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 Latest News From Our Volunteers in Nepal

VOLUNTEER COMMUNITY CARE CLINICS IN NEPAL

Nepal remains one of the poorest countries in the world and has been plagued with political unrest and military conflict for the past decade. In 2015, a pair of major earthquakes devastated this small and fragile country. 

Since 2008, the Acupuncture Relief Project has provided over 300,000 treatments to patients living in rural villages outside of Kathmandu Nepal. Our efforts include the treatment of patients living without access to modern medical care as well as people suffering from extreme poverty, substance abuse and social disfranchisement.

Common conditions include musculoskeletal pain, digestive pain, hypertension, diabetes, stroke rehabilitation, uterine prolapse, asthma, and recovery from tuberculosis treatment, typhoid fever, and surgery.

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COMPASSION CONNECT : DOCUMENTARY SERIES

Episode 1
Rural Primary Care

In the aftermath of the 2015 Gorkha Earthquake, this episode explores the challenges of providing basic medical access for people living in rural areas.

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Episode 2
Integrated Medicine

Acupuncture Relief Project tackles complicated medical cases through accurate assessment and the cooperation of both governmental and non-governmental agencies.

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Episode 3
Working With The Government

Cooperation with the local government yields a unique opportunities to establish a new integrated medicine outpost in Bajra Barahi, Makawanpur, Nepal.

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Episode 4
Case Management

Complicated medical cases require extraordinary effort. This episode follows 4-year-old Sushmita in her battle with tuberculosis.

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Episode 5
Sober Recovery

Drug and alcohol abuse is a constant issue in both rural and urban areas of Nepal. Local customs and few treatment facilities prove difficult obstacles.

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Episode 6
The Interpreters

Interpreters help make a critical connection between patients and practitioners. This episode explores the people that make our medicine possible and what it takes to do the job.

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Episode 7
Future Doctors of Nepal

This episode looks at the people and the process of creating a new generation of Nepali rural health providers.

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Compassion Connects
2012 Pilot Episode

In this 2011, documentary, Film-maker Tristan Stoch successfully illustrates many of the complexities of providing primary medical care in a third world environment.

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From Our Blog

Premier screening of Compassion Connects

We had a standing room only turn out for the premier screening of the short documentary by Tristan Stoch. Thank you to all of you who could attend. I'm including a link to the full documentary for everyone to see. Please share it.

The film was accepted to screen again at the Columbia Gorge International Film Festival in August. We hope that all of you in the Portland Area will come and support our bid for best documentary short. We are also submitting to several other film festivals across the country and abroad.

For more information please visit: www.CompassionConnects.org and like us on facebook

Click here to watch the full length version of Compassion Connects.


Annual Report

Annual Report coverOn behalf of myself and our Board of Directors, I want to thank every one who reads this blog and supports this project. With the help of our partners, Vajra Varahi Clinic and the Chokgyur Lingpa Foundation, we continue to provide extremely effective and cost efficient care in Nepal. 

In 2011 our Third World Medicine Immersion Program was a great success with twelve volunteers serving at the Vajra Varahi clinic. These volunteers worked six days a week not only providing care to patients but also participating in over 40 hours of continuing education focused on improving their skills in case evaluation, treatment planning and patient progression. Upon completion of their course, each practitioner presented a case study for peer review. These case studies help us analyze the efficacy of our clinic efforts and contribute to a body of evidence that supports our overall project model. For their participation in this course, volunteer practitioners received 40 Professional Development Activity (PDA) credits from the National Certification Commission of Acupuncture and Oriental Medicine (NCCAOM).

Acupuncture Relief Project also conducted a Patient Reported Outcome Measures (PROM) research study during the Fall and Winter 2011/2012. The goal of the research was dual purpose. First to collect demographic and efficacy information from our patients. Second to provide a tool for our practitioners to help guide them in their treatment planning, evaluations and prognosis as they learned to work with their interpreters and adapt to treating in a foreign environment. Since my return from Nepal this year, I have been mentoring a group of graduate students from the Oregon College of Oriental Medicine to compile and analyze this data. Currently we are working on writing the research paper and seeking approval from the Independent Review Board (IRB) to publish our findings. 

As the quality of our clinic operations continues to mature, we are increasing our focus to solving our greatest sustainability challenge which is to train local Nepali practitioners in acupuncture. In 2011, we fully funded a scholarship for one student only to be setback as the only Oriental Medicine school in Nepal became defunct. We have now adopted a mentorship approach for two students and I personally conducted over 100 hours of training during my stay last fall. We are also exploring the possibility of sponsoring a student to study in the US, Canada, Australia or China. Currently our major obstacle is a lack of legitimate accreditation and licensure in Nepal. Obviously this issue will be on our list for awhile.

On a financial note, we have definitely felt the strain of higher fuel prices reflected in the cost of air travel. We take these expenses very seriously and do our best to factor this into the cost per treatment when evaluating our efficacy and sustainability measures. Our organizational board of directors, officers and team facilitators are not compensated and volunteer many weeks (if not months) of their time every year. We feel we are maintaining an absolute minimum administrative footprint as we provide services to thousands of patients, jobs to our interpreting staff and a unique developmental experience for our practitioners.

Download our Annual Report and Financial Statements click here.


Compendium of Clinical Case Studies: Volume One

clinical case studiesCase studies provide a way for us to capture and share a small piece of our overall clinical experience. These case studies help us analyze the efficacy of our clinic efforts and contribute to a body of evidence that supports our overall project model. We share them here to provide our community some insight into our work in advancing our medicine both at home and abroad.

Download our Compendium of Clinical Case Studies: Volume One


If you have any questions about our financial report, case studies or would like to find out how you can help, please contact me at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

Best regards,

Andrew Schlabach

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Our Mission

Acupuncture Relief Project, Inc. is a volunteer-based, 501(c)3 non-profit organization (Tax ID: 26-3335265). Our mission is to provide free medical support to those affected by poverty, conflict or disaster while offering an educationally meaningful experience to influence the professional development and personal growth of compassionate medical practitioners.


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