The origin of the concept of the meridian system is closely connected with the treatment effects of acupuncture, and it serves as an empirical reference system in the clinical setting. Understanding the meridian channels would be a first step in enhancing the clinical efficacy of acupuncture treatment. To understand the relationship between the location of the disease and the sites of relevant ...

OBJECTIVES To assess two aspects of the external validity of acupuncture research for osteoarthritis knee pain and determine the common acupoints and treatment parameters used. METHODS The external validity of 16 randomised controlled trials (RCTs) was investigated using a scale consisting of two aspects: reporting and performance. The reporting aspect included acupuncturist's background, stu...

Three cases of primary hyperhidrosis of no known cause, with excess sweating day and night, were treated using the same acupuncture points. The patients reported that their sweating decreased and that they felt better after the treatment.

INTRODUCTION One of the basic beliefs of traditional acupuncture is that needling and massaging on certain skin areas called acupuncture points (AP) help to treat medical conditions. While acupuncture is widely accepted as a useful non-pharmacological method for pain reduction, the mechanism of acupuncture is still debated— whether it works through the mechanical stimulation of skin and muscle ...

Acupuncture textbooks mention a wide assortment of indications for each acupuncture point and, conversely, each disease or indication can be treated by a wide assortment of acupoints. However, little systematic information exists on how acupuncture is actually used in practice: i.e. which points are actually selected and for which conditions. This study prospectively gathered data on acupunctur...

Acupuncture is an efficient therapy method originated in ancient China, the study of which based on ZHENG classification is a systematic research on understanding its complexity. The system perspective is contributed to understand the essence of phenomena, and, as the coming of the system biology era, broader technology platforms such as omics technologies were established for the objective stu...

During acupuncture treatments, acupuncture needles are manipulated to elicit the characteristic "de qi" reaction widely viewed as essential to acupuncture's therapeutic effect. De qi has a biomechanical component, "needle grasp," which we have quantified by measuring the force necessary to pull an acupuncture needle out of the skin (pullout force) in 60 human subjects. We hypothesized that pull...

The topographic structures of acupuncture points were investigated by using the synchrotron radiation based Dark Field Image (DFI) method. Four following acupuncture points were studied: Sanyinjiao, Neiguan, Zusanli and Tianshu. We have found that at acupuncture point regions there exists the accumulation of micro-vessels. The images taken in the surrounding tissue out of the acupuncture points...

Within the acupuncture literature there is debate on the safety of using specific acupuncture points during pregnancy. Termed 'forbidden' or contraindicated, they refer to acupuncture points that can be used to induce labour but may also include points with no known inducing or labour-enhancing effects. Recommendations range from avoiding these acupuncture points at any time in pregnancy to sta...

Location-dependent skin surface's partial nitric oxide pressure (pNO) is studied using highly sensitive amperometric NO microsensor with a small sensing area (diameter  = 76 μm). The pNO level of LI4 (Hegu) acupuncture point is measured and compared with the pNO level of nonacupuncture point. In addition, the mapping of pNO is carried out over the left wrist skin area one- as well as two-dimens...