Biography
Claudia Benvegnu has been running a private practice as a Licensed Acupuncturist
near Stanford University since 1996. She is a product of blending eastern and
western medical strengths.
Her professional background includes receiving her Ph.D. in biochemistry and doing medical research for 10 years, with positions at Stanford University and University of California, San Francisco. This scientific experience allows her to better understand a patient’s western medicine diagnosis and other cellular and immune aspects of a patient’s condition.
Following her medical research, she studied at Meiji College of Oriental Medicine in San Francisco (now called the Acupuncture & Integrative Medicine College, Berkeley).
Claudia has studied herbal prescription since 2002 with Dr. C.S. Cheung, a Traditional Chinese Medicine herbalist/M.D. from Yunnan. The format for this study is one-on-one, weekly, one hour sessions. She uses this time to discuss patient cases that are not progressing as she would expect. The Yunnan herbalist gives her ideas of pattern diagnosis and different herbs or formulas to try. This long term learning has allowed her herbal prescribing to advance a great deal.
She is able to prescribe herbs individually for each patient. This greatly increases the effectiveness of the herbs prescribed. She uses a classical formula as a basis and then modifies it by adding and subtracting herbs according to what the individual needs.
Since May, 2007, Claudia has also been studying pattern diagnosis and herb prescription with Dr. Z. X. Mah, a clinician/Ph. D. from Beijing whose specialty is cancer and who runs a research institute.
Claudia’s has the most experience treating pain, depression, digestive complaints and internal medicine.
Claudia is required to attend 50 hours of continuing education courses every 2 years. She has emphasized herbal seminars and seminars about biochemical tests that can be performed on site.