Established more than four thousand years ago, acupuncture is one of the oldest forms of medicine in existence.  Even in our modern, fast paced world, this time honored tradition is a unique art and a safe, effective, natural medicine.

The medical practice of acupuncture entails the insertion of sterile, disposable needles into specific points on the body.  The type of needle used exclusively for acupuncture is thin and solid, rarely causing pain.  Acupuncture needles are inserted anywhere from right beneath the third layer of skin to as much as a few inches into large musculature. There are hundreds of acupuncture points on the body but only about eight to fifteen of these points will be used during a single treatment. Acupuncture points are found all over the body and the points used correspond to an organ or body system in need of balance.  Acupuncture needles are used to stimulate specific points along energy channels or meridians. These meridians are paths through which qi flows; much like your blood flows through your veins, somewhat like electricity through a wire. Messages are constantly transmitted through our bodies by biochemical and hormone activity. Activating individual acupuncture points induces chemical and hormonal responses, which trigger the therapeutic effect and the healing process.  (Please see links included under the NIH Studies tab to read more about the investigation on Acupuncture from a Western scientific and medical perspective).

In my tenth grade biology class, my teacher began by announcing: “You can put the world into three large bags: electrons, protons and neutrons.” Oversimplified, yes, but true, right?  On the very basic level of life, everyone and everything is made up of vibrating electrons.  If you stick an electrical conductor, (an acupuncture needle for example), into an electrical being (the body made of these electrons), laws of nature tell us a reaction will occur, an effect will be created.  When these needles are inserted into the meridians of energy and their acupuncture points, our electrical pathways and their corresponding electrical outlets, the effect is great.
Ask yourself, “What keeps me alive?” Your heart beating, your brain working, right…but what is it that powers those life processes? As described above, it is the electricity of life, or “life force” or as you will often hear it referred to in a Chinese medical clinic as qi.

“Qi” takes two basic forms: yin and yang.  The brightness of day and the darkness of night.  Summer heat and winter cold.  The expansion and contraction of the ocean.  These are but a few examples as we see represented in nature.  In Chinese Medicine, it is believed that we are ‘microcosms’ of our environment and that we can observe the same opposing forces that govern the world around us, govern within our bodies.  Rest and movement. Laughter and tears. Growth and destruction.  Disease is simply yin and yang out of “right relationship.”  Chinese Medicine restores the balance and harmony of this relationship.

Scientific Research Studies to support the use of Acupuncture:
Sometimes the theories of acupuncture and Traditional Chinese Medicine are difficult to grasp for those of us who have been raised in Western culture.  Please see below for a link to a few Western science based research articles.

Although it is difficult to prove entirely how acupuncture works with modern technology, the progress that these studies have made is bringing us closer to understanding and closer to the integration of allopathic and alternative medicine.