(By Medical Research Center News Service, 14/06/2007) TCM Advisory -- There are estimates that suggest that 80% of the world uses alternative treatment as their primary means of medical care. Therefore, it is timely and appropriate to introduce acupuncture which has been used successfully for several thousand years in China and other Asian countries.

Acupuncture has evoked a lot of public interest and has had a remarkable growth and following in the United States and Europe. The use of acupuncture was documented in Europe in the 19th and 20th centuries. Acupuncture and its related theories have grown rapidly and became important to the Western health care system, for the simple reason that it works. This fact was further expressed by the First Consensus Development Conference on Acupuncture held by US National Institutes of Health (NIH). The chairman of the expert panel, Dr. Ramsay concluded that data supporting acupuncture are "as strong as those for many accepted Western medical therapies".

Acupuncture is a part of Traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) used to prevent and treat diseases and has been in existence for at least 2000 years. Acupuncture is based on the concepts of Yin, Yang, Qi (pronounced as Chee), and meridians. The treatment is applied by piercing the skin with very fine sharp needles. Acupuncture is defined as "puncturing with a sharp instrument", but the original term in Chinese includes both "needling" and "moxibustion" which is a specific method to burn herbs, usually mugwort.

According to TCM theory there are patterns of Qi, which is vital energy or life force that flows through pathways in the body called meridians. Any potential disruptions of the flow of this Qi flow are believed to be responsible for diseases. Acupuncture can therefore be used to correct imbalances of the flow of the Qi by stimulating the applied needles or by applying moxibustion at the identified acupuncture points. These points are the locations where the Qi coursing through the meridians is transported to the body surface. There are 361 "regular meridian points" which fall on the 14 main meridians. The performance of acupuncture involves syndrome differentiation, which is based on the diagnostic principle of Chinese medicine. TCM uses four major diagnostic methods: inspection, auscultation and olfaction, interrogation and palpation. Decisions must also to be made about depth and direction of needle insertion, type of needle manipulations, duration that needles are left in place, and the frequency and total number of treatment.

The Qi response (needling sensation) is a crucial factor in achieving acupuncture effects. It involves the feeling of "soreness, numbness, expansion, heaviness" by the patient. At the same time, the doctor should feel heaviness and tension around the needles. There is very few known side effect related to acupuncture treatment as to date.

(tcmadvisory.com)