The latest buzzword in veterinary medicine is “evidence based medicine.”  Whenever I see it I cuss and sputter. The implication is that any treatment that hasn’t been tested through multiple double blind studies published in big journals isn’t valid.

I don’t care if I don’t understand the scientific reasoning behind the treatments I use. If they work in my hands for my clients then I don’t care if elves riding unicorns sprinkling fairy dust out of their horns is the cause.  (Actually that would be very cool!)

Besides, most of the people screaming that everything needs to be evidence based don’t care how much evidence you show them. If it doesn’t fit their preconceived notion of proper medicine (read that as drugs) then all the evidence in the world won’t appease them.

Thousands of studies on acupuncture published in Chinese?  Doesn’t count.

Histories of effective use of specific herbal formulas for hundreds of years?  Anecdotal

The fact that there are gazillions of Chinese people who are alive and well from these treatments?  Not relevant

At the beginning of this year the evidence based folks on a committee overseeing continuing education credits revoked the approval for many of the holistic veterinary medicine courses in the U.S.  Nothing had changed in these previously approved courses. The board just didn’t like that they weren’t “evidence based.”  In retaliation the center that I studied acupuncture through made up a course called “Evidence Based Acupuncture.”  They told us about it the weekend of the final. At that point in my life I was responding to all new info by sticking my fingers in my ears and humming so I ignored it.

Then two days ago the sneaky little $%=&(s sent me an email. For all of us who took the spring acupuncture course and were therefore affected by the lack of CE approval, we can take the new course – FOR FREE.    It is 27 hours online.

Well, for free you just about have to, don’t you?  I’m supposed to get online access to it today. Smart of them to give us two weeks for our brains to recover from the stress of the final exams before reeling us back in. I was wondering what to my with myself between appointments now that I wasn’t studying nonstop. I guess I have my answer.