About — Washington Institute of Natural Sciences

FUTURE HOME OF W.I.N.S. COLLEGE OF INTEGRATED MEDICINE

Our plans include a dynamic college that includes an initial school of acupuncture & herbal medicine with plans to expand with a School of Mind, Body, Spirit with an emphasis on Meditation & Yoga, and a School of Nutrition.

W.I.N.S.'s academic and educational programs are intended to train holistic and integrative (eastern and western medicines) healthcare providers so that they can go on to make valuable contributions to the healthcare system globally.

PROGRAM DESCRIPTION

Washington Institute of Natural Sciences (W.I.N.S.) School of Acupuncture and School of Herbal Medicine will be an ACAOM (Accreditation Commission for Acupuncture and Oriental Medicine) accredited academic institution of complementary and integrative medicine located on Orcas Island, located off the coast between Vancouver B.C. and Seattle, WA. The college will provide world-class education, modern research opportunities, and premier clinical services in a variety of medical modalities including Acupuncture, Oriental Medicine, Western Herbal Medicine, Integrative Medicine, and Holistic Nutrition as well as Mind-Body-Spirit disciplines (Tai Chi and Yoga).

The W.I.N.S.’s College of Integrative Medicine will be founded upon an unwavering commitment to excellence, compassion, and truthfulness. It will be a place where the east meets the west. Founded by Dr. Vincent Shu, a board-certified Internist/Geriatrician/Cardiologist trained in both eastern and western medicine, its organizers recognize that education in Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) is at all times heavily linked to classical writings, in particular the Yellow Emperor’s Internal Canon written thousands of years ago. While accepting the importance of the knowledge contained in such classical Chinese writings, he found that the greatest hurdle for western-trained scientists and/or clinicians with a firm foundation in western bio-sciences when studying TCM was not simply access to the knowledge, but also the ability to explore and model the Chinese way of thinking of Yin-Yang and “five elements” theories. He believed that using the common language of western bioscience to conceptualize the theory of TCM could be the path to address this issue.

Accordingly, the W.I.N.S.’s College will, through western-recognized modalities, endeavor to investigate, validate, and perhaps transform the knowledge and properties of acupuncture and herbal medicine as they have evolved through five thousand years of tradition. The Institute, using this approach, will offer a depth of instruction simply not available at any other school of Acupuncture and Chinese Herbal Medicine in North America.

4 KEY QUESTIONS

Despite the recent economic downturn, American consumers have been spending approximately 34 billion dollars per year for “Alternative Medicines” claiming to be “secret remedies of thousand(s) of years". As consumers, we have legitimate reasons to question the presence of evidence-based data to support such usage, for example:

Are western medicine approaches to new drug discovery superior to those of eastern medicine?
With the advent of new fast and relatively inexpensive DNA sequencing technology making personalized medicine a real possibility, can either western or eastern medicines favorably modify the behavior of genetic profiles sufficiently to prevent or modify the expression of certain diseases?
Can a retirement community model for green land and natural beauty conservation evolve into one that drives younger generations to accomplish the same goals?
Can we re-shape our future to retain our children by developing local careers engaged in solving growing national issues in healthcare, environment, and green energy?

PROGRAMS OFFERED

A 3-year Herbal Medicine/Acupuncture Practitioner Master degree Program.
A Certificate and diploma in Herbal Medicine.
Scholar farmer/ scholar gardener programs to teach how to grow key herbs used in Chinese Herbal Medicine and to discover new herbs and plants in the San Juan Islands that can be used as Herbal Medicine.
Internships for Chinese citizens and students to learn Acupuncture and Chinese Herbal Medicine as well as how to grow Chinese Herbal Medicine in the Pacific Northwest.
Clinical experience in the W.I.N.S. Community Clinic Center for Integrative Medicine.

MEASURABLE OBJECTIVES

To present comprehensive 3-year programs that encompass the five modalities of traditional Chinese medicine, including the requisite Western Biomedical Sciences as well as other required subjects.
To assist students in attaining an understanding of the principles of herbal medicine and experience and study the function of that paradigm in everyday life.
To prepare students to meet all of the qualifying examinations and regulations concerning acupuncture and traditional Chinese medicine, as such regulations and licensing come into force.
To prepare students to become responsible healthcare providers and able practitioners.
To offer a curriculum that meets or exceeds all academic and clinical requirements required by the profession’s regulating bodies.
To provide compassionate, comprehensive integrative health care for the diversified population on the San Juan Islands including low socioeconomic and/or no income population.
In collaboration with oncologists at UW Medicine, Seattle Cancer Care Alliance, Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, Island Hospital Cancer Care Center, and Peace Island Medical Center to provide complementary alternative medicine for islanders undergoing chemotherapy in order to improve their quality of life and prolong their life by mitigating chemotherapy-associated adverse side effects.
To grow Chinese medicinal herbs – both traditional as well as newly discovered – locally in the San Juan Islands, and then validate their therapeutic properties before clinical usage.
To maintain and enhance community economic vitality by creating an intellectually challenging environment that encourages and supports our children and grandchildren to develop local careers in solving growing national issues of health care, farming, and environment, for example in evidence-based natural healing centers and clinics, herb-growing farms, as well as green energy production.

IMPACT SUMMARY

In the relatively near future, we envision that medical care decisions will link with western genetic-based personalized medicine, and through this link, the better treatment outcome can be predicted and evidenced by either herbal medicines or ( reduced dosage of ) western medicine or both with accompanying significant healthcare cost savings and improving quality of life.

While working on medicinal herb research projects at W.I.N.S. grant-sponsored scholar gardeners/ farmers will help sustain local economic vitality and meaningful land usage, thereby also helping to fulfill the missions of, for example, San Juan County’s Land Bank and Agricultural Guild.

Nature-Science College Academic Programs will bring in diverse talented professionals in the fields of medicine, herbs, agriculture, green energy, and environmental science, helping the San Juan Islands to become renowned for personalized medicine based healing, attracting people seeking not only the enjoyment of natural beauty but also healthy life.

The San Juan Islands will over time become a center for organically-grown science-validated medicinal herbs in North America. Locally held research seminars in Herbal Medicine and Acupuncture will attract many people around the world to both work and visit.

W.I.N.S. will provide a supporting source of academic unbiased data and act as a liaison between the western and eastern practitioners with resultant improved treatment outcome and quality of life in patients with chemotherapy and/or chronic diseases.