Acupuncture for Pain Relief
In the United States, acupuncture is best known for its ability to treat pain. This is due in part to the large amount of Western research that has demonstrated the effectiveness of acupuncture for pain relief.
From low back pain to knee pain, carpal tunnel to migraine headaches, acupuncture can be a powerful therapy in your recovery. By looking at the whole person, we can also address contributing factors that may be making your pain worse, such as irritability, insomnia and depression.
Pain Relief & Sports Medicine
How does acupuncture treat pain?
Acupuncture is extremely effective at relieving pain and helping the body heal from injury. It raises endorphin levels, thereby diminishing the nervous system’s pain response. It increases blood flow to the local area, aiding the healing process. Finally, acupuncture relaxes muscles and stops spasm.
Acupuncture is great for both acute and chronic pain. Whether this is the first time or the fifth time you’ve thrown out your back or twisted your knee, acupuncture can help you recover quickly.
If it’s good enough for pro athletes…
What do Joe Montana, Matt Hasselbeck, Jason Kidd, Shaquille O’Neal and Maria Sharapova have in common? All of them have used acupuncture to help recover from injuries. Few of us put our bodies under as much stress as pro athletes, but we are all just as prone to injury. Often these injuries never fully heal, leaving many people struggling with chronic aches and pains.
Tackling Arthritis
For many Americans of a certain age, arthritis is simply a fact of life. Does it really have to be that way? In July 2006, the Annals of Internal Medicine published a German study on acupuncture and osteoarthritis of the knee demonstrating the effectiveness of acupuncture. What we in the West call arthritis is known as a “bi syndrome” in Chinese medicine. Bi means painful obstruction. When qi is obstructed instead of flowing smoothly through the body, there is pain. There are several types of bi categorized by their symptoms, but they all tend to settle in the joints. For example, people whose symptoms tend to be worse in damp weather have “damp bi”. People who have swollen, red joints (more common in rheumatoid arthritis) have “hot bi”. Bi syndromes include osteoarthritis as well as rheumatoid arthritis, gout and sciatica. For arthritis, treatment consists of several needles in and around the affected joints, as well as other major points along the channels that pass through the joint. By “opening” the cannel we smooth the flow of qi and blood to alleviate pain.
Acupuncture and Headaches
Acupuncture has been in the news recently for treating both migraines and chronic headaches. From a traditional Chinese medicine perspective, headache can be caused by both external and internal factors (walking outside in cold weather without a hat, for example, versus a headache after a bad fight with a loved one).
Both acupuncture and Chinese herbal medicine can be used for treating headaches. Different headaches respond better to different treatments. In my experience, very chronic headaches that were either caused by trauma, seem to be related to a woman’s menstrual cycle, or are exacerbated by fatigue tend to respond better to a combination of acupuncture and herbal medicine. For headaches that are the result of muscle tension, acupuncture is usually the better choice. To learn about acupressure points you can try at home, click here.