longus muscle in the inside of the legs.  In classical acupuncture the points Liver-10 and Liver-11 are the two pressure points that lie directly over the adductor longus muscle, which are needled to improve healing, relieve spasm and improve performance of this muscle.

 

 

 

Rotator cuff muscles are commonly injured in grapplers that practice Brazilian Jiu Jitsu and Mixed Martial Arts.  For instance in the Kimura lock, where the shoulder is forcefully internally rotated with the forearm brought behind the body, the infraspinatus muscle and teres minor muscles are over-stretched.  The classical acupuncture point Small Intestine-11 located over the shoulder blade is powerful pressure point used to alleviate many different kinds of rotator cuff related injuries.

 

 

 

 

 

Contemporary Medical Acupuncture and Traditional Sports Medicine

 

I have a personal interest in the martial arts, particularly internal styles, Taoist martial arts and both European and Chinese swordsmanship.  As an acupuncturist and practitioner of Chinese herbal medicine, naturally I wanted to bridge my two interests by providing medical and rehabilitative service to my fellow martial artists (Mention you are an active martial artist and receive 15% discount in our acupuncture services).

 

Motivated by this sense of martial righteousness and recognizing that there are few acupuncturists that focus on martial arts injuries, I completed the Contemporary Medical Acupuncture program offered through the McMaster University Medical School, to add a scientific sports medicine based approach to my traditional training in classical acupuncture and Chinese herbal medicine.  Therefore my approach is a hybrid between Western scientific neuro-muscular sports medicine and traditional Eastern natural sports medicine.

 

Our clinic makes our own herbal poultices for the initial inflammatory stage of a traumatic injury.  We use YunNanBaiYao (a century old recipe) to stop bleeding and help close cuts and lacerated wounds.  Once the inflammation or bleeding is controlled, we have herbal Sprain/Strain Creams, Tendon Relaxing Tinctures and Trauma Tinctures that we combine with massage and acupuncture to improve circulation to the site of injury to bring about a speedy recovery.  Sometimes people come to me for past injuries to reduce the scar tissues that are preventing them from their full range of motion or preventing them from strengthening certain muscle groups.

 

If you are interested in Acupuncture and Traditional Sports Medicine, then I suggest you pick up the book A Tooth From The Tiger’s Mouth, by Tom Bisio.  This book is becoming the definitive standard introductory book for the treatment of martial arts related injuries.

 

If you have any question about whether my approach to treating martial arts injuries is right for you, you can contact my clinic to arrange a complimentary 15 minute assessment.  I would be happy to answer any questions.