Dear Regulatory Board,

  Not only does the public recognize Dry Needling as Acupuncture despite its renaming, they expect the same training, safety and more. If a PT describes all their western medicine training, it misleads the public to think they have all the necessary acupuncture training (which the World Health Organization deems to be over 1000 hours if one is not an MD).

Allowing dry needling creates liability risks for the PT, hospitals who hire PTs to do this, and the legislature/state that has to deal with lawsuits from creating a law without ensuring proper and sufficient training for safe practice for consumers. 

Don't be misled by what the PTs are saying, as it is purely a political movement to expand their scope without having fully studied (with other experts of other professions) the required training for this seemingly innocuous but highly invasive procedure. 

The Academy of Medical Acupuncturists has issued a policy statement against dry needling for this reason, as we see an increase of pneumothorax incidents due to dry needling (extremely rare among trained acupuncturists). 

Dry needling instructors are even causing these incidents in the seminars they teach. If that does not say inadequate training, I'm not sure what does. The attached video shows the incident I am speaking of:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EWb69O__NiE&feature=youtu.be

Keep this therapy safe for the public, vote no to dry needling.

Sincerely,

Kristen Happe L.Ac. DOM