How does acupuncture work? A brief explanation.
How does acupuncture work? I get asked this question all the time, and very often what people really want to know how does it help their pain. How can needles really help with musculoskeletal problems and pain? This is the question. An acupuncturist might say that these issues are usually caused by qi and blood stagnation and that a treatment would aim to restore a normal flow of energy in the body and thus facilitate healing. Language like ‘qi and blood stagnation’ can come across as jargon. What does it really mean?
One way to explain it would be to imagine that you have a rubber band wound tightly around your little finger. The finger would very quickly become uncomfortable. This represents the stagnation Chinese Medicine talks about. You could take an aspirin tablet. It would not really help. You could have surgery on your finger. Again, it would be of no help. The thing you need to do is remove the rubber band. You need to open up the area of pain and let the blood flow in.
The body has an incredible inner wisdom and almost always knows how to remove the rubber band. But things can get stuck. It just needs the right nudge. Acupuncture is a way of giving the body that nudge. Once the body opens up, homeostasis is restored and self-healing can take place. The needles create a stimulus that results in a cascade of signalling through the body’s nerves and connective tissues, affecting both the central and peripheral nervous systems. This influences not only the nervous system itself, but also the cardiovascular system and the endocrine system. Suddenly the affected tissue, whether it is muscle or tendon or bone, will have a good blood supply, flushing out waste and supplying nutrients, reducing inflammation and pain and allowing the whole system to heal.
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