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Description
In traditional Chinese practice, the needles are twirled or rotated as they are inserted. Many patients feel nothing at all during this procedure, while others experience a prickling or aching sensation, and still others a feeling of warmth or heaviness.
The practitioner may combine acupuncture with moxibustion to increase the effectiveness of the treatment. Moxibustion is a technique in which the acupuncturist lights a small piece of wormwood, called a moxa, above the acupuncture point above the skin. When the patient begins to feel the warmth from the burning herb, it is removed. Cupping is another technique that is a method of stimulation of acupuncture points by applying suction through a metal, wood, or glass jar, and in which a partial vacuum has been created. Cupping produces blood congestion at the site, and the site is thus stimulated.
In addition to the traditional Chinese techniques of acupuncture, the following are also used in the United States:
- Electroacupuncture. In this form of acupuncture, the traditional acupuncture points are stimulated by an electronic device instead of a needle.
- Japanese meridian acupuncture. Japanese acupuncture uses thinner, smaller needles, and focuses on the meridians rather than on specific points along their course.
- Korean hand acupuncture. Traditional Korean medicine regards the hand as a "map" of the entire body, such that any part of the body can be treated by stimulating the corresponding point on the hand.
- Western medical acupuncture. Western physicians trained in this style of acupuncture insert needles into socalled trigger points in sore muscles, as well as into the traditional points used in Chinese medicine.
- Ear acupuncture. This technique regards the ear as having acupuncture points that correspond to other parts of the body. Ear acupuncture is often used to treat substance abuse and chronic pain syndromes.
A standard acupuncture treatment takes between 45 minutes to an hour and costs between $40 and $100, although initial appointments often cost more. Chronic conditions usually require 10 treatment sessions, but acute conditions or minor illnesses may require only one or two visits. Follow-up visits are often scheduled for patients with chronic pain. As of 2000, about 70–80% of health insurers in the United States reimbursed patients for acupuncture treatments.
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Author Info: Rebecca Frey PhD, Rosalyn Carson-DeWitt MD, The Gale Group Inc., Gale, Detroit, Gale Encyclopedia of Neurological Disorders, 2005 |
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