Acupuncture Works!
"The superior physician helps a patient retain their health and advises them before they are ill. To wait until sickness has arrived is like digging a well after you are thirsty."
-Classical Chinese Saying
Acupuncture is a health science, which is used to successfully treat both pain and dysfunction in the body. Oriental medicine, of which acupuncture is just on modality, began over 6000 years ago. Its use spread throughout ancient Egypt, the Middle East and later to Europe as merchants and missionaries to China told of the amazing discoveries the people of the Orient had developed. Acupuncture did not become widely used in the United States until after President Nixon opened diplomatic relations with China in 1971. Medical historians have noted that more people have benefited from Oriental medicine over the course of the last 5000 years than the combined total of all other healing sciences, both ancient and modern.
Oriental physicians discovered an energy (called Qi, pronounced “chee”), which flows from just below the skin to all the internal organs and structure. This energy worked in combination with the circulatory, nervous, digestive, endocrine and other body systems |
to increase the health of each individual. According to the physicians who developed the practice of acupuncture, when this vital energy becomes blocked or diminished, pain and disease can develop. Stimulation of acupuncture points by inserting fine needles under the skin can restore the harmony of the Qi, which in turn reduces pain and restores health.
The World Health Organization, working in conjunction with the International Training Center of the Shanghai College of Traditional Chinese Medicine has reported that acupuncture is effective in treating: acute and chronic pain syndromes; migraines, tension, and cluster headache; trigeminal neuralgia, bladder dysfunction; all types of back pain and sciatica; osteo- and rheumatoid arthritis; tennis elbow; carpal tunnel syndrome; stomach problems; allergies; hypertension; menstrual irregularities and many other “internal” conditions. Acupuncture is also widely accepted as an effective treatment in the treatment of addictions.
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In July 1997, a news brief from the National Acupuncture and Oriental Medicine Alliance stated that acupuncture is used in more than 20 states in over 300 drug dependency programs have lower recidivism rates and lower re-arrest rates due to drug related charges than those not treated with acupuncture. A study in five states showed efficacy and cost savings of acupuncture in the medical setting. OF the patients treated with acupuncture, 91.5% reported disappearance or improvement of symptoms, 84% said they have fewer treatments, 79% said the use fewer prescription drugs and 70% of those to whom surgery had been recommended avoided having that surgery due to acupuncture treatment.
While acupuncture is the most well known of the Oriental Medicine modalities, practitioners are trained in many other therapeutic tools. The Chinese pharmacopoeia includes over 2000 herbs and 500 herbal combinations. Oriental massage techniques include shiatsu and tui na.
Therapeutic exercise called Qi Gong and Tai Ji can help the individual resist disease and improve overall health. And Oriental dietetic counseling is used in both the treatment and prevention of disease. |
