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Where do you stand on acupuncture?

Kosh3

New Blood
K
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Dec 22, 2005
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does it have any health effects? if so, is it explainable by science? Its not something I commonly hear railed against by science, like homeopathy is.
 
I’m no expert on the subject, but from what I’ve gathered about acupuncture it works by distracting your attention if anything else. It makes you forget your back hurts, because you too focus on the pain from all the needles stuck in you. Kind of like smashing your thumb with a hammer to forget about your toe after you’ve stubbed it.

There is also the idea about a link between acupuncture and endorphins released in the body. I’m unable to post links still, but a quick google search for acupuncture and endorphins found about 102,000 hits. I’m sure most of those are irrelevant, but you should be able to find some info on this. Endorphins are released in the body as a response to pain, so I’m not sure why acupuncture would work any better then the thumb and hammer method.

The woo component of acupuncture has to do with meridians and the flow of chi. This has about as much evidence to support it as does homeopathy, and is dismissed by science just the same.
 
I less than three logic said:
I’m no expert on the subject, but from what I’ve gathered about acupuncture it works by distracting your attention if anything else. It makes you forget your back hurts, because you too focus on the pain from all the needles stuck in you. Kind of like smashing your thumb with a hammer to forget about your toe after you’ve stubbed it.

There is also the idea about a link between acupuncture and endorphins released in the body. I’m unable to post links still, but a quick google search for acupuncture and endorphins found about 102,000 hits. I’m sure most of those are irrelevant, but you should be able to find some info on this. Endorphins are released in the body as a response to pain, so I’m not sure why acupuncture would work any better then the thumb and hammer method.

The woo component of acupuncture has to do with meridians and the flow of chi. This has about as much evidence to support it as does homeopathy, and is dismissed by science just the same.
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That last bit, I think, is a sine qua non of acupuncture. Without that, it isn't acupuncture; it's just plain old puncture.

Otherwise, homeopaths could take credit for the fact that drinking water is good for you.
 
There are some trials that seem to indicate that acupuncture performs better than placebo for some conditions. However, the conditions it seems to be effective for tend to be those for which the results must be judged on a subjective basis (e.g. pain relief), so this may be to with the difficulty of properly blinding the trial. After all, you're either sticking a needle in or not.

There was also a trial earlier this year which found that although acupuncture (with the needles stuck into the "proper" points) seemed to be effective, "sham" acupuncture (with the needles stuck anywhere else) seemed to work just as well. This certainly seems to indicate that the stuff about the meridians and chi is nonsense.
 
The pain issue seems interesting to me.
I recently had treatment for a bad neck, and some of the time this involved being prodded around the painful area of my neck and chest. I was not amused by this one jot but a friend of mine, a nurse, told me that in her training they covered a thing called 'pain gateways' which is to do with confusing signals in the pain area by stimulating other nerve endings. It's the same reason you rub your elbow after you have bashed it for example.
I have just asked her if sticking needles in the area could have the same effcet to which she has responded 'I suppose it could'.
This 'pain gateway' treatment I had seemed to be effective for a short peroid afterward, but I wasn't convinced that it was any different to the 'smashing your finger with a hammer after stubbing your toe' effect. She assures me that it is. I'll try and get some more info if needed.
 
Smashing your finger would only work by distracting you. The neural gateway method overwhelms your sensory capacity by sending non-pain touch messages that compete with the pain messages in the spinal cord. It is quite different.
 
Non pain touch messages? I am assuming that is literal. It certainly wasn't 'non pain' in my experience. :D
So do you think that acupuncture could work in the same way then?
 
Melendwyr said:
Smashing your finger would only work by distracting you. The neural gateway method overwhelms your sensory capacity by sending non-pain touch messages that compete with the pain messages in the spinal cord. It is quite different.
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The neural gateway method would apply to acupuncture if the needles were stuck in where the pain is located, but then you would just be replacing one pain signal for another. However, that’s not how acupuncture works according to some. I found a site called acupuncturedoc . com (sorry can’t post links yet) run by Henry Fusco OMD, L.Ac. According to the site, OMD stands for Doctor of Oriental Medicine and L.Ac. is Licensed Acupuncturist. On this site I found a map of the meridians of the ear.

Acupuncture points on the ear are effectively used to treat illness. In 1957, Dr. Nogier developed a map of the ear based upon the inverted fetus concept, when he observed the occurrence of scars on the ears of a patient who were successfully treated for sciatic pain by French lay practitioners. Auricular acupuncture is a treatment system based on normalizing the body's pain and dysfunction through stimulation of points on the ear. Resulting amelioration of pain and illness is believed to be through the reticular formation through the sympathetic and parasympathetic nervous systems.
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I don’t see how this would compete with the original pain signals in the spinal cord anymore then smashing your finger.
 

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Besides, most thin neeedles don't cause pain. Ask any diabetic- I give myself four injections a day. Most are painless- except the ones that later bruise. It seems the nerves run along the arteries, so as to have maximum sensation where protection is needed. Hit a nerve= hurts and bleed internally, don't hit a nerve, no pain at all. Perhaps 'meridians' are lines of low sensation? And, if no pain, no gateway effect, so placebo effect only? Knowing needles are stuck into you must kick in a large psychological component...

I'm still chuckling overr the 'inverted fetus' plan...such WOOO!
 
I think acupuncture does something, well maybe not acupuncture but jabbing needles into someone causes an effect (DUH) The whole idea of meridians chi etc is total BS. Does it do all the wondrous things it is claimed to? No
 
Hey I Less Than Three

Inverted fetus....wow.

Is Clear Lake in Northern MN? I grew up in Minnesota. I traded cold weather for bible belt idiocy. I still like the weather better, though. :)

Oh, and for the record, I don't know how acupuncture works because...(drumroll) it DOESN'T...

Steph
 
Many years ago I tried acupuncture. Now, before you write me off as a woo ridden fool, allow me to explain.

I had, and still have, back problems from the days when I used to jump out of aeroplanes and had a particularly bad opening. This causes persistent low level pain at random intervals. I had tried pretty much everything else I could think of and allowed a relatively wooish cousin to talk me into going for some acupuncture.

As far as I can determine the acupuncture treatment had no effect whatsoever.

BTW, the needles did not hurt.
 
Kosh3 said:
does it have any health effects? if so, is it explainable by science? Its not something I commonly hear railed against by science, like homeopathy is.
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A few good quality clinical trials have reported its effectiveness in low back pain and nausea/vomiting. There is not a scrap of evidence that the underlying mechanism is anything to do with qi, which doesn't exist. My guess is that it will turn out to be a manifestation of a known phenomenon, not something new to science. The 2 best sites I know for getting quick answers on such questions are Clinical Evidence and Bandolier. However the last time I looked Bandolier was not quite as up to date with the latest studies. On the other hand, it presents the data more effectively.
 
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