There is a doctor among us, but she is not what you imagine. She doesn’t wear a white lab coat or stethoscope, and she doesn’t believe in brightly lit exam rooms.

A Mother’s Intuition

On the contrary, Marcy McFee, M.A., Dipl.Ac., L.Ac.wears normal fashion, serves herbal tea in the waiting room and is the kind of practitioner that might even be considered revolutionary — bridging the gap between western medicine and the practice of centuries-old traditional Chinese medicine. With a foot firmly planted in both the modern and ancient worlds of healing, Marcy has found a way to incorporate the very best of both to create a dynamic, integrated path to health for her patients.

Marcy grew up in Solvang and as a girl always had the desire to fix living things. She started with animals — birthing puppies and helping the vet during office visits. Marcy was always keenly aware of the state of living things and how she could help improve their health. Growing up as the daughter of an aeronautical engineer in a time when girls were not encouraged to become physicians, Marcy found herself at University of California, Irvine, studying to become a school teacher. What her parents didn’t realize was that her elective second major, pre-med, which she explained as a mere hobby, was really Marcy’s first love.

“I’ve always had a thirst to know about all forms of healing practice,” Marcy says. She took an interest in European herbal medicine at age 17, reading everything she could find about diet, nutrition and herbal remedies.

“Just from experimenting a little here and there I turned myself around from a sickly kid, to a rather robust young woman,” Marcy says. “I knew I was onto something.”

When Marcy and her husband moved back to Solvang in 1981, she continued her studies at Santa Barbara College of Oriental Medicine, with courses in acupuncture, Chinese herbology and other oriental medicine modalities. Marcy has since earned her master’s degree in acupuncture and Oriental medicine, become a Medical Board of California Licensed Acupuncturist, and has received diplomat status and certification from the prestigious National Certification Commission for Acupuncture and Oriental Medicine board of review. In addition, Marcy has recently begun a specialized program for acupuncturists to become board certified in internal medicine, which will refresh her past western medical training.

With enough credentials to fill a wall, Marcy’s personal office at her Valley Clinic of Oriental Medicine is surprisingly bare. A tapestry and Chinese chimes hang behind her desk, opposite a floor-to-ceiling shelf stocked with potent and wide-ranging herbal remedies. “My goal is to promote health and well-being for my patients.” This includes dietary counseling, Chinese herbal medicines and acupuncture, which is a science of placing hair-like needles into specific points in the body shown to be effective in the treatment of specific health problems.

“Most needles are associated with blood draws and uncomfortable medical procedures,” Marcy says. “But when acupuncture is done right, it is virtually painless.”

Effective, too, she says. These points, totaling more than a thousand all over the body, have been mapped for over 2,000 years. Recent decades of electromagnetic research have confirmed the existence and location of these points. The broader practice of traditional Chinese medicine dates back even further, as many as 5,700 years, to a sect of Tibetan monks called the Shaolin. They were the originators of Kung Fu and also believed to be the first to develop acupuncture, which is considered the second-oldest medicine in the world.

“They were the original doctor-priests,” Marcy explains. Through the centuries their practice was adopted by what we now call barefoot doctors that travel through China, literally barefoot, performing the healing arts in exchange for a bowl of rice or a bed for a night. “They bring medicine to the people.”

This is also how Marcy views her practice — bringing knowledge to the community, partnering with her patients in their health and total well-being. Marcy sites the most rewarding aspect of her practice as the partnership established between her and the patients. “Education is the most important component and I learn just as much as anyone in the process,” Marcy says.

In a time when many are looking for alternatives to drugs and surgery, traditional Chinese medicine is fast becoming the preferred option. Regarding acupuncture, the World Health Organization sites more than 150 conditions that acupuncture treats, among them: musculoskeletal pain, infertility, premenstrual syndrome, endometriosis, gastrointestinal disorders (including acid reflux), allergies, asthma, arthritis, addiction, headaches, ulcers, vertigo and many, many more.

As an interesting aside, Marcy explains that many of our western ailments don’t even have a name in traditional Chinese medicine. Things like menopausal syndrome simply don’t exist in China. Perhaps this is explained by the keen interest the Chinese take in vitality and longevity, partaking in very powerful herbal elixirs after the age of 50. “It is hard to deny the correlation between the herbs and their lack of illness in old age,” she says.

But even with the proven effectiveness of traditional Chinese medicine, sometimes treatment requires western medical intervention. Marcy has caught more than a few medical emergencies on her table, which is why she considers her knowledge in both medical practices absolutely paramount to her effectiveness as a practitioner.

“I want to understand the labs, the X-rays and the medical history of my patients. I want the big picture,” Marcy says.

It is this kind of fluency in western medicine that has built a trust and rapport between Marcy and many local Valley doctors. “They know I’m not going to take their patients off in a completely different direction. We work together, we’re all a team,” she says.

For 14 years Marcy McFee has been the barefoot doctor among us, bringing healing and education to our community. She can be found at www.valleyclinicoforientalmedicine.com or by calling 805-688-9674.