for acupuncture students, alumni, faculty & friends — sponsored by AIMC Berkeley

Are you interested in a western herbal elective at AIMC???

I am currently designing a western herbal course for the school. I am really excited to work with this body of knowledge in this context! It would go 1-2 hours for the course of a trimester and would cover topics such as the following:
1) Western herbal terminology
2) Several aspects of herbs, (constituents, actions, indications, medicinal prep, food prep, energetics, dosage, etc.), divided by actions and/or body system
3) Proper usage of these herbs
4) Cautions/contraindications/side effects
5) Medicine making techniques,
6) Good quality sources for western herbal medicine or medicine making supplies

The course may include medicine making days and an optional field trip to a semi-local medicine making facility. The main objective of the course would be to introduce the student to a number of popular and/or local medicinal plants, to enable the student to incorporate them into their practice, and to teach basic medicine making skills popularly used in western herbology.

As for my background, I have been a western herbalist for about 6 years. I studied with Gail Julian at the Western School of Herbal Medicine in Forestville, CA for 2 years as well as with Adam Seller for about a 6 month period in Oakland. Additionally, I managed the supplement department and worked as a practitioner at Elephant Pharmacy. Currently and for the past 3 years, I have worked as an educator, conducting staff trainings and store presentations for Herb Pharm.

I would like to get an idea of who’s interested, to get an idea of whether this is a desired aspect of an integrative medicine education. If this interests you, please post a response and include a couple days and am, pm, or midday to give me an idea of what time works for the most people.

If you have any questions or suggestions that you prefer not to post here, please email me at dzdreamer@gmail.com.

Thanks!!!
Dawn Zaft

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Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Chris Kresser on February 25, 2009 at 9:08am: I am definitely interested, particularly in using herbs that can be/are grown locally with sustainable methods. Please keep us posted.; ▶ Reply to This

Permalink Reply by Dawn on February 25, 2009 at 8:58pm: Hey Chris- I'm really glad you're interested. I figured out some of the logistics with Benjamin today. The elective is going to be on Fridays from 9-11am and will be a 2 unit course. I hope that might work for you- I would really like to have your energy and knowledge as a part of the class. As for the use of local herbs, I will be covering as much of that as possible- local and commonly used. Currently, I am working on designing an optional field trip to the Sonoma County Herb Exchange and Simplers Botanicals, both in Sebastopol. I really want to offer an opportunity to see some of the more sustainable uses of herbs. That's so important and right at our fingertips!; ▶ Reply to This

Permalink Reply by Chris Kresser on February 26, 2009 at 7:21am: That actually is a possibility for me. I can't commit for sure yet, since I have a very full schedule next term. But thanks for making this available.

Question: what text will we be using? I have Jeremy Ross's book and it's excellent, because it covers how to use western herbs with TCM diagnostics. Very valuable.; ▶ Reply to This

Permalink Reply by Dawn on February 26, 2009 at 10:14am: David recommended that book, but I am not familiar and it's very expensive. I'll probably incorporate it as a reference text. As for a required text, I'm hesitant to use anything. I am going to make weekly handouts and copies of each weeks power point presentation, I think. The weekly presentation is a compilation of info from about 6 sources. I am using some websites as well as books to pull the info from, especially for modern and clinical research. I will be putting almost all of my herbal books on reserve in the library as well, and I'm hoping the school will kick down for an academic membership to the American Botanical Council. That membership would allow us all to access a lot of modern/clinical research as well as read the on-line Herbal Gram, a western herbal magazine. I think it would be a useful tool in both the library and the clinic. We could print current info out for patients.

In the meantime, I'm going to make a point to check out Jeremy Ross's book. What is your opinion of the Peter Holmes books? Some are not so fond of them- do you have any input?; ▶ Reply to This

Permalink Reply by Chris Kresser on February 26, 2009 at 10:18am: I've only glanced through the Holmes books when I was deciding what to buy (between Tierra, Holmes & Ross). I ended up with the Ross book, and I'm very satisfied. I like it much better than any other book I've seen on herbs - including the Bensky and Chen books on Chinese herbs and formulas.

Perhaps the school could be convinced at least to get a copy of the Ross book for the library. The reason I think it's so important and helpful is that it allows us (as students and future practitioners of Chinese medicine) to fit western herbs into the holistic framework of diagnosis and prescription we are already familiar with.

This is just my experience. I still want/need to learn a lot more about the western herbs themselves, and that's the main reason I'd be interested in taking the class.; ▶ Reply to This

Permalink Reply by Deborah Corrente on February 25, 2009 at 10:20pm: Dawn,

I would be very interested. Please let me know more as it comes about.

Thank you,
Debbie; ▶ Reply to This

Permalink Reply by Dawn on February 26, 2009 at 10:16am: Benjamin is going to put it on the schedule on Fridays from 9-11am. I really hope you will be able to attend!; ▶ Reply to This