People have been turning to acupuncture for thousands of years to treat a host of ailments and to improve overall health. Since today’s mainstream medicine achieved prominence, the practice of acupuncture has been the subject of ridicule.
Nevertheless, the practice has maintained a solid following in the United States and other western countries since it was imported. It is a service that is frequently offered in chiropractic offices, for example, and is used to ease pain, treat depression, fight acne, promote weight loss, lower blood pressure and much more.
Acupuncture works, practitioners believe, by manipulating the life energy known as qi, allowing it to flow properly through the body. We do not know what qi is, but those who swear by acupuncture say they can feel it in their bodies. Some even believe they can manipulate it at will.
All that aside, a new meta-analysis has been published in the Journal of Pain which shows that acupuncture has a measurable beneficial effect on patients suffering from chronic pain. Not only that, but it also shows that the effects of acupuncture are lasting.
The researchers looked at more than 20,000 cases spanning a total of 39 clinical trials. They studied cases where people were suffering from pain in the neck, back, shoulder, or who experienced severe headaches or pain from osteoarthritis for four weeks or longer.
The subjects were divided into a test group and a control group. The test group received acupuncture while the control group either got a treatment other than acupuncture or a fake version of acupuncture. The patients received between 6 and 15 total treatments each.
The results were pretty hard to misinterpret. Nearly 50% of patients experienced an average of a 35% reduction in pain symptoms.
Over the years, practitioners have found that acupuncture is best suited for the treatment of pain in cases like those mentioned above- cases of chronic pain involving the spine and central nervous system, especially along the neck, back, hips, and shoulders.
Patients who receive the treatment report lasting improvements to their pain conditions as well as to their overall sense of well-being. In the cases where acupuncture fails to treat the chronic pain, patients still tend to leave the treatment with a greater sense of ease and wellness.
It’s important to note the fact that the acupuncture treatments studied in the research project were those that come from the Chinese version of the practice. In Chinese acupuncture, the needles are inserted slightly deeper than they are in practices that come from other regions, and the needles are twirled slightly or an electrical charge is applied.
In Japanese acupuncture, the needles are inserted less deeply and are not electrified or twirled. In Korean acupuncture, the needles are only inserted into the hands and feet of the patient. The practice originated in China, and it might be safe to say that the cultures of the surrounding regions have adopted it, but have not duplicated it. This would explain the fact that practitioners of the Chinese method of acupuncture tend to get better results.
