Recently I attended a course in medical acupuncture to finally be able to pass on the benefits of medical accupuncture experienced on several occasions.
Just to quickly clarify; Medical acupuncture is quite different from Traditional Chinese acupuncture (TCA) which is why I will not call myself an accupuncturist without making clear that I practice medical accupuncture.
TCA practitioners have studied in most cases done 4-5 years to specialise in it. It is a great representative of traditional chinese medicine (TCM) and is quite different from western medicine in its approach to a patient. While western medicine is very much symptom based, meaning that if the patient comes in with a headache, best known practice will be applied to diagnose and treat these headaches. In TCM headaches will be seen in context of the patient and will be treated in different ways to make sure that all parts like meridians are treated and adjusted to provide health to the patient.
In this context, medical acupuncture is designed to target very specific sore points in muscles. This is to activate the bodies own pain relieving mechanisms. In a way the brain is being made aware of the fact that this particular area needs attention and care. Being able to draw n the anatomy, neurology and pathology from the course of osteopathy makes medical acupuncture a natural addition to my repertoire of treatment tools.
The needles used are incredibly fine and can barely be felt when applied. You may well feel a scratch like discomfort when the needle is set and an ache in the treated area afterwards. This usually reduces within 24-48h. Mild side effects like dizziness or sharper pain can be felt on occasion and it helps to mention it to the practitioner as soon as they occur. These too, will pass quite rapidly after the needles have been removed.
Severe risks are very rare and practitioners, who have been trained in a course like the one I attended have been trained to reduce the risk to zero.
The normal reaction is to feel a small twitch and a bit of a pull in the area treated while the needes are applied but this reduces the moment the needles are removed. The practitioner may use between 2-8 neeldes depending on how many muscles are treated.
To the practitioner the muscles will feel immediately after treatment softer and they may use the opportunity to massage the treated area straight after to get even better results.
The patient will notice that the area massaged is less sore and the massage more comfortable.
If you do have any quetions about medical accupuncture feel free to ask one of our trained practitioners to get a better understanding.
Thanks for reading!
