Animal Acupuncture Academy
FAQs ( frequently asked questions)
What sort of time commitment is required to complete the course?
If you have perused the Prospectus you will have
seen that there is a lot of material to be covered. Around 155 lessons
in fact. Some lessons are relatively short and some are quite big.
There is no time limit imposed providing a student is making reasonable
efforts. We estimate that 15 hours per week average, should enable an
average student to complete the material in 18 months.
We are not a "Diploma Mill" where you pay your money and without doing
any study get a shiny but worthless Diploma.The course material as you
will see is pretty comprehensive and we are committed to ensuring that
our graduates will be our best ambassadors. To this end we endeavour to
only select students who are determined to complete the course of study
and committed to outlay the effort required. We do not want students to
start the course and then grind to a halt.
The first 60 lessons of the course are probably the hardest as they lay
the foundations for an understanding of acupuncture which will enable
you to read the world literature and discuss acupuncture with
therapists around the world.
The next approximately 50 lessons deal with the nuts and bolts of small
animal acupuncture, ie the points, meridians, techniques, ailments and
how to treat them.
The final approximately 45 lessons are devoted to the horse where we
cover the points, meridians, techniques, ailments and how to treat them.
What fees do I get back if I decide that the course is too hard or I lose interest or want to withdraw from the course for what I consider to be a good reason?
FEES and WITHDRAWAL POLICY
This is a serious course of study and we make a serious commitment to you.
In return we expect a serious commitment from you. Unless you are serious about pursuing this course we would rather that you didn't enrol with us. If you do suffer changed circumstances then upon application you will be able to defer for a reasonable period. If you are having difficulties of any sort you are urged to contact the office and we will endeavour to assist you with your problems. Thats what we are committed to doing.
All
fees paid to Animal Acupuncture Academy are totally non-refundable
after 14 days and there are NO EXCEPTIONS to this rule. See
CANCELLATION POLICY statement in the prospectus.
You can choose payment options which provide for either substantial
discount or for limitation of your exposure. It is your choice.
(1)
Fees may be paid in 4 equal instalments. The first instalment must be
paid at the time of enrolment. Subsequent instalments will be required
after 25%, 50% and 75% of the course has been delivered. Should you
withdraw from the course you forfeit fees paid to date but you will not
be required to make further payments.See CANCELLATION POLICY statement
in the prospectus.
(2) If you wish to fully prepay the course fees you benefit from a 25%
discount, but if you withdraw from the course for any reason at any
time after enrolment, you forfeit the discounted fees paid. See
CANCELLATION POLICY statement in the prospectus.
(3) TRIAL OFFER. We understand that you may have reservations about
(a)
Your academic abilities to complete the course
(b)
Up-front payments of fees
(c)
Making a substantial financial investment.
(d)
Making a substantial personal commitment of time and effort.
Our special trial offer will address the above issues and allow you to fully experience our course, while limiting your financial investment to just $600 (+GST in Australia).
A Trial offer applies ONLY to FULL PRE-PAYMENT
options for the FULL COURSES (ie A, B, &C). It does not apply
to the DIY Course.
If you choose the trial offer, you will be provided access to the first
10 lessons of your chosen course in the same way as other students. If
you withdraw at any time during the trial period you are not refunded
any part of the trial offer fee, but you are under no further
obligation to proceed with the remainder of the course. When you have
finished the 10th lesson, you will have to option of
- Withdrawing from the course with no further obligations.
- Continuing the course by choosing payment method 2 above. Your trial payment will be credited towards the single discounted prepayment.
What is the legality of practising acupuncture
on animals if you aren't a veterinary surgeon?
These comments summarise our current understanding of the situation which of course may change at any time subject to the whim of the politicians.
In Australia and NZ there is no legal impediment to anyone performing acupuncture on animals for fee or reward. The only constraint we are aware of in Australia is that someone who is not a veterinary surgeon must not make a "veterinary diagnosis", and must not use the word "veterinary" with respect to his actions. Avoiding those words/claims takes one outside the orbit of the Veterinary Surgeons Acts.
In the UK, it seems that Veterinary Surgeons have assumed the sole right to insert needles into animals. However, we have noted that there are some human acupuncturists who are performing animal acupuncture "under the control of or by referral from,Veterinarians". There is no legislation to preclude anyone using laser acupuncture or acupressure on animals.
In the rest of the world, different countries and different states
within those countries have different regulations. You should make
inquiries for the regulations in any specific area of interest to you.
A few states are quite restrictive but others are not.
You will need to see if any restrictions extend to cover laser
acupuncture or acupressure on animals. Some people in other countries
get around restrictions by practising "energy medicine" rather than
"animal acupuncture".
We are sure that most of the Laser stimulators in use by owners and trainers in the USA are being used for stimulating acupuncture points!
Veterinary
surgeon/acupuncturists and Medical/acupuncturistsdo have their own
professional organisation but it excludes all others. These are the
people who have learnt a peasants art and now want to restrict it to
themselves as "guardians of all knowledge and expertise". It continues
to be a source of annoyance to us that some veterinarians pursue this
arrogant and restrictive line, and it is a source of great pleasure
that some non-veterinarians are practising with excellent results, and
without the benefit of a veterinary education. In fact our tutor, a
veterinarian, received his initial acupuncture education from
lay-persons and became a human acupuncturist for a brief period before
transposing his knowledge to animals.
Does this course have the approval of various
organisations such as the
Government Education Authorities, Veterinary Associations and the like?
The
answer is obviously NO. There are three reasons for this.
(1) The course has not been in operation long enough to be assessed for
any accreditation.
(2) The Veterinary Surgeons Boards in Australia have no jurisdiction
over animal acupuncture. In fact they correctly deny that Acupuncture
is an act of Veterinary Medicine.
(3) The only other acupuncture course is the IVAS course for vets
promoted in the USA and even this is only "recognised" by IVAS. It has
no official recognition or standing. Not even with AVMA or AAHA, and
certainly not outside the USA..
We are a private, fully autonomous teaching institution that is not restricted in any way by organisational red tape. We have never sought any government funding, any bureaucratic direction or limitation, and we are not looking for any subsidy or hand-out. We intend to retain total control over course content and graduate standards, and will never compromise our vision for any bureaucrat's stamp of approval! Our standard will be the one, that in the future, others will be measured against.
Our mission is to share the knowledge of this peasant technology with everyone who wishes to learn to use it.
How do I know that you are not a fly-by-night rip-off artist?
As you have probably
heard, there are only 2 sure things in this world, Death and Taxes. We
can't control either but we have managed to be in business for about 35
years and have always paid our taxes, our debts, our staff and have
never been in bankruptcy or other courts of Law. You are free to verify
all of that should you wish to through the usual commercial checking
facilities. We are happy to provide you with Directors and Commercial
Entities names for this purpose.
So, while we cannot predict our death date, we expect to be around for
many tomorrows, over the next 15 years.
You can always opt for the installment program which gives you the
opportunity to limit your exposure to any risk that you might have
concerns about.
And if this does not convince you then you can always take advantage of
our unique TRIAL OFFER. (see page 7 of the prospectus)
As far as animal acupuncture tuition is concerned, we consider
ourselves as the leaders in this field in the Southern Hemisphere,
having racked up around 30 years of involvement.
As to the quality of what we teach I suggest you look at the
testimonials on our website.
I hope this will help you in your decision.
Why do I need to learn such a huge amount of stuff just to stick a few needles into my cat?
It
would be possible to show any person how to treat a very specific
condition on a certain species of animal on a once-only basis, without
that person having any understanding whatsoever about what they were
doing or why. This is not what this course is about.
Our graduates will be equipped to tackle most conditions in most
animals from first principles. This means that our graduates should be
able to think about almost any problem with which they are faced, and
then by applying first principles, they should be able to design and
implement a treatment schedule in almost any species even if they have
not had specific training on that species. Even though our training
will be biased towards the dog/cat/horse models, there is every
expectation that you will be able to apply first principles to the
treatment of elephant or kangaroo should that interest you.
We will endeavour to teach you to think rather than to just spoon feed
you with a mountain of facts to be committed to memory. We will teach
you how to look for solutions to problems rather than just provide
stock answers for common problems.
To this end, it is necessary that you are equipped for the task.
In order to study this subject properly you will need to become
proficient in the language of anatomy and the language of acupuncture.
Now this is not as daunting as it might seem. There are few conventions
that you must learn so that when you have something described to you it
will be absolutely specific in meaning, and when you describe something
to someone else there can be no room for misunderstanding.
For example to say that " I have examined the patient and she is lame"
will mean absolutely nothing to anyone else. Compare that to the
following statement: " I have examined the 3yo female Doberman named
'Tara' belonging to Joe Bloggs, and have determined that there is a
lameness in the right hind leg. The lameness appears to be
intermittent. At the time of examination, pain could not be
demonstrated in any of the joints or muscles of this leg. The only
abnormality seen was a laxity of the ligaments between the femur and
the tibia, leading to a provisional diagnosis of cruciate ligament
damage."
The second statement
(1) identifies the patient
(2) identifies the owner
(3) identifies which leg is involved
(4) narrows down the affected area to the knee joint.
(5) identifies a probable cause
(6) does not make an absolute diagnosis such as "cruciate ligament
rupture" because that would be a guess. Absolute diagnosis would
require confirmation of that suspicion with an endoscopic examination
of the interior of the joint.
The examiner might then refer that patient on to you as an acupuncturist with the following recommendation: " Suggest you treat this patient using St35; Med Knee Eye; St36; Bl40; Bl11; Sp6; Sp5.....etc etc"
You as an acupuncturist will know exactly what the examining person meant you to do.You will know that St35 is an acupuncture point situated in the depression on the lateral side of the knee-cap, and between the the thigh-bone and the leg-bone(tibia). You will know exactly where this is on your own body and you will therefore be able to work out where it is on the dog's body, allowing for all the differences in structure between humans/animals and between different breeds of dogs. (Compare a Chihuahua to a St.Bernard for instance).
To do all of the above requires that you are comfortable with the terminology of anatomy, and with the terminology of acupuncture, and that you have a knowledge of how species/breeds differences can impact on the practice of acupuncture.
The
first "lesson" directs your attention to the history of acupuncture.
The next few lessons will inform you about the importance of "energy"
in acupuncture.
Then you will become acquainted with some of the basic teachings of TCM
or Traditional Chinese Medicine.
After that, and up to about lesson 20 you will be exposed to the
specifics of human and animal anatomy. We will deal with all the things
that are important for you and will leave out what is not important. If
you want to study anatomy more fully you can do that at another time
and place.
The next approx 15 lessons will deal with the "nitty gritty" of
acupuncture, the points and meridians in Humans. The human is the basic
defining model of reference. It is also the easiest model to learn on
because it is always with you, and you can be practising point finding
at any time. Once again we will not be dealing with every point on
every meridian, but will concentrate on the important ones.
Then we get to the "interesting stuff".....how to go about applying
your knowledge to real conditions and on animals. Different types of
problems require different approaches (different ways of thinking about
problems) and these will be introduced at the appropriate time.
Different techniques are used at different times. Subjects such as
"needling", "electro-acupuncture" and "lasers" are just some of the
techniques explored.
Then there are many lessons relating to clinical practice in small
animals and horses.
I know that we have kept the best bits till last, but to understand
those "goodies" you will have to put in the effort which will enable
you to understand it all.
Be assured that animal acupuncture is easy to learn providing you have the desire and the commitment plus the perserverance to conquer any small hiccoughs along the way.
Can you give me the names and contact details of your students ?
Privacy
laws in this country prevent us from divulging any information about
one client to any other without their consent. Penalties are in the
millions of dollars!
Also, because of commercial considerations , it is policy to not put
students in contact with one another until the final stages of the
course. The reason hardly needs stating but you can appreciate that
there is little we can do to prevent an existing student selling/giving
our course content to others. To put a potential student in touch with
an existing student provides the opportunity for unscrupulous persons
to do just that.
Sorry.
We have already had to put in place anti-piracy methods to protect our
website from hackers who were attempting to steal our lessons.
As you may know our Veterinarian Tutor has been directly involved in
the training of more than 1000 veterinarians in the basic techniques of
animal acupuncture, mainly in Australia but also in NZ, UK and Belgium.
The correspondence course we are offering is a relatively new product,
but already we have students in Australia, New Zealand, and the USA.
One of our students is a veterinary surgeon who has opted to do the
full course to brush up on human anatomy/physiology.
I am a human acupuncturist. How does "my" course differ from the "full"
course?
As
an acupuncturist you should already be proficient in the language of
anatomy and physiology so this has been left out of your course. You
will of course still have to learn the language of animal anatomy and
how it may differ from human anatomy, so this has been left in.
You should be proficient in TCM principles so this has been left out of
your course.
If you were presented with a patient suffering the following...
* weakness, tiredness or lassitude.
* runny faeces.
*nausea symptoms or even vomiting.
You would immediately suspect "symptoms of a spleen chi deficiency" and
probably commence treatment to "strengthen spleen chi".
On the other hand, if you were presented with a dog showing weakness, vomiting and inappetance you should also consider a diagnosis of paralysis tick and eliminate that from your differential diagnosis. Upon finding a tick you should recognise your veterinarian's area of expertise and immediately refer the case to a vet.
You might have a colleague consult with you about a patient that he has been treating for a knee problem . He asks for your opinion on his treatment which entailed needling St35; Med Knee Eye; St36; Bl40; Bl11; Sp6; Sp5.....etc etc"
You as an animal-acupuncturist will know exactly what the other person meant. You will know that St35 is an acupuncture point situated in the depression on the lateral side of the knee-cap, and between the thigh-bone and the leg-bone(tibia). You will know exactly where this is on your own body and you will therefore be able to work out where it is on the dog's body, allowing for all the differences in structure between humans/animals and between different breeds of dogs. (Compare a Chihuahua to a St.Bernard for instance).
To do all of the above
requires that you are comfortable with the terminology of anatomy and
physiology and with the terminology of acupuncture, and that you have a
knowledge of how species/breeds differences can impact on the practice
of acupuncture. If you elect to pursue this course you are not required
to complete some of the lessons of the full course. You may however
elect to complete the additional lessons for revision purposes at no
additional cost. Support for these additional lessons in not provided
unless it is purchased on a per lesson basis.
I am a veterinarian. How does "my" course
differ from the "full" course?
You will become
acquainted with some of the basic teachings of TCM or Traditional
Chinese Medicine.
We will deal with all the things that are important for you and will
leave out what is not important. If you want to brush up your anatomy
you can always purchase additional lessons.
We will be omitting lessons 8 through 26 which contain stuff that you
as a veterinarian should be comfortable with. If you elect to pursue
this course you are not required to complete some of the lessons of the
full course. You may however elect to complete the additional lessons
for revision purposes at no additional cost. Support for these
additional lessons in not provided unless it is purchased on a per
lesson basis.
Do you have a list of lessons that I can look at?
To view our List of Lessons for the 3 courses go to:-
http://www.animal-acupuncture.com/LessonNumbering.htm
Can I have a look at some of the tuition material?
You
might like to have a look at a sample from the CDRom interactive
teaching modules for the horse and dog. The links below will take a
little while to load from the web, but they will load almost
instantaneously from the CD which we supply to students as part of the
course.
These pix are taken from the "interactives" which are delivered as part
of Lessons #61 & #105. The "interactives" if printed out would
occupy nearly 1000 pages of similar high quality resource material.
Notice the clarity and precision of the pictures.
Then compare this with anything else you may have seen.
I'm sure that our course will exceed your expectations.
http://www.animal-acupuncture.com/ST01.htm
http://www.animal-acupuncture.com/LiaoPoints.htm
http://www.animal-acupuncture.com/Haohoy.htm
http://www.animal-acupuncture.com/BL15.htm
http://www.animal-acupuncture.com/BL67.htm
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