Acupuncture Tops Drugs for Sty Treatment

New research finds acupuncture more effective than medications for the treatment of a sty (hordeolum), a red lump near the edge of the eyelid. A total of 102 sty patients participated in the study. They were randomized into two separate groups. 

Group 1 received acupuncture and group 2 was given local applications of the antibiotics levofloxacin and erythromycin. Both groups also received the application of a warm compress to the affected eyelid.

Comparisons were made in pain reduction and swelling size reduction. All investigators evaluating the improvements did not know which group each patient participated in as a measure to avoid bias. On day 3 after treatment, the acupuncture group showed a 64.7% improvement and the medication group showed a 41.2% improvement. On day 5, the acupuncture group demonstrated a 90.2% improvement and the medication group showed a 62.7% improvement. On day 7, the acupuncture group demonstrated a 94.1% improvement and the medication group showed an 80.4% improvement. The researchers concluded that the data showed that acupuncture produced superior results to medications for the treatment of a sty. They noted that acupuncture for the treatment of an external sty is effective for the relief of pain and reduction of sty size. The researchers also note that acupuncture shortens the duration of the disease.

Getting to the Point
The only acupuncture point used in the study was Erjian (Tip of the Ear, M-HN-10). This acupuncture point is located by folding the ear forward and is then found at the apex of the outer ear at the upper helix. The folding technique involves covering the posterior aspect of the upper helix over the anterior aspect such that the posterior aspect covers the anterior aspect of the upper helix entirely. The investigators chose to use the bleeding technique and removed between 5 and 6 drops of blood each treatment from Erjian.

The first historical record of the Erjian’s use comes from the Ming Dynasty. The great scholar Yang Ji Zhou covered its use for the treatment of superficial visual obstructions by stimulation with moxibustion in the Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) classic work The Great Compendium of Acupuncture and Moxibustion. Since its very first mention, Erjian has been ascribed the functions of clearing heat, dissipating swelling and benefitting the eyes and throat. Traditional indications for the use of Erjian are redness, swelling and pain of the eyes. In addition, superficial visual obstructions, throat pain and swelling, unilateral headache, fever and mumps are indicated.

Reference:
Qi, H. F., J. F. Zhao, Y. Wang, and X. Y. Chen. "[Randomized controlled clinical trials for treatment of external sty with ear-apex blood-letting]." Zhen ci yan jiu= Acupuncture research/[Zhongguo yi xue ke xue yuan Yi xue qing bao yan jiu suo bian ji] 38, no. 2 (2013): 148-151.

Military Pokes Holes In Acupuncture Skeptics' Theory

In a fluorescent-lit exam room, Col. Rochelle Wasserman sticks ballpoint-size pins in the ears of Sgt. Rick Remalia.

Remalia broke his back, hip and pelvis during a rollover caused by a pair of rocket-propelled grenades in Afghanistan. He still walks with a cane and suffers from mild traumatic brain injury. Pain is an everyday occurrence, which is where the needles come in.

"I've had a lot of treatment, and this is the first treatment that I've had where I've been like, OK, wow, I've actually seen a really big difference," he says.

'Let's Give It A Shot'

Army doctors have been told by the top brass to rethink their "pill for every ill" approach to treating pain. For the 47,000 troops who've been wounded in Iraq and Afghanistan, some of the new options include less tried and true methods, like massage and chiropractic treatments. The military hopes to win over skeptics, many of them in uniform.

Wasserman is the top doctor for the Warrior Transition Battalion at Fort Campbell, Ky. To her own surprise, she's also now the unit's physician trained to do acupuncture.

"I actually had a demonstration of acupuncture on me, and I'm not a spring chicken," she says, "and it didn't make me 16 again, but it certainly did make me feel better than I had, so I figured, hey ... let's give it a shot with our soldiers here."

In recent years, military doctors have turned to acupuncture in special pain clinics and for troops in battle zones. Last year, the Army surgeon general began making the alternative treatments more widely available.

Steering Away From Painkillers

Remalia says his headaches have disappeared, and he's relying less on his cabinet full of pain medication. To Col. Kevin Galloway, that's mission accomplished. He's in charge of carrying out recommendations from the Army's Pain Management Task Force, which focused heavily on unconventional therapies.

"You can throw fairly cheap pharmaceuticals at the problem now and push the problem to someone else later if you're not really working on what the genesis of the pain is," he says.

Galloway says if soldiers get hooked on high-powered painkillers, the Department of Veterans Affairs may be dealing with the side effects for decades to come. Already, at least 40 percent of veterans entering the VA system are coping with pain.

'Quack-Ademic' Medicine

New academic studies from places like Duke University back up acupuncture as an alternative to medication.

But Harriet Hall, a former Air Force flight surgeon, shares the skepticism found in many corners of the medical community.

"We call that 'quack-ademic' medicine when it gets into medical schools," she says.

The way she reads the science, acupuncture does no more than a sugar pill. To offer a placebo, she says, is unethical.

"The military has led the way on trauma care and things like that, but the idea that putting needles in somebody's ear is going to substitute for things like morphine is just ridiculous," Hall says.

A Chance At Normalcy

As some top medical officers put it, though, there's nothing like pain to make someone open-minded. Staff Sgt. Jermaine Louis says he's tried it all.

"Physical therapy, occupational therapy, PTSD group, anger group, stress group ... everything," he says.

Louis is trying to overcome a traumatic brain injury that followed him home from Iraq five years ago. He's still dependent on medication, and the soon-to-retire infantryman says he's scared.

"[Scared] that I have to be on it for the rest of my life and [that] I will get accustomed just to taking them, and I don't want to be that way," Louis says. "I want to be normal like everybody else."

But if being normal depends on regular acupuncture treatments, the Defense Department has more convincing to do. TRICARE — the military's own health plan for service members and retirees — still doesn't cover acupuncture.

Acupuncture Channels Transmit Electricity- New Study

A new study finds unique electrical phenomena through acupuncture meridians, channels. Researchers discovered that needling proximal acupuncture points causes significantly increased bioelectric amplitudes in distal acupuncture points along the same meridian. The same was not true of non-acupuncture points in similar regions of the body. The researchers note that the measurements indicate “electrophysiological uniqueness in the form of a greater bioelectric potential amplitude when a proximal acupoint is stimulated and the response is measured at a distal acupoint along the same meridian.”

Acupuncture point P4 was stimulated with an acupuncture needle. The bioelectric potential was measured at acupuncture point P6 to determine if needling P4 elicited a change in the current. Non-acupuncture control points were also needled at nearby points on test subjects. The amplitude of induced signals at acupuncture point P6 showed significant increases on the test subjects whereas the non-acupuncture points did not have the same effects. The researchers measured that “a signal with statistically greater amplitude appeared only when a verum acupuncture point was stimulated and when the distal measurement was recorded on the acupuncture meridian.”

The researchers note that this type of bioelectric investigation is uncommon because most bioelectric investigations of acupuncture points and their meridians measure electrical impedances whereas this study measured endogenous bioelectric potentials. The electrical impedance studies involve the application of an externally generated electric current applied to an acupuncture point with subsequent measurements at other acupuncture points and regions of the body. This study, however, did not involve any externally generated currents. Rather, the current was naturally produced by the body as a result of manual acupuncture point needling. The “endogenous bioelectric potentials”, note the researchers, reflect changes in amplitudes without conflation with external currents. In this way, the researchers suggest that this new finding is more accurate. Another difficulty with prior bioelectric investigations was reading only high frequency currents. In this study, slower frequencies were also examined and the equipment was able to detect significant changes as a result of acupuncture point stimulation.

Reference: Spaulding, Keith, Andrew Ahn, and Agatha P. Colbert. "Acupuncture Needle Stimulation Induces Changes in Bioelectric Potential." Medical Acupuncture (2013). New England School of Acupuncture, Newton, Massachusetts. Martinos Center for Biomedical Imaging, Charlestown, Massachusetts. Researcher, St. Augustine, Florida.

- See more at: http://www.healthcmi.com/acupuncturist-news-online/767-bioelectricp6p4#sthash.Q8JiNINT.dpuf

New MRI Images Reveal Acupuncture Point Specificity

New MRI research concludes that needling acupuncture points causes specific brain patterns associated with the treatment of specific diseases. Investigators compared two acupuncture points on the foot with a nearby sham acupuncture point. They discovered that the true acupuncture points consistently elicited specific brain responses in regions associated with their Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) medical indications and functions for therapeutic effects.


Acupuncture Model
Acupuncture points LR3 (Taichong) and ST44 were compared with a sham point located between the two points. MRI scans revealed that LR3 uniformly stimulates specific regions of the cerebrum as does acupuncture point ST44. Although physically located in close proximity, each acupuncture point elicited its own, unique fMRI response in the brain. The researchers note that, “Acupuncture at adjacent acupoints elicits distinct cerebral activation patterns, and those specific patterns might be involved in the mechanism of the specific therapeutic effects of different acupoints.”

The researchers noted that LR3 and ST44 stimulated distinct brain response patters and also shared some common areas of cerebral activation. Unique to LR3 was its stimulation of the middle occipital gyrus, an area related to the visual cortex. Acupuncture point LR3, although located on the foot, is traditionally indicated for the treatment of eye disorders within the Traditional Chinese Medicine system. The researchers note that this MRI finding is not isolated to this study. Other research also finds visual cortex activation elicited by needling foot acupuncture points that are specifically indicated for the treatment of eye disorders.

LR3 also activated the medial frontal gyrus, superior parietal lobe, thalamus and the limbic system. These areas are associated with the physiological processes of both pain and paralysis. LR3, according to TCM theory, is indicated for the treatment of pain and paralysis. The researchers note that, “The results confirmed the view that therapeutic
effects of acupuncture may work through the central nervous system pathway.”

The study notes that Traditional Chinese Medicine indications for acupuncture point ST44 are for the treatment of toothaches, sore throat, stomachache, swelling and pain of the foot. MRI imaging demonstrated that ST44 activated areas of the brain associated with pain processing: superior and inferior frontal gyrus, secondary somatosensory area. The researchers note that, “Our results provide supplementary neuroimaging evidence for the existence of acupoint specificity.”

This investigation concurs with another recent finding. Researchers concluded that acupuncture points CV12 and UB32 specifically stimulate the heart, stomach and intestines consistent with their TCM indications and functions. The study used electrogastrogram and HRV readings to verify the results. Another related MRI study of acupuncture points TB5 (Waiguan), GB34 (Yanglingquan) and GB20 (Fengchi) finds that these acupuncture points traditionally used for the treatment of migraines activate specific brain regions associated with pain reductions. PET-CT neuroimaging revealed that acupuncture “induce(s) different cerebral glucose metabolism changes in pain-related brain regions and reduce(s) intensity of pain” for patients with migraines.

A wealth of recent MRI research has measured acupuncture point specificity. University of California School of Medicine (Irvine) researchers analyzed MRI based acupuncture studies and concluded that, “Recent evidence shows that stimulation of different points on the body causes distinct responses in hemodynamic, fMRI and central neural electrophysiological responses.” The MRI findings demonstrated that “stimulation of different sets of acupoints leads to disease-specific neuronal responses, even when acupoints are located within the same spinal segment.” The culmination of this research helps us to gain greater understanding as to the mechanisms by which acupuncture exerts its effective actions.

References:
Liu, Hua, Jian-Yang Xu, Lin Li, Bao-Ci Shan, Bin-Bin Nie, and Jing-quan Xue. "fMRI Evidence of Acupoints Specificity in Two Adjacent Acupoints." Evidence-Based Complementary and Alternative Medicine 2013 (2013).

Minagawa, Munenori, Yasuzo Kurono, Tatsuyo Ishigami, Atsushi Yamada, Toshinori Kakamu, Ryoichi Akai, and Junichiro Hayano. "Site-specific organ-selective effect of epifascial acupuncture on cardiac and gastric autonomic functions." Autonomic Neuroscience (2013).

A PET-CT study on specificity of acupoints through acupuncture treatment on migraine patients. Jie Yang1, Fang Zeng1, Yue Feng1,Li Fang1, Wei Qin2, Xuguang Liu1, Wenzhong Song3, Hongjun Xie3 , Ji Chen1, Fanrong Liang1.

Point specificity in acupuncture. Chinese Medicine 2012, 7:4 doi:10.1186/1749-8546-7-4. Emma M Choi, Fang Jiang, John C Longhurst. ?Susan Samueli Center for Integrative Medicine, Department of Medicine, School of Medicine, University of California, Irvine CA.

- See more at: http://www.healthcmi.com/acupuncturist-news-online/764-mrilr4st44#sthash.0p2iSA9k.dpuf

A great article from the Stars and Stripes

LAS VEGAS — Sandra Moncayo carries the pain with her everywhere she goes.

It starts in her head — a constant throbbing that feels as if her head is giving birth to her brain – and works its way down her spine, tying her neck, shoulders and back muscles into knots. Insomnia sets in, then nausea, and then anger.

The retired Navy chief petty officer suffers from a tumor in her brain. While radiology removed most of the tumor in 2007, an inoperable section remains wrapped around an artery in the brain. It is the source behind the pain — her constant companion.

She tried medication, but the pills made her a zombie. She tried to live with it, but the pain was too excruciating. Her faith told her there was a reason she was still alive, but she wondered how she would ever be able to function again in life and as a middle-aged mother to her six children.

Then her doctor recommended acupuncture. Moncayo leapt at the opportunity, desperate to try anything. When the first needles went in her ear, relief was instantaneous. She passed out in exhaustion. She became hooked.

Now Moncayo sits in a patient’s room for her regular acupuncture treatment at Mike O’Callaghan Federal Medical Center situated on Nellis Air Force Base on a mid-May morning. The military hospital has become an unlikely center where Eastern and Western medicine collide. It’s a place where military doctors combine the holistic practice of acupuncture with their medical expertise to treat pain for countless airmen and veterans — a practice that has become more commonplace in the military over the past eight years.

To read the rest of this article, click on the following link:

http://www.stripes.com/news/us/acupuncture-now-a-staple-at-nellis-afb-hospital-1.222601#