What Acupuncture can help with
“There are no incurable diseases, only incurable people”
~ Tibetan proverb ~
There is a large body of evidence to support the effectiveness of acupuncture, along with the anecdotal evidence of many people who have had treatment.
The British Acupuncture Council has compiled the evidence for over 60 conditions, which can be found on this page on their website, using the alphabetic search bar on the right of the screen. These conditions include:
Chronic pain, including back pain. Acupuncture is now recommended by the National Institute for Care and Health Excellence (NICE), the organisation responsible for providing guidance to the healthcare sector, as a first line treatment option before pharmacological prescriptions.
Arthritis
Anxiety & depression
Respiratory conditions such as asthma and COPD
Fatigue & insomnia
Digestive issues such as IBS
Migraines and headaches
Sinusitis and allergic rhinitis
Women's health issues such as endometriosis and painful peroids
Infertility
Menopausal symptoms
I personally have experience and have had success with treating symptoms related Long Covid, and it is also a particular interest area of mine having written a dissertation on it. As this is such a new condition there is limited research currently to highlight the efficacy of acupuncture for Long Covid symptoms but studies are underway.
Acupuncture is also very good at treating symptoms which evade formal Western diagnosis as it looks at patterns and underlying imbalances. Many people turn to acupuncture when they have struggled to get a Western diagnosis or to find relief from symptoms using more conventional medical treatments.
The World Health Organisation (WHO) issued a consensus statement which has indications “for which acupuncture has been proved through clinical trials to be an effective treatment”:
Respiratory: allergic rhinitis
Gastrointestinal: biliary colic, dysentery, epigastralgia (in peptic ulcer, acute and chronic gastritis and gastrospasm), morning sickness, nausea and vomiting
Pain: facial pain, headache, knee pain, low back pain, neck pain, dental and temporomandibular pain, periarthritis of the shoulder, postoperative pain, rheumatoid arthritis, sciatica, sprain, tennis elbow
Gynaecological/renal: colic, primary dysmenorrhoea, induction of labour, correction of malposition of foetus
Cardiovascular: hypertension, hypotension, strokePsychiatric: depression (including depressive neurosis and depression following stroke)
General: adverse reactions to radiotherapy and/or chemotherapy, leukopenia
The WHO also issued a list of indications for which “a therapeutic effect of acupuncture has been shown, but further evidence is needed”:
Respiratory: asthma, post-extubation in children, whooping cough
Ear, nose, and throat, eye and mouth: eye pain, epistaxis (nose bleeds), herpes zoster, Menier’s disease, sore throat, Sjogren syndrome
Gastrointestinal: cholecystitis, cholelithiasis, gastrokinetic disturbance,
hepatitis B carrier status, ulcerative colitisNeurolo-psychiatric: anxiety, Bell’s palsy, depression, facial spasm, neuralgia, reflex sympathetic dystrophy, dementia, schizophrenia, Tourette syndrome
Pain: abdominal pain, cancer pain, earache, fibromyalgia, gouty arthritis, osteoarthritis, radicular pain, spinal pain, pain due to endoscopic examination, stiff neck, temporomandibular joint dysfunction, Tietze syndrome
Skin: acne vulgaris, neurodermatitis, pruritus
Gynaecological/renal: female infertility, female urethral syndrome, hypoovarianism, labour pain, overactive bladder, polycystic ovary syndrome, premenstrual syndrome, urinary tract infections
Male sexual dysfunction: prostatitis, , bladder infections, recurrent lower urinary tract infection, urolithiasis, retention of urine
Cardiovascular: cardiac neurosis, hyperlipaemia, pain in thromboangiitis, Raynaud’s syndrome
General: alcohol dependence, competition stress syndrome, craniocerebral injury, diabetes (non-insulin dependent), haemorrhagic fever, obesity, insomnia, lactation deficiency, opium, cocaine and heroin, dependence, post operative convalescence, tobacco dependence