- Medical Services
- Family Medicine and Primary Medical Care
- Gynecology, Women's Wellness, Menopause
- Integrative Medicine Consults for Men, Women & Children
- Acupuncture & Traditional Chinese Medicine
- Headache Specialty Care
- Nutrition & Weight Loss Consults
- Compounding Pharmacist Consults
- Pain Management
Acupuncture & Traditional Chinese Medicine
What is Acupuncture?
Acupuncture is among the oldest healing traditions; it is a system of healing based on balancing the body’s energy known as Qi. According to ancient Chinese beliefs, Qi flows along channels throughout the body known as meridians. An imbalance in the body’s energy may result in distress signals in the form of symptoms. Treating the person’s basic constitution, as well as alleviating the symptoms, is part of the treatment plan. The acupuncturist inserts thin, sterile, disposable needles along specific points of the meridian pathways to help balance and unblock the flow of Qi.
Wunian Chen, LAc is one of the leading acupuncturists in the Triangle. He was trained in traditional Chinese medicine and nephrology in China. Dr. Chen and Dr. Coeytaux are nationally known experts in the treatment of headaches with acupuncture. In addition to headache, Dr. Chen’s acupuncture treatments can be beneficial for a wide range of conditions including back and neck pain, sinus problems, menopausal hot flashes, fibromyalgia, fatigue, and more. Dr. Chen incorporates Chinese Herbal Therapy when appropriate.
Dr. Chen’s acupuncture hours:
Tuesdays: 7:45 am -10:30 a.m.
Wednesdays: 12:45 pm-7:00 pm
Thursdays: 7:45 am -noon
Fridays: 2:45 pm-6:30 pm
Saturdays: 8:00am-noon
Initial Acupuncuture Consult and Treatment: $120
Follow-up Acupuncture Treatments $70
Biographical Profile: Wunian Chen, LAc
Wunian Chen was born and raised in Wuhan, China. He was inspired to a career in medicine at the age of 16, when his father suffered severe back pain that was cured completely by acupuncture. Wunian studied both Western and Chinese medicine at the Hubei College of Traditional Chinese Medicine. Upon graduation, he received the equivalent of an MD degree in 1983 and began the practice of acupuncture, herbal medicine, and western medicine in the Department of Internal Medicine in a large community hospital in Wuhan.
Dr. Chen moved to North Carolina in 1990 to take a position as Visiting Scholar in the UNC School of Medicine, working in the lab of distinguished nephrologist, Dr. Carl Godschalk. As Visiting Scholar and later as Research Specialist in Pediatrics he studied, among other things, the efficacy of acupuncture for non-pharmaceutical reduction of hypertension in genetic hypertension rats. He subsequently earned certification of his US MD degree by the Educational Commission for Foreign Medical Graduation, and obtained his US Diplomate in Acupuncture. In the United States, he is licensed to practice Oriental Medicine.
He has been on the faculty of UNC School of Medicine in the Department of Family Medicine since 2002.
