Jean Chuang Menges is a national board-licensed acupuncturist and herbalist and a certified bioenergetic practitioner residing in New York City. She is the founder of Wisdom House New York, Inc., a holistic center providing individualized services aimed at optimizing health and well being. A community clinic is part of Wisdom House Services. The clinic provides low cost treatments and education in holistic medicine topics.

Jean is currently focusing on Wans 3E Acupuncture a blending of classical Chinese medicine with a modern understanding of anatomy and physiology, and the BodyTalk System.  She is presently developing an internship program to train acupuncturists and healthcare providers in these techniques. Her goal is to encourage practitioners of Western Medicine to develop a greater understanding of working with the body to increase its natural and innate ability to heal.

Foundation  Jean’s journey toward her expertise in holistic healing therapies started early in life. She spent her first ten years in a rice-farming village in Taiwan where respect for ancient Chinese practices of health and longevity were strong. She also received acupuncture treatments that resolved her respiratory allergies. During later schooling in the U.S., she developed a strong interest in science, especially biology and environmental science.  From an early age, she planned to study medicine and so focused her activities toward that goal.  She did hospital volunteer work and was accepted at Columbus Children’s Hospital’s summer internship program focusing on genetic molecular research on retinal blastoma.

As a high school exchange student in Australia, Jean’s experiences there opened her eyes to alternative medicine beginning with successful naturalpathic and massage treatment of an old and long-painful sports injury. However, Jean remained focused on preparing for medical studies and therefore entered college as an undergraduate biology major. After receiving her bachelor’s degree, she decided to take advantage of a special offer to study medical technology and received a second bachelor’s degree in that field.

After college, Jean became a research assistant in the Department of Microbiology at the University Hospitals of Cleveland. Her research focused on molecular fingerprinting studies on antibiotic-resistant bacteria developing in hospitalized patients. Her work in medical technology gave her solid experience in medical research, but she began to feel that something was missing.

Acupuncture and BodyTalk  Jean’s interest in alternative medicine grew stronger as her foundations in science continued to deepen. A desire to explore the principle of holistic healing, namely that our bodies have the tools we need to heal ourselves, led her to a new chapter in her life when she began to study acupuncture and Chinese herbology at Baylo University in California. An acupuncture teacher there showed her how acupuncture uses familiar medical technology as another way of healing. Her current passion for melding her knowledge of Western medical achievements with the wisdom of holistic healing therapies in whole foods, energy psychology and shamanic practices led her to found Wisdom House. There, she offers her advice and expertise to those who seek to join present-day science with the wisdom of natural healing processes.

Jean lives with her musician husband, Jon Menges, and two young children.  She is a co-chapter leader of the NYC Uptown Chapter of the Holistic Moms Network.  Her hobbies and interests include traveling, ballroom dancing, zumba, photography, camping, hiking, scuba diving and philanthropic work.