With this project we want to finance the renovation necesary to offer a community acupuncture service in a center where we currently work with Traditional Chinese Medicine.
Community service
Acupuncture is a therapy able to address common health problems and is has high esteem by the general public but unfortunately, because it is in the private health sector, it's use is restricted to the users purchasing capacity.
It forms part of the Traditional Chinese Medicine sistem which encompasses health in its broad sense (physical, emotional and psychic), and as such, is a perfect complement to alleviate symptoms difficult to treat in our current medical sistem.
The Community Acupuncture room that we want to open will have a different format to the usual one that will help eliminate barriers that prevent people who could benefit from this therapy from using it.
The community room is different in its working format because:
- Offers the treatments in a comfortable shared space that allows the costs of consultation to be reduced without compromising the quality of the service provided.
- Uses a flexible price scale (€15-30) where the user decides how much they wants to pay without having to give explanations.
- It offers very flexible appointments, and the possibility of a drop-in service.
- It offers a friendly service that aids it's use by people not accustomed to alternative therapies.
- It permits the use of the room accompanied by someone you know, helping to create health advocates in our comunities.
Another important aspect of the project is that it will help to disseminate the benefits of Traditional Chinese Medicine, which although it is increasingly well known, is still wrapped in an air of mystery that limits its use.
With the community room we will try to bring this preventive and ecological therapy which has virtually no collateral effects, to people who for lack of knowledge have not yet tried it.
Main features and goals of the crowdfunding campaign
The objective of this crowdfunding is to finance the renovation of our clinic in order to provide this new acupuntcture service and to fund the publicity of our new service.
Why do we bet on Community Acupuncture?
Price
The usual price of an acupuncture session is €45 requiring a minimum of 1 session per week for 1-2 months to obtain the desired results (sometimes more sessions are advisable). This causes the effectiveness of the therapy to be conditioned by economy.
In the community room, the price per session will be flexible, between 15-30 € according to the capacity of the person using the service, allowing the sessions to have the continuity and duration necessary to effectively solve the problem.
Format
Treatments are provided in a warm and comfortable space where users are in sight of each other. This provides the following benefits:
- sharing the administrative costs with other people reduces the price of the acupuncture session.
- is accesible to people who want to learn to take care of their health.
- Allows patients to share their experience with someone they know.
This working format allows us to increase the effectiveness of the treatments without affecting their quality.
Flexibility
Offering acupuncture as a service to the community means that during the opening hours there are acupuncture professionals available and willing to help you. This allows us to:
- provide drop-in service.
- provide online booking and lots of openings
- Adjust the cost of the treatment.
Viability
This is a viable project that is based on 30 years of experience of community acupuncture cooperatives in the United States and England. Our goal is to offer this model in our community and the resources we have are:
- A consolidated and experienced team of professionals.
- A clinic space that is currently active and devoted to Traditional Chinese Medicine.
- Experience in cooperatives and social movements.
What will we use the money for?
We need to turn a cold and noisy room into a health oasis . For this we must do some renovation works such as:
- Soundproofing the space.
- Building furniture to organize the new service.
- Improve the lighting.
- Install a door that isolate the space from outside.
The renovations are essential for the startup because the success of the new service depends on the comfort of the room. The minimum amount we ask for in the crowdfunding, is only for the expenses of the materials of the reforms. The maximum price allows us to hire professionals to do the necesary tasks.
Another indispensable aspect to the viability of the project is a solid base of users to maintain a high occupation of the room. Another portion of the budget will be used to make a marketing and advertising campaign during the first year.
Why this is important
We want to extend the current model of medicine
Our principal motivation is to provide a service that allows acupuncture to be part of everyone's health kit, breaking the barriers that prevent the general population from trying it.
We want health be something that is talked about, so we want to provide a health service where the patient decides how they wants to heal.
We want to create stable employment for acupunctors
Being socially motivated in a society where acupuncture is part of private medicine is complex. The high costs and difficulties of being an autonomous worker, added to the need for continuous education that this profession entails make it difficult to leave the cycle of working to pay the expenses of being able to work.
With this project we seek to create a clinic model with good jobs while offering a quality service to the general community.
We would love to see an acupuncture clinic in each neighborhood!
We want you to come and try acupuncture
We want this project to reach the entire community: acupuncture works, it forms part of preventative health, it's ecological and has no side effects.
Team and experience
The people who lead this project, we are also part of a larger team. Ten Wan Center is a school of martial arts and Traditional Chinese Medicine, which has been promoting health locally and internationally for years, and has a broad membership base.
Kevin Albors is an acupuncturist, professor of Traditional Chinese Medicine, Kung Fu and Chi Kung Master . Over the last two years he has been the director of the Mutual Health of Roger de Lluria and is currently in charge of the section of Traditional Chinese Medicine at the Ten Wan Center. Kevin has been planting seeds of health in Barcelona for years and has the support of many future clients for the community room.
Monica Richardson is an acupuncturist, instructor of Kung Fu and Chi Kung, and teacher of preventive health classes. In 2016 she opened a pilot community acupuncture clinic with great success. Monica has been involved in collective and social projects in Barcelona for years, and has experience in communication and project management.
The rest of the team is made up of people who are passionate about health and who are indispensable to the project. They support us in tasks of writing, marketing, advertising, recording and editing videos and a long etcetera that shows us the need to open this community space. Alot of times we repay them with acupuncture treatments :)