Tara Bianca Rado, MSOM, LAc
Lead Acupuncturist and founder of the practice, Tara began studying traditional forms of medicine in the mid-1990s. Beginning with Asian bodywork, qi gong, and meditation, she later trained in community based western and native herbalism. She worked as massage therapist specializing in shiatsu, tui na and orthopedic massage for close to 20 years before transitioning to Acupuncture and Traditional Chinese Medicine in 2011. Tara spent four years studying at two of California's top professional degree programs for acupuncture and traditional Chinese medicine. She graduated with her master's from the Acupuncture and Integrative Medicine College in Berkeley, and before that her Bachelor's from UC Berkeley in Medical Anthropology.
Tara enjoys bringing resonance, connectivity and celebration to the process of the practicing medicine. She partners with patients to cultivate health while finding levity, humor, comfort and joy in the (sometimes challenging!) healing process.
From acupuncture to herbs to bodywork, Tara is grateful to have the opportunity to fully show up, a curious, diligent researcher who aims to bring heart to each session. While a generalist, Tara really enjoys seeing patients for hormone balance, fertility, pregnancy and postpartum and she's been privileged now to have many patients go through multiple pregnancies and births. She finds it especially gratifying to help patients reduce the amount of medications they are on with the use of Chinese medicine and help women over 35 reclaim their vitality. Recently, she's been deep diving on the classical herbal formulas used for IBS and anxiety, some of the most common issues seen in the clinic.
Currently, Tara is expanding her work through deeper study of the classics, the extra ordinary vessels and complement channels with students of Jeffrey Yuen, and Daoist view, healing and dream with Da Yuan Circle. She co-teaches an online class with her colleague and friend Anne in Berkeley on nourishing life practices where we discover that everyone can connect with the rhythms of nature access the wisdom of Chinese medicine and apply it to their day to day lives, to learn more about that class click here.
Tara believes in making sure all kinds of populations access acupuncture and herbal medicine. She can treat fluently in Portuguese and (so so) Spanish and has worked through out her career in choosing to align with projects and organizations that bring holistic health into more accessible public health spaces.
She is proud to be a part of an ancient medical tradition that's rooted in rigorous, logical application of observation-based natural philosophy and grateful to the teachers and elders in her healing lineages and happy to bring these views into modern life where they are so needed.
In 2023, Tara transformed her Durham private practice into the 501c3 non-profit organization, Durham Integrative Health and Acupuncture Center, moving to officially offer a sliding scale. Previously, she volunteered monthly at Caare in downtown Durham with folks in recovery and under-served elders, among other volunteer projects. She loves working with the LGBTQ community and is educated on the healthcare aspects of gender transitions and respectful of the full diversity of the expression of sex and gender.
In her free time, Tara loves to travel, visit hot springs and spend a lot of time in the kitchen and her perennial flower and herb garden. She lives with her partner Kris, some fur babies and her son, who is a very cool and happy teen studying art at DSA.
A few years ago, Tara discovered a new passion for Chinese Astrology. Also called Zhi Wei Dou Shu or Polestar Astrology, she now offers sessions in it, click here learn more about Tara's Oracular work.