Melinda Iglesias Wheeler is a licensed acupuncturist, herbalist, and somatic therapist practicing in Portland, Oregon. Mixed, queer, and a mother, she brings her whole self to this work — and holds space for patients to do the same. She founded Malachite Medicine after years of practice at Dragon Rises Center for Wholeness, carrying forward everything she was trained in while creating a practice of her own: more personal, more continuous, and organized around the kind of care that allows real healing to take root.

TRAINING & MENTORSHIP

Melinda’s formation as a practitioner was shaped not only by rigorous academic training, but by years of mentorship within the Shen-Hammer lineage — one of the most clinically precise pulse diagnosis traditions in East Asian medicine. That mentorship taught her to listen deeply: to the pulse, to the body’s patterning, to what a patient brings into the room beyond what they can put into words.

She holds a Doctor of Science in Oriental Medicine, is nationally board certified through the NCCAOM, and is licensed in the state of Oregon. She is a Certified Instructor of Shen-Hammer Contemporary Oriental Medicine Pulse Diagnosis. Her post-graduate training spans classical herbalism and medicinary practice, Hakomi somatic psychotherapy, Primary Attachment Psychotherapy, Lifespan Integration, and parts work. She continues her own study and supervision, because she believes a practitioner who keeps learning brings something different into the room.

PHILOSOPHY

Melinda approaches every patient from a foundational belief: that the body has an innate capacity to heal, and that symptoms are not problems to be suppressed but messages to be understood. In East Asian medicine, those messages live in the body’s channels — a vast watershed of interconnected pathways whose health reflects and determines your overall wellbeing. When the channels flow freely, you experience vitality. When they become obstructed or depleted, your body begins to signal.

Her work — through acupuncture, herbalism, bodywork, and somatic therapy — is to restore that flow. Not to override the body’s intelligence, but to work with it. To listen carefully to its patterning, honor the aspects of physiology and pathology that are present, and support patients in moving through disease and toward a life they feel genuinely at home in.

East Asian medicine has always understood what modern neuroscience is now confirming: that the body, the nervous system, and consciousness are not separate. Tending to one means tending to all. This integrated view is what makes the medicine so effective for complex, chronic, or multifaceted conditions — and it is the lens through which Melinda holds every patient she works with.

IN THE TREATMENT ROOM

Patients often describe Melinda as someone who makes them feel genuinely heard — and who notices things they hadn’t thought to mention. She brings deep intuition to her diagnostic work and an unhurried quality to her presence. People come in feeling like a collection of problems and leave feeling like a whole person. That is the goal.

Every patient is welcomed at Malachite Medicine exactly as they are. There is no judgment about how long something has been going on, or how many other approaches have been tried. You bring what you have. Melinda brings her full attention.

CREDENTIALS

Licensed Acupuncturist (L.Ac.), State of Oregon

Doctor of Science in Oriental Medicine (DSc.OM)

Board Certified — NCCAOM

Certified Instructor, Shen-Hammer Contemporary Oriental Medicine Pulse Diagnosis

Classical East Asian Herbalism — formulation and medicinary

Hakomi Somatic Psychotherapy

Primary Attachment Psychotherapy