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| Photo credit: odt.co.nz |
For roughly 3,000
years, acupuncture, at least in some parts of the world, has been known to be
an effective way to treat pain, among a plethora of other health
problems. It wasn't until the Henry Kissinger excursion to Communist China—when
accompanying journalist, James Reston, contracted appendicitis and received
acupuncture to treat his pain following the
appendectomy—that much of America (and the Western world) first realized how
effective acupuncture and Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) actually were.
The ancient art of
acupuncture uses needles to subcutaneously stimulate points along the qi meridians, currents of 'life-energy' called qi along the surface of the body that correspond to
vital organs. Qi can be divided into yin energy (cold and feminine) and yang energy (hot and masculine), and many other things surprisingly follow this binary system—like types of food and even exercise. Acupuncture promotes a healthy and balanced flow of qi throughout
the body, but can also be used to relieve pain.
In a study done in
2010 by the Department of Diagnostic and Interventional Radiology and
Neuroradiology at the University Hospital in Essen, Germany, lead researcher
Nina Theysohn, MD revealed that, “activation of brain areas involved in pain
perception was significantly reduced or modulated under acupuncture.
The study consisted of
using Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI) to scan the brains of
eighteen volunteers hooked up to electrical pain stimuli, with half of them
receiving an acupuncture treatment. fMRI evaluates blood flow due to changes in
brain metabolic activity. Researchers found that brain scans of those left
untreated were characterized by increased brain activity in the areas
corresponding to pain activation. fMRI scans of those treated with acupuncture
showed reduced activity in those areas of the brain.
The study also
disclosed that acupuncture affected areas of the brain involved in pain
expectation, “similar to a placebo analgesic response,” Theysohn notes. Though
some brain responses to acupuncture might seem indicative of placebo response,
the majority of the findings depict perceivable physiological changes in the
brain--those that are closely related to pain activation.
Placebo or not, fMRIs
are a relatively expensive way to prove something that has already been known
for millennia. The real question lies in how the physiological changes manifest themselves.
Unfortunately for us, acupuncture points and the qi meridians have not yet been
found to correspond to any bodily systems, though some scientists in the U.K. believe they resembles the highly conductive liquid crystalline collagen in
connective tissue. Either way, it should all seem a lot less painful after
reading this. Fear not, trypanophobes!
http://www.naturalnews.com/030736_acupuncture_chronic_pain.html
http://www.webmd.com/pain-management/news/20101130/how-acupuncture-may-alter-perception-of-pain
