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Clinic Promotes Healing, Point By Point

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By ELAINE MARKOWITZ Tribune correspondent

Published: November 21, 2007

Updated: 11/19/2007 06:34 pm

RUSKIN - Kenneth Kuchar-Haas, tall and slim, munched on an organically grown apple one recent morning in his new office.

In April, Kuchar-Haas opened the Acupuncture and Wellness Clinic of Ruskin, his most recent in a long line of professions focusing on serving others.

Prior to arriving in Florida in 2002, Kuchar-Haas had traveled far and wide in various careers, including that of an ordained minister and missionary to Japan and a mental health professional in Washington state.

Now a board-certified acupuncture physician, he said he believes in the use of alternative therapies for healing and is dedicated to practicing what he has studied for the past four years.

"I'm utterly shocked at the power of healing that acupuncture and nutrition can have on the body," he said.

People come to the clinic for all sorts of reasons, including back problems, fibromyalgia, frozen shoulder, depression and sinus problems. Kuchar-Haas said he has met with success using a variety of techniques, many of which are not commonly found in acupuncture offices.

Kuchar-Haas said most patients he sees need pain management.

"I see tremendous lumbar problems," he said. Many of those back problems deal with discs.

"I can help with the pain from degenerative discs," he said, "but I can't completely treat it."

He said disc problems often require orthopedic evaluation, and he will send patients to the appropriate doctors.

Local residents come in with other pains as well.

Fibromyalgia, a mysterious constellation of body-wide pain and weakness, more commonly afflicts women. Many have come to the clinic seeking help.

"I've had considerable success with people suffering from this," he said. "It mostly afflicts women, but I see two men with it currently."

Neuropathy patients also have benefited from acupuncture.

"These patients experience numbness or burning in their limbs and lose their balance," he said. "It could be from back pain, a pinched nerve or diabetes."

Patients appeared pleased with their progress. In the waiting room that morning sat Albert Walter of Sun City Center, a retired chiropractor. Lower back pain brought him into the office.

"I work on the Sun City Center Emergency Squad," he said, "and I lifted the new stretcher improperly."

Walter, who learned about Kuchar-Haas from a neighbor who had been treated for another illness, said that in three treatments he was feeling better. He had been ailing since May.

"We are going by how symptomatic I am and how clinically improved," he said.

Kuchar-Haas considers time with people important to their healing. Generally he spends at least an hour with each patient, and said he limits the number of patients he sees in a day for that reason.

In addition to a 20-minute standard acupuncture treatment, he takes blood pressure readings and checks the tongue and pulse, using Chinese methods. He also follows up with phone calls the next day to see how his patients are feeling.

Another technique used at the clinic is hair analysis.

Hair tissue, taken from strands close to the nape of the neck, is sent to a laboratory in Texas for analysis. Kuchar-Haas said that hair gives an indication of the amount of minerals and toxic metal accumulation in the body.

Kuchar-Haas' wife, Toni, who also is his business manager, said she has benefited from hair analysis.

"I learned I had too high a level of calcium in my body and didn't need the amount of supplement I was taking," she said.

The clinic has been well-received, and Kuchar-Haas is satisfied with the results he has seen to date.

"I probably get a 98 percent rate in improving people's health," he said.

In the meantime, he is busy completing one more degree - a doctorate in nutrition.

Treating the complete individual with compassion is part of the package.

IF YOU GO

The Acupuncture and Wellness Clinic of Ruskin is at 203 W. Shell Point Road, Ruskin. Call (813) 645-8168 or visit www.acupuntureruskin.com for information.

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