Acupuncture! In the Health forum!

[DavidDvorkin]

Gushing praise underway now!

[TZ]

1. Its teh cure for cancer!

But big pharma doesn't want you to know.
On the serious side, multiple studies have shown that acupuncture does help with some pain relief in some instances, but woos blow way out of proportion the usefulness of it. If they would only understand by overhyping it they actually are damaging the usefulness of it to the general population because when people find out its not a cure all they get pretty mad--I've seen this happen with my own eyes for any lurking woos.
Another case of woos damaging their own cause.

[beam me up scottie]

2. Put the mouse down and slowly back away from the forum...

I looked at it briefly yesterday and realized even my Facepalm poster would be inadequate.

I have a hunch several of the other skeptics did the same.

Sigh...too many fronts and never enough troops.

[WoodrowFan]

3. My Dog had it

My dog had it. Yes, I know, I know. We have a rat terrier that's about 15 or 16 years old, and among other health issues has arthritis. We are very careful about his quality of life now and don't want to keep him around if he's in pain, but on the other hand we don’t want to rush him off this mortal coil too soon either. So about 5-6 weeks ago we took him to our vet for a checkup and reality check. We talked about his difficulty getting up sometimes and how he handles steps (we carry him between floors but there is a single step up to our porch and then another into the house). He slips on wood floors so we added big and little rugs everywhere so he never has to step on slick wood floors again. The vet said he didn't seem to be in pain and seemed happy even with his stiffness and difficulty with small steps. However, he said, one of the other vets in the practice (a younger one) did acupuncture and it seemed to help. I must have done a "what's that smell" look because he said he was doubtful at first too but it seemed to work.

Some background: Our vet has been around for years (he's probably in his 60s) and has about ½ dozen vets in his practice, including his partner, plus some middle-aged vets that have been there for awhile, and some younger ones. We went to them when we got our dog 14 years ago because friends liked them. They're kept our little buddy up and running and happy and wagging his tail through several health crises over the years, so I do trust them. OK, back to the story.

So, long story short, we agreed to try the acupuncture. He had 4 treatments over 4 weeks. Amazingly, our dog sat quietly through the procedure. That in and of itself was surprising as he's very protective of us and has been known to nip at vets in the past. He sat quietly with these little pins sticking out of his back for about 15 minutes.

All I have is some anecdotal evidence but the treatments did seem to help. When we took him into the vet he couldn't turn around in his doggy-travel cage and we had to help him get out backwards, but when we left he turned around inside with ease. He went up the single steps at home without trouble whereas beforehand he struggled. Each treatment seemed to have lasted longer than the previous. It's been a week and a half since the last one and he's doing fine.

I should also note that after the SECOND treatment the vet also took some additional blood tests and discovered his thyroid levels were low so we increased his thyroid medicine and that ALSO made a difference. But we did see definite improvement with the acupuncture alone after the first week.

I am not sure what to think. I don't think it's a placebo, I mean, how could the dog think "OK, these things are in me to help me do stairs?" My wife was sceptical as well but also saw improvement. Of cource, the change in the thyroid medicine muddies the water a lot. However, I trust my vet: he's given our little buddy great care in the past. Maybe for things such as pain management, etc, acupuncture does work. I'd love to see some clinical trials though.

[TZ]

4. No there is some scientific evidence that acupuncture does help

in cases like your dog. The problem is, acknowledging the limits of acupuncture. A lot of woos take that scientific acknowledgement to mean that its a cure all and its not.

[LeftishBrit]

5. Actually acupuncture isn't TOTAL woo

Most of the theories behind it are, but there is real evidence that it can be useful for pain.

[Warpy]

6. Acupuncture is one of the things that looks like woo

because it's outside the western model of surgery and chemistry, but there is a lot of evidence that it produces changes in the brain, some of them profound.

Acupuncture works, in other words. The jury is still out on Chinese herbs.

[Orrex]

7. It suffers from the same problems facing chiropractic IMO

Both have been tested, and both have achieved measureable results, so there's clearly something to them. But when woos start making all kinds of wild claims ("acupuncture cured my sinus infection" or "my chiropractor cured my irritable bowel syndrome"), then it gets a little thick. And when they start up about chi and subluxations, my eyes glaze over.

It's a shame that the legitimate aspects of the two techniques are so deliberately muddled with their woo components.



And I stand by my story about pin-the-tail-on-the-donkey.

[semillama]

8. one of the big problems with acupuncture

is that how would you do any sort of double-blind study on it? That's partly why it has some problems being accepted.

[Warpy]

9. Actually, they've done a few studies

where they've used acupuncture versus random needle insertion.

[moggie]

10. Haven't those shown that random insertion works as well?

I haven't read much on this subject, but ISTR at least one trial which showed that random placement of needles was as effective as using the traditional acupuncture points.