How Can Acupuncture Help?

By Wei Zhao, LAc, CMD

Wei Z. Zhao, CMD

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How Can Acupuncture Help?

As a complement to conventional medicine, acupuncture and traditional Chinese medicine can treat both acute and chronic problems such as headache, migraine, insomnia, chronic pain, digestive problems, weight loss, stopping smoking, and much more.
Traditional Chinese medicine diagnoses illnesses from a different perspective than conventional medicine. The basic theory of traditional Chinese medicine is that we have a life force that energizes all the metabolic activity in our bodies, and this life force (often referred to as energy) is always moving and flowing. When energy flows unimpeded, we are healthy. When energy is blocked, pain and ultimately disease will occur. The strategy of the practitioner of oriental medicine is to find the areas of blocked energy, and to helps remove those blocks, which in turn helps the body return to its natural healthy state.
The traditional Chinese medicine model is often very effective at treating hard to diagnose problems since it does not rely on having to know the biochemical reason for your condition, which is not known in most cases, particularly where blood tests, X – rays or MRI are normal. This difference in perspective means that traditional Chinese medicine can often make sense of illness that Western medicine has difficulty treating. In cases where Western medicine may be limited to prescribing medicine for symptom management, Acupuncture may be able to intervene and encourage the body in a self-healing process.
Acupuncturists are interested in all your symptoms and medical history which helps the practitioner determine the treatment strategy. Acupuncture can help to reduce or eliminate the need for medications for many conditions including narcotics and other pain-relievers, but your physician must always be consulted in such instances.
Acupuncture has much broader applications beyond pain relief. The World Health Organization ( WHO) recognizes the use of acupuncture in the treatment of a wide range of common illnesses including

Acute sinusitis, acute rhinitis, common cold and flu, acute tonsillitis

Acute bronchitis, bronchial asthma

Acute conjunctivitis, central retinitis myopia, cataracts

Toothache, post extraction pain, gingivitis, pharyngitis

Spasms of esophagus, hiccup, fastroptosis, gastritis, gastric hyperacidity, duodenal ulcer, colitis. Dysentery, constipation, diarrhea

Headache and migraine, trigeminal neuralgia, facial palsy, paralysis following a stroke, peripheral neuropathies, sequelae of poliomye-
litis, Menieres disease, bedwetting,
intercostal neuralgia, cervicobrachial syndrome, frozen shoulder, tennis
elbow, sciatica, low back pain,
osteoarthritis, carpal tunnel syndrome, back and knee pain, fibromyalgia, chronic fatigue, sports injuries and pain

Premenstrual syndrome, dysmenorrhea (menstrual cramps), amenorrhea (loss of menstrual period), impotence, infertility, incontinence, prostatitis

Stress, anxiety, depression, insomnia
The World Health Organization Interregional Seminar compiled the above list of illnesses that may benefit from acupuncture treatment. The list is only partial and is based on clinical experience.