Acupuncture Services for Veterans

Acupuncture Services for Veterans

As a Community Care Provider through the VA, Family Tree Acupuncture is able to treat authorized veterans as part of their health benefits. Veterans can request our services through their Primary Care Provider or specialist at the VA and name “Family Tree Acupuncture” as their preferred provider.

Our team has extensive experience providing acupuncture to veterans and addressing their unique needs. From 2012 through 2019 we hosted a weekly veterans clinic at our office where we provided thousands of free treatments to hundreds of veterans. As a Community Care provider with the VA, we’ve been able to continue to offer access to acupuncture to veterans suffering from pain, headaches & migraines, insomnia, stress, anxiety, and many other health issues.

The video below was taken from the documentary, Escape Fire, and gives a clear and thorough depiction of how acupuncture is currently being used in the US Military:

According to Col. Arnyce Pock, Medical Director for the Air Force Medical Corps, acupuncture comes without the side effects that are common after taking traditional painkillers.

“It allows [some] troops to reduce the number of narcotics they take for pain,” Pock said. While Pock admits that it’s not a cure-all in every case, “it can be another tool in one’s toolbox to be used in addition to painkillers to reduce the level of pain even further.”

Raul Rojas, a participant in a similar acupuncture clinic for veterans in New Mexico has found great value in this burgeoning program and states, “I believe that because of the acupuncture treatments I have become calmer and my anxiety level has drastically come down. I’m able to sleep more restfully and longer and without nightmares or flashbacks. Acupuncture is helping me get my life back.”

Paul J. Suchcicki: Our Hero and Inspiration

Maggie’s grandfather, Paul J. Suchcicki, was a staff sergeant member of the US Air Force and a gunner with the 93rd Bomb Group, 2nd Air Division, 8th Air Force during World War II. On February 24th, 1945, his B-24J liberator aircraft led a raid on the Misburg refinery near Hanover, Germany. When their plane was hit by enemy flak, causing engine failure, he and his 11 crew members were forced to bail. They parachuted safely into a small village in Holland but were quickly captured by German soldiers and transported to a prison camp in Moosberg, Germany, 45 minutes outside Munich. In a written account of his experience, my grandfather said:

“The trip [by box car] took a couple of days. We didn’t know if we were to be exterminated or where we were headed. There was standing room only, and we had to take turns sitting and lying down.

 

[At the Mossberg prisoner of war camp,] the marches were very tough. It was freezing rain and sleeping on the ground. Marching day and night, almost in your sleep. Dysentery was terrible, and the lack of food for strength made it hard to keep going on. We had on light clothing, which meant we were always freezing cold and wet a lot of the time. We didn’t ever take our boots off or we knew we would never get them back on from our feet swelling so bad…the marching seemed to go on forever.

 

While we were marching, we were [mistakenly] attacked by our own planes. A lot of guys were killed during these attacks. Today, if I hear a low flying plane overhead, I duck and think of the attacks when we were marching, and [about] the guys who were hit and didn’t make it back. I also dream about this at night and have to be awakened and reminded I am not there, but at home in a safe place. This is not easy for a wife to deal with.”

My grandfather spent his 21st birthday in the Mossberg prisoner of war camp and was released on April 30th, 1945, when the 14th Armored Division liberated the camp. All told, the camp held 110,000 Allied prisoners of war.

“Scenes of the wildest rejoicing accompanied the tanks as they crashed through the double 10-foot wire fences of the prison camps. There were Norwegians, Brazilians, French, Poles, Dutch, Greeks, Rumanians, and Bulgars. There were Americans, Russians, Serbs, Italians, New Zealanders, South Africans, Australians, British, and Canadians – men from every nation fighting the Nazis. There were officers and men. Twenty-seven Russian Generals, sons of four American Generals. There were men and women in the prison camps …. There were men of every rank and branch of service, war correspondents, and radio men.”                             ~ “The history of the 14th Armored Division” by Joseph Carter.

My grandfather received a Purple Heart “for wounds received in action on 24 February 1945, in the European Area” and a POW Medal.

Although exposure to trauma has been part of the human condition since we’ve evolved as species, it wasn’t until 1980 that the American Psychiatric Association brought recognition to Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) by adding it to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders. As a result, veterans of war before this time did not have as many resources available to them as there are today to understand and treat symptoms of PTSD.

Despite the physical and emotional trauma my grandfather endured while serving his country; he was a gentle, lighthearted, thoughtful, creative, funny, and honest man throughout his life. His love was unconditional, and when I decided to pursue Chinese medicine, he offered to be my first patient. At the time, he was dealing with symptoms of Parkinson’s disease. He died in 2007 at the age of 86, before I had the chance to complete my acupuncture training. If he were alive today, he would have been first in line at the grand opening of Family Tree Acupuncture in Daytona Beach.

Our free veteran’s clinic is dedicated to my brave grandfather. May his spirit fill this room and help bring a sense of peace to every person who walks through these doors.

Family Tree Acupuncture Can Help You Enjoy a Pain-Free Life

 

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About Family Tree Acupuncture

Acupuncture and Chinese Medicine in Daytona Beach, FL

Since 2012, Family Tree Acupuncture has provided Chinese medicine in historic downtown Daytona Beach, Florida. Our services include acupuncture, herbal medicine, therapeutic massage, moxibustion, gua sha, cupping therapy, and nutritional and lifestyle counseling.

One of the many unique aspects of Family Tree is that our practitioners thrive on collaboration. By seeing more than one practitioner over the course of your treatment plan, you’ll get the best of what each of our experts has to offer while experiencing seamless, gold-star quality healthcare. Our clinic is patient-centered, which means that our practitioners listen, give you ample time during your appointment, and expertly customize treatments using multiple modalities.

Our practitioners are Florida-licensed Acupuncture Physicians specializing in pain management, women’s health, fertility, headaches and migraines, depression, anxiety, stress, allergies, insomnia, muscle and nerve pain, hormonal imbalances, smoking cessation, weight loss, irritable bowel syndrome, fibromyalgia, stroke recovery, and much more.

We Accept Insurance

We would be happy to verify the details of your coverage prior to scheduling your first appointment.