Hanging the Acupuncture Shingle in a Small Mountain Town

by Tracy Rudnicki, LAc

If you are on of those people who likes to get outside and see the stars, trees and mountains, setting up an acupuncture practice outside of the city might be appealing to you. It may be a bit difficult if you plan to set up shop in a town where you have not previously lived. First of all, after you take the board exam, you have to wait to see if you passed it before you can put your listing in the phone book. Most phone books only come out once a year, so you may have to wait quite a while before you are listed in print. Luckily, there are plenty of ways to get your name out there on the internet.

Another challenge is getting to know the people in the town. Most of my patients come mainly from word of mouth and referrals. This means that once you are established, you will have a nice patient load, but starting out takes a while. In the mean time, it is crucial to join business organizations, like the Chamber of Congress or Rotary Club. The Chamber of Commerce will help with advertising, for example, and will often write articles about new businesses. I have been to many "mixers" to get my name out there. People in small towns do a lot of community service, and I try to be very involved in these events. For example, I volunteer with Disabled Sports USA Far West and teach skiing to people with various disabilities. I donate acupuncture treatments for their fundraisers as well as other groups, such as Tahoe Women's Services and the Humane Society.

I have written several articles about acupuncture and TCM for local newspapers and have done lectures at various schools. It is a good idea to hold seminars for people in the community on various various issues you see that are prevalent in the area. In Tahoe I see mainly younger patients with sports injuries and women with infertility issues, but I don't limit the types of patients that I treat. I see people with sleep issues, stress, digestive problems, cancer and many others.

I do take insurance so that patients who may not normally be able to afford acupuncture on a regular basis have the opportunity for treatment. I do not necessarily recommend accepting insurance because it is a lot of extra work, but it does help to promote you when you are first starting your practice. If you do, I highly recommend taking an insurance billing seminar to learn proper billing procedures and you will want to purchase software to complete the forms.

Where I live, I rarely see tourists as patients. Some tourists will call me if they want to stay on their treatment plan and are going to be in town for a while or if they get injured while they are here. Many of my patients have second homes in Lake Tahoe and will come during the months they are in town. This takes a bit of getting used to because you may not hear from patients until the following year, even though--more often than not--they will come back to you. The other strange thing about living in a town with a heavy tourist population is that locals tend to go on vacation during the "low season," resulting in fairly drastic lulls in my practice during spring and fall. This is when you should go on vacation or go to one of the AAAOM conferences to take advantage of your free time. Speaking of free time, in Tahoe, Mother Nature will provide this as well. I will often get a lot of cancellations on snow days due to the road conditions. If all of my appointments cancel for the day, then I get to go skiing. You'd be amazed at how many patients who felt reluctant to drive to your office will make it to the ski resort that day!

When you are looking into setting up a practice, it is important to check the size of the population and see how many acupuncturists already practice in the area. Obviously, the more practitioners, the more competition--but it is also a good way for you to get treatments for yourself.

It is also a good idea to see if there is a local hospital and make contact with the doctors there. This is an excellent way to get referrals as well as finding who to refer your patients to as well.

Tracy Rudnicki Biography
Ten days after completing my Master of Arts in Recreation Administration, I found myself on a plane heading to Osaka, Japan to teach English. At that point, I honestly had no idea what I wanted to do with my career. I knew from previous experiences overseas that living in Japan would be a great opportunity to live in another culture, study another language, meet a lot of new friends, and travel.

I had no idea how much my experiences there would influence the direction of my life’s path. Several of my students had careers in medicine, although, the most intriguing of them all was Shintaro, a fifth generation acupuncturist. We talked extensively about Oriental medicine and how the people in his family had been treating patients with acupuncture for well over 150 years. All the different types of conditions that could be treated with acupuncture and herbal medicine amazed me. At one point, I asked Shintaro if he thought he could help me treat a neck injury that I had for six years. He felt my neck and told me that it was “very bad, but he would try“. Six acupuncture treatments later, my pain had vanished. The idea of putting a few needles in my body to alleviate chronic neck pain fascinated me. It seemed to be a miracle and very unlike anything I had experienced with western medicine.

After much deliberation and meditation, I decided I wanted a career that would help people. I thought about becoming a western medical doctor but found that I was drawn more toward Oriental medicine due to my recent experiences with it. I felt compelled to share these experiences with others. I applied to Meiji College of Oriental Medicine in Berkeley, CA, which is the sister school to the one my acupuncturist went to in Kyoto, Japan. (Meiji has since changed its name to Acupuncture and Integrative Medicine College of Berkeley.)

While attending school full time, I also worked two to three days a week in a Chinese herb shop and volunteered in my professor’s acupuncture clinics to gain as much knowledge as possible. When I was in school, I also joined and participated in three professional Chinese Medical Associations organizations to learn about the political side of my profession as well as keep up to date with the latest research and publications. I am still very active in these organizations.

I graduated with an MS in Oriental Medicine from Acupuncture and Integrative Medicine College of Berkeley. I have been working as an acupuncturist and Chinese herbalist in Tahoe, California for five years now.

Three years ago, I went back to Japan for a month with Rotary International on the Group Study Exchange program, which gave me the opportunity to visit various acupuncture clinics and hospitals and meet many different health care professionals. I was also asked to lecture at universities and acupuncture schools during my time there. I feel fortunate to have had such an extremely valuable learning experience.

I enjoy many outdoor activities like skiing, mountain biking, rock climbing, white water rafting, SCUBA diving, swimming, and hiking.