Does Acupuncture work ?

Does It Work ?

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For specific information detailing some research articles on this condition and Acupuncture, please read below.

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ACUPUNCTURE FOR ARTHRITIS

Acupuncture For Fibromyalgia - Mayo Clinic Study Shows Benefit

Acupuncture reduces symptoms associated with fibromyalgia, according to a Mayo Clinic study involving 50 fibromyalgia patients. Fibromyalgia is an arthritis-related disorder with symptoms of widespread musculoskeletal pain, joint pain and stiffness, and fatigue.

In the randomized, controlled Mayo Clinic study, symptoms of the group receiving acupuncture significantly improved versus the control group.

Acupuncture & Ankylosing Spondylitis

Acupuncture has traditionally been successfully employed in China to treat most illnesses. There is little doubt that acupuncture is an excellent therapy for people suffering with this condition as it works through the nervous system and energy channels in the body. Treatment has been shown to cause the brain to release endorphines and encephalins (natural pain killers), boost the immune system and calm the nervous system.

There are several studies suggesting that acupuncture can be very helpful in the treatment of arthritis and more specifically Ankylosing Spondylitis. For instance, a recent study in Russia (1) found that 73% of patients suffering from Ankylosing Spondylitis benefited from acupuncture treatment.

In another study, 54 Rheumatoid Arthritis sufferers were given acupuncture (warm needling) with Zhuifengsu (Chinese herb)

A study of auriculo-electropuncture (AEP) - treatment of points on the ear - by a double blind method was conducted in Russia with 16 arthritis patients. Not only did they all feel better as a result of the treatment but they all showed "statistically significant" improvement in blood samples. (3)

Traditional acupuncturists treat the whole person rather than a disease and therefore attempt to get to the root cause of the problem rather than treating the symptoms and, like other holistic practitioners, will consider all lifestyle and environmental factors before commencing treatment. Controlled medical studies indicate that acupuncture is an appropriate therapy to adopt in holistic treatment of Ankylosing Spondylitis.

(1) [The combined use of acupuncture and UV irradiation in treating the neurological manifestations of lumbar osteochondrosis] Sochetannoe primenenie akupunktury i oblucheniia UF-luchami v lechenii nevrologicheskikh proiavlenii poiasnichnogo osteokhondroza. Tsarev IuK; Troshina ED Vopr Kurortol Fizioter Lech Fiz Kult (USSR) May-Jun 1991, (3) p25-9,
(2) Effect of acupuncture and point-injection treatment on immunologic function in rheumatoid arthritis. Liu X; Sun L; Xiao J; Yin S; Liu C; Li Q; Li H; Jin B General Hospital of PLA, Beijing. J Tradit Chin Med (CHINA) Sep 1993, 13 (3) p174-8
(3) [Auriculo-electropuncture in rheumatoid arthritis (a double-blind study)] Aurikuloelektropunktura pri revmatoidnom artrite (dvoinoe slepoe ispytanie). Ruchkin IN; Burdeinyi AP Ter Arkh 1987, 59 (12) p26-30

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German Sufferers Refuse Drugs, Ask for Acupuncture Instead

May 29th, 2008 Posted in Acupuncture, Health Reports

The authors of a large German research study comparing the effectiveness of Acupuncture to the drug metoprolol in treating migraine headaches found that German patients suffering from the dreadful pain and misery of migraine “expressed a strong preference for treatment with Acupuncture” rather than risk the potentially life-threatening side-effects of the drug.

“Also, patients receiving metoprolol rather than Acupuncture were considerably more likely to discontinue treatment,” the authors stated.

The headache study was part of a larger nationwide research project to study the effectiveness of Acupuncture for headaches, chronic low back pain, and pain from osteoarthritis.

The results showed that, for all three conditions, Acupuncture produced a clear benefit that lasted for at least several months, and whose benefit was greatest in the osteoarthritis groups. In all three categories, Acupuncture proved extremely effective at reducing pain and inflammation compared to either traditional drug or other treatments, or no treatment at all.

The study was aimed at providing more information for the government to ascertain whether Acupuncture for these conditions should be covered by medical insurance. As a result, insurance in Germany has been extended to include osteoarthritis of the knees.

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Another German team of researchers was able to show evidence that acupuncture used in conjunction with conventional medicines can boost the quality of life of patients suffering from osteoarthritis.

In the study by Dr. Claudia M. Witt of Charite University Medical Center in Berlin, researchers spent three years tracking the treatment results of 3,500 male and female osteoarthritis patients suffering from either hip or knee pain. All the participants were permitted to continue whatever conventional western medical treatments they had been undergoing prior to the onset of the treatment trials for 6 months. Furthermore, over 3,200 of the patients also received up to 15 sessions of needle-stimulation or acupuncture during the first three months of the study except for the remaining 310 patients, who received such treatment only in the final three months of the study period. The experiment showed that patients with chronic osteoarthritis pain who underwent a combination of routine medical care plus acupuncture demonstrated significant quality of life improvements as well as increased mobility and pain reduction above and beyond that experienced by patients who did not receive acupuncture. Osteoarthritis is caused by a progressive degeneration of bone cartilage and is the most common type of arthritis in the United States. Rheumatoid arthritis is an immunological disorder characterized by a painful inflammation of the lining of the joints.
Improvement in osteoarthritis held steady three months after cessation of the sessions for those who began their acupuncture treatments immediately. While those who had begun acupuncture three months into the study period, comparable improvements occurred by the time they ended their sessions at the six-month mark. The study, one of the largest of its kind, demonstrated that acupuncture appeared to be a viable therapeutic option for people suffering from osteoarthritis.