Canadian Conference on Acupuncture and Natural Healing July
To CMAAC Members
In the past January edition of the CMAAC newsletter, the Acupuncture and Traditional Chinese Medicine Association of Nova Scotia and the Canadian College of Acupuncture and Traditional Chinese Medicine (CCATCM) with the support of the Chinese Medicine and Acupuncture Association of Canada were proud to announce the first annual Canadian Conference on Acupuncture and Natural Healing July 9th and 10th, 2011, to be held at CCATCM, 1306 Bedford Highway, in Halifax, Nova Scotia.
Since then the Conference has made major strides in setting its agenda and attracting major keynote speakers, seminar leaders and support.
The Conference focus is on cancer and integrative medicine. Right now the Canadian Medical Association is pushing for health-care reform through a series of public forums. The Conference is providing complementary medicine and supporters of integrative medicine their own forum on tomorrow’s medicine and how it could work for cancer care.
The Conference presents a number of important firsts:
· *It is the first event to bring the natural healing abilities of complementary therapies and conventional medicine together to explore synergies in cancer care and wellness in an open round table forum.
· *The forum will look at the future of cancer care and medical reform from an integrative, patient-centered perspective
· *The round table will strive to include educators, researchers, health-care practitioners, care workers, government and cancer survivors. The round table discussion will be open to questions from the public.
· *The long-term Conference goal will be to envision the medicine of tomorrow, and gain input into it.
· *All profits will go into a special scholarship fund to promote the use of natural therapies and to advance the integration of complementary and conventional medicine.
· *It is inviting all acupuncture associations and practitioners across Canada to contribute to its focus on cancer care by providing their research and clinical experiences.
· *It is the first opportunity for all complementary medical practitioners to come together to learn from each other through our 15 seminars (participants get to choose to take 5 of the 15), and the presentations of our 3 keynote speakers
· *The keynote speakers will include medical doctors and doctors of TCM with a special guest from Guangzhou Chinese Medicine University (GCMU), China who will discuss cancer research in China
· *Another special guest from GCMU will speak on its masters and Phd. Programs for Canadian acupuncturists
If trends continue, medicine will be driven by the public’s’ need for diversity, choice and sustainability. It will integrate heroic, conventional medicine and caring, informative, natural medicine. It will combine the best of all worlds and focus on wellness and prevention as well as disease. It will work on the parts and the whole person. It will be both science and art. Acupuncture has an invaluable part to play. The Conference is a golden opportunity to show the public, government and the health-care system what acupuncture can contribute.
Dr. Diana Tong Li, Conference Co Chair
