Acupuncture Flashcards
Acupuncture
is a practice in which needles are inserted into various traditionally determined points of the body and then manipulated
- claims to relieve pain, treat infertility, treats disease, prevents disease, promotes general health, or can be used for therapeutic purposes
Dry needling
-one type of acupuncture but can be practiced by PTs in 26 states
Yin Yang
- Extreme opposites
ex. male/female, night/day
zang-fu organs
- Describes 5 organs with specific functions and pathological changes
- heart controls mind
- kidney controls bone ( metabolism or vitamin D)
Qi
energy- light force
- need food and air to get energy (rice and vapor)
Theories based on chinese philosophy
- Yin yang
- zang-fu organs
- five elements
- qi, blood, and body fluid
- meridians
Five elements
used to describe symptoms
- Fire
- Earth
- Metal
- water
- Wood
Fire
- comes from water, gives birth to metal
- Yin Yang examples
- yin: heart (HT) Yang: small intestine (SI)
- Yin: heart constrictor Yang: triple heater (TH)
Earth
- comes from wood, gives birth to water
- Yin Yang example:
- Yin: spleen (SP); Yang: Stomach (ST)
Metal
- Comes from fire gives birth to wood
- Yin Yang example:
- Yin: lung (LU); Yang: large intestine (LI)
Water
- Comes from earth gives birth to fire
- Yin yang example:
- Yin: kidney (KI); Yang: Bladder (BL)
Wood
- Comes from metal, gives birth to earth
- Yin Yang example:
- Yin: liver (LIV); Yang: gall bladder (GB)
Yang in the body
- Exterior: skin, flesh, hair, meridians
- excess (shi): disease preventing forces (-), pathogenic factors increase
- heat: yin deficiency or excess heat
Yin in the body
- Interior: organs, bone marrow, qi, and blood
- Deficiency (xu): disease preventing forces decrease, pathogenic factors (-)
- Cold: yang deficiency or excess cold
Pattern recognition
- Five elements
- interconnections between patterns
- TCM eight principles
Acupuncture meridian chart
- includes everything (vascular, cardio, etc)
- high correlation between pathways of nerves and meridian system
examination in traditional chinese medicine
- Inspection (whole body including tongue)
- Palpation including pulse which would include feeling strength, rhythm, depth of pulse
- Auscultation
- Percussion
- History taking
Diagnosis in TCM ( pattern recognition)
- eight principles
- Zang-fu organ system
- Qi, blood, body fluid system
- Meridian system
- ie. kidney yang deficiency
Acupuncture treatment
Treatment via tonifying deficiencies and dispersing excesses
- release excess fire
-tonify deficient water
- use acupuncture and chinese herbs in combo
Treatment based on modern biomedical understandings
History of acupuncture: middle ages
- acupuncture spread from china to korea, Japan, and Vietnam, and elsewhere in East Asia.
- Portuguese missionaries in the 16th century were among the first to bring reports of acupuncture to the West
History of acupuncture: modern era
- acupuncture became better knonw in the US after an article appeared in the NY times by James Reston, who underwent an emergency appendectomy while visiting China
- while standard anesthesia was used for actual surgery, he was treated with acupuncture for post-op discomfort
- National Acupuncture Association (NAA) introduced acupuncture to the West through seminars and research presentations
Modern understandings of Needling in Musculoskeletal pain: myofascial pain
summarized as tight cord, nodule or band that can be accompanied by radiating pain and localized muscle twitches
Modern understandings of Needling in Musculoskeletal pain: Trigger points
90% of pain will be gone within 2 minutes with acupuncture
Modern understandings of Needling in Musculoskeletal pain: stretch- like effects
- Acupuncture acts like stretch
- stretch activates fibroblasts to secrete inflammatory mediators that dilute pain mediators and activate 2nd messenger systems that increase protein production to help with recovery
Modern understandings of Needling in Musculoskeletal pain: adenosine system (acupuncture/ dry needling for muscle performance)
- mediates secretion of ADP
- if you have more ADP can fire with more force and have more ROM
Modern understandings of Needling in Musculoskeletal pain
- myofascial pain
- trigger points
- stretch-like effects
- endogenous opioid system
- adenosine system ( for muscle performance)
- gate-control theory
Acupuncture and the human brain
- can modulate brain activity by activating and inactivating specific areas
sensations patients feel during acupuncture
- fullness
- numbness
- soreness
- tingling
- heaviness
- Pressure
- dull pain
- warmness
- coolness
Acupuncture for pain study results
- Acupuncture was superior to both sham and no-acupuncture control for each pain condition
- these results were robust to a variety of sensitivity analyses, including those related to publication bias
Nerve stimulation in needling
- Low back pain: sciatic nerve
- sinusitis: infraorbital N
- Blurry eye vision: greater auricular N (C2, C3)
- Headache: greater occipital N (C2, C3)
- GI systems: sympathetic and parasympathetic N
- Urinogenitary symptoms: sacral N
East Meets West
- Acupuncture vs dry needle technique ( same needles)
- acupoints vs trigger points
- electroacupuncture treatment vs eletrotherapy
- tuina (massage) vs soft tissue mobilization (comes from chinese massage)
- OM moxibustion and cupping vs hot pack
Effectiveness of Dry Needling for Upper-Quarter Myofascial Pain study results
- Dry needling compared to sham or placebo is recommended for decreasing pain immediately after treatment and at 4 weeks in pts with upper quarter MPS
