My name is Dr. Tom Ingegno, DACM, LASC, MSOM. I’ve had my own Acupuncture practice since 2001 and began my Acupuncture training in 1998 - which seems like a lifetime ago!

I’ve watched acupuncture get referred to as “New Age”, “Alternative”, “Complementary”, and most recently ”Integrative”. Each new term seems to give Acupuncture and Traditional East Asian medicine more respect, which I’m ecstatic to see.

Acupuncture as a formalized system dates back at least 2,700 years, but mentionings of “needle therapy” go back as far as 9,000 years. In addition, modern research has backed up many of the benefits of acupuncture that practitioners have known for eons.

What makes our Baltimore Acupuncture Clinic different? Truthfully, there are more reasons than these, but I’d like to touch on a few that I feel make Charm City Integrative Health really stand out.

1) No “New Age-y” Spin

Acupuncture is and has always been a MEDICAL system. East Asian Medicine can be seen as a long-term study of how the body functions. It has cultivated a body of knowledge over thousands of years of looking for patterns given various signs and symptoms.

However, acupuncture became lumped in with New Age and occult practices as it made its way to the western world. Yes, traditional monks and nuns ran hospitals, but it should be looked at as no different than going to a Catholic hospital to receive medical care. No one will convert you and the service you get does not require or even ask you to subscribe to specific beliefs.

While I’m not knocking, practices like tarot, singing bowls, and physic readings. Lumping East Asian Medicine into them detracts from this scientific method of observation that all the previous practitioners strove to accumulate and systematize.

2) Continue to Learn and Grow

Acupuncturists, especially those of us in the west, have the ability to study many different classical styles as practitioners of most styles make their way to the US to settle or at least teach.

We love learning about classic systems. On the same hand, we also read and study modern research about acupuncture. Personally, I find it amazing that modern research often explains what classical writing knew thousands of years ago. We have language that westerns can understand that helps bridge the gap between “smoothing the flow of Qi and moving Blood” and regulating the autonomic nervous system to put the body into a state of rest and digest.

3) Clearly Outline Both the Modern and Classical Effects of Acupuncture

Being able to explain what Qi is in modern terms and how acupuncture triggers a cascade of physiological changes to help your body heal, balance your emotions and deal with physical, mental, and emotional issues in an easily understandable way is one of the reasons we have so many patients that are western medical professionals. It is also why so many MDs, PAs, NPs, and others trust referring their patients to our clinic.

4) Combine Health Treatment Modalities

If you look at a list of services, you will see we offer many therapies. Acupuncture was the cornerstone of our clinic and we decided to bring other traditional and modern services that all offer some of the benefits of acupuncture via different interventions. Yes Baltimore, acupuncture is the reason all these other services exist in our space.

5) All of Our Services Complement Each Other

I have created the term “therapeutic health stacks”. Acupuncture can be paired with any and all of the other services, but depending on what you need as a patient we can combine specific health stacks that address your unique needs. We’ve done our best to make it easy for you by offering pre-made health stacks, but love to work with patients to put together custom plans, whether or not they include acupuncture treatments.