Scorpiotiger, thanks for asking this good question. It needs a bit more than two sentences to do justice to us, but I can't do that until Thursday or Friday. I just wanted to let you know that my lack of response is not a sign of me running away from it!!

ok, Xania, I am looking forward to your teaching us about acupuncture.

but in the meantime, here are 2 more studies about acupuncture where acupuncture proved better than western medicine for these particular problems:

Here are two clinical trials testing eastern energy medicine against western drugs... gasp. guess these researchers don't agree with ralph's opinion that energy medicine can't be tested by traditional means.

Comparative observation on acupuncture and western medicine for treatment of minimal brain dysfunction


Study on mechanisms of electroacupuncture treatment of acute gouty arthritis

ST,

You may find this to be a good resource for acupuncture-science:

https://www.liebertonline.com/action/...single&x=0&y=0

700 hits to papers in this medical journal.

Here are a few I found to be rather interesting:

https://www.liebertonline.com/doi/abs...acupuncture%29

https://www.liebertonline.com/doi/abs...acupuncture%29

https://www.liebertonline.com/doi/abs...acupuncture%29

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I think I can best explain what I do by describing one patient and one treament from a day, rather than generalise about non-specifics.

A few days ago Katherine age 60 came for a rouitne treatment to try to help her trigeminal neuralgia, which she has had most of her life. As a baby and small child she was physically and mentally abused by her mother. She suffered brain damage from being shaken, as a baby.
She worked as an auxiliary nurse in her younger working life. She married and had three children. Following the birth of the first child the head pains started. Over the years she saw physicians, psychiatrists and finally a neurosurgeon. He was able to release some of the scar tissue in the occiput, and she had some relief from the pains for a time.
But of course, surgery causes its own scars and the pains returned. For some years now, she has been taking synthetic narcotic analgesics, anti-inflammatories, something for blood pressure and a statin.
Kathleen has been having acupuncture every two weeks for about ten years now. She says it helps, but doesn't cure, the head pains, helps with general health and well-being, and "It helps to keep me sane."
At the last visit I used points to help control the head pain Those points are "symptomatic treatment" and not intended to address any constitutional imbalance. Such a treatment is usually intended to drain or disperse energy which is blocked or not moving freely, as can be imagined in the case of scar tissue.
As there had been a recent virus infection, which left her fatigued and a poor colour, I added points to tonify her general energy and help recovery.

Needle technique. The needles used for dispersing or draining energy are inserted to the appropriate depth and left in place for about 20 minutes. As there is usually a lot of conversation and laughter between us, needles placed in Stomach 4, at the corner of the mouth, often fall out and that leads to more laughter as we try to find the fallen needle.

I used two points on the back - bilaterally, so that's four needles - to aid recovery and improve overall energy. Those needles are turned clockwise 180 degree to induce a tonifying action. There can be a lift and thrust movement, too, but I didn't use it on this occasion.
Next was a point in the hand at the base of the thumb - Large Intestine four. That point directs energy to the face which is where much of the trigeminal pain is felt.

There is an almost unlimited variety of conditions to be treated, and as much variety in the people who come for treatment. Of course, there are those who need medical attention and I always advise patients to see a doctor if it is obvious that is called for. There have been times when someone wanted help with feeling tired, and it was clear from signs and symptoms there there was an untreated heart condition. I hope she visited her doctor. Some do and some don't.

In another post, another day, I will describe more people and more treatments.

Here is a site which illustrates the location of acupuncture points.

https://www.yinyanghouse.com/acupunct...ridian_graphic

this is a great site, Xania.. I love the way they've made it easy to find the information for the different points.

here is the main page (like a table of contents for the body):
https://www.yinyanghouse.com/acupunct...l_applications

so, I notice they say for LI4.. acne. should I tell my teenage son to press there to help improve his skin?

actually, I have a dermawand. I wonder if he tried zapping that point, if he would see a change. He used to roll his eyes when I would suggest certain things to him, but he now uses quite a few things I've mentioned to him. (some of them I thought were weird, but they seemed to work for him).

I will assume the conception vessel are those points that govern the sexual part of your being.

what does the "governing vessel" do? is it mostly to do with the mind?

Xania, are the majority of your patients looking for pain relief? Would you say this is the area where acupuncture is good?

is the "lift and thrust" to produce more stimulation at that point? or do you just use this on patients that don't pay their bills? JUST KIDDING, XANIA!!!

thank you, Xania. This is very interesting!

Another problem - another treatment.

A 59 year old male needing help with pain in a frozen shoulder.
Robert is a healthy looking, upright, intelligent man, who has been a police officer for most of his working life. Four months ago he had a sudden angina attack and had a stent in a heart artery. He is recovering well from that. Unfortunately, he was taking a statin medication, which he stopped last week because of the risk of muscle damage complicating his already frozen shoulder.

This acupuncture treatment was 90% pain relief and 10% energy correction. Because of the angina and now the "frozen shoulder" his energy is saying quite clearly that there is a condition of stagnation and obstruction, so some of the points were intended to promote movement of Qi as well as movement of blood.
Liver 3 and Spleen 10 are good for "movement".
Other ponts for the shoulder condition - Gall bladder 21. Small intestine 11, 12. Large intestine 15.. And some Ah Shi points. His neck and shoulder muscles were bunched up and felt very hard to me, while I was palpating for the points.
After the first treatment he had the first full night's sleep in a month, so he was pleased with this treatment and came back for more.

Now, I want to try to learn something from him - he said he was told that there is a correlation between angina and frozen shoulder. This is news to me! If anyone knows more about it, please tell us here.

Another new thing I have learned this week is a neurological condition named Arnold Chiari syndrome. A 60 year old woman wanted to find out if acupuncture can help her pains and tingling in her face, neck arms caused by nerve damage from this condition
https://www.spinalcord.ar.gov/Publica...20/fact16.html
I don't know the answer, and told her that no one else could say for sure. Did she want to try?
Yes, she did, so we did a first treatment. I didn't want to stimulate much at this session, so I used very few points - none near the site of the lesion, or the surgery. She had a decompression of the foramen magnum a few months ago That helped a lot, but she feels that the condtion is progressing again, and there isn't room for another decompression. I shall see her again next week and report progress, or lack of it.

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This is pretty impressive. Thanks for posting this, Harry.

more on the DeQi sensation that Xania talked about:

https://www.biomedcentral.com/1472-6882/7/33

NIH Consensus statement.. even they say it definitely helps with chemotherapy pain and nausea. So, imo, it has a chance of becoming accepted complementary medicine for people undergoing chemo.

https://consensus.nih.gov/1997/1997Acupuncture107PDF.pdf

Thanks for finding those reports, Scorpiotiger. The Deqi report is comprehensive!

now.. what they need to do next, is test to see if these spots where the deqi occurs are also the spots where there is a drop in skin resistance.

or for that matter, to just test in general how these spots differ from the surrounding areas..

the benefit is if they could find some consistent difference, some consistent way of zeroing in on the right acupuncture spots for a person (without having to poke them repeatedly.. a good benefit right there), then perhaps there would be more consistency in the testing of acupuncture.