The never-ending battle between Western and complementary medicine. Can't we have the best of both worlds?

Ever since I began studying Chinese medicine I became aware of the rift between Western and Eastern medicine. At one stage I was even one of those people that whole-heartedly believed acupuncture could cure everything. I really did. But as I studied more, both about Eastern medicine and biochemistry/anatomy and physiology, the more I realised how great Western medicine is and I began to wonder why we don't use both. Why does the West hate (fear?) complementary medicine so much? And why do a lot of natural health practitioners think Western medicine is evil? I'm am a registered Acupuncturist and I am not sure if I will ever be able to answer these questions but they were at the forefront of my mind today as I received my iron infusion, prescribed by my GP (fantastic guy! Big supporter of natural medicine, also an incredibly popular/sort after GP).
(Here is a pic of what got injected into me today. How cool is modern medicine!)

Wouldn't it be great if we could take the best of all medicines and use them to our advantage? That's what I try to do. I went to the doctor a few weeks ago because I was so tired all the time and I was starting to get a little concerned. I went in and within 5 minutes the Dr had given me a form to go and get a whole bunch of blood tests. I hate blood tests but I went anyway. The Dr himself called me that night when he received my results and said my iron was stupid low (my words, not his) and that I should book in for an iron infusion as soon as possible. Not cheap but a hell of a lot cheaper then getting acupuncture/Chinese herbs every week for the next 3-6 months. Because realistically thats how long it probably would have taken for acupuncture and herbs to have made a notable difference. I know that if I really wanted to go down the Eastern medicine path I could have, and I'm sure I would have felt better in a few months. Did I have a few months to wait? Nope. I'm trying to grow/run a business, hang out with all the important people (boyfriend, friends, family) in my life, exercise, eat right AND study. And at the moment I barely make it through the day, even with a nap, and I'm still in bed my 9:30pm. Ain't nobody got time for that. So I chose the Western medicine solution and according to the nurse I should be full of beans and back to my usual energetic/slightly hyperactive self by the weekend! Seriously, that's pretty bloody awesome.

So here are my thoughts... Western medicine is pretty rad and does emergency medicine really well. Like I know where I'm going if my appendix is about to burst or if I accidentally chopped off my hand. Definitely not an acupuncture clinic. But if I have a headache, or am having trouble sleeping or suffering digestive issues, well I'm booking in for all the Chinese medicine there is! Thanks to an amazing paper call The Acupuncture Evidence Project it is 'no longer possible to say that the effectiveness of acupuncture is because of the placebo effect, or that it is useful only for musculoskeletal pain.' Acupuncture is effective as proven by scientific research. Western medicine is slowly starting to recognise Acupuncture as a legitimate treatment option for many conditions. So why don't we all stop fighting and starting learning from each other. Think of how many people we can help! Just because you don't understand something doesn't mean we need to be frightened of it. You might not understand what Qi Deficiency means and thats ok. It doesn't mean that it's rubbish, it's just in language that is unfamiliar to you. I have no idea what Haemolytic uraemic syndrome is (I do now because I googled it) but that doesn't mean I don't think it's a real thing.

This was a scary hour! They covered my arm up so I wouldn't see the needle and faint. Turns out I'm more of a scaredy cat than I thought.

N.B. These is just my humble opinion. If you don't agree, that's cool. I'm literally too tired to argue so if you passionately disagree with what I wrote, no problems, but please don't spend an hour crafting a perfectly worded rebuttal. It would be a waste of your time as I probably won't have the energy to reply. Constructive feedback is always welcome though.

Thanks for listening/reading! Hopefully once I'm fully saturated with iron I can put more effort into writing engaging blog posts