Research
suggests acupuncture can be an effective treatment for pain. Clear and
robust effects have been found in the treatment of back pain, neck pain,
shoulder pain, osteoarthritis and headaches
When
properly administered to elicit da qi, acupuncture results in the
release of nitric oxide (NO) at the acupuncture site, which in turn
encourages the release of natural analgesics in your body
Previous research shows acupuncture deactivates certain parts of your brain, thereby altering your experience of pain
By Dr. Mercola
When it comes to treating ailments such as chronic pain, I definitely
prefer nontoxic options to drugs and surgery. Americans use 80 percent
of all the opioids sold worldwide1 — a testament to the pervasiveness of pain in this country — and with drug overdoses now being the ninth leading cause of death in the U.S., we clearly need safer alternatives.
Acupuncture is one such alternative. Research shows it can be an
effective option for a number of health problems, but pain in
particular. Contrary to allopathic, symptom-based medicine, acupuncture
aims to eliminate the root cause of your problem, which is said to
originate in a dysfunction in your body's energetic meridian system.
Basic Principles of Acupuncture
Traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) views the body as a cohesive
system where everything within it is interconnected. In other words, it
recognizes that each part of your body has the ability to affect all
other parts.
There are 14 major energy channels called meridians that flow through
your body. An energy called qi (or chi) circulates along the meridians
to all parts of your body, including the internal organs and every cell.
This qi is the vital force that literally keeps us alive. Vibrant
health is a result of balanced, unimpeded flow of energy through your
body.
According to TCM, illness and pain are the byproducts of energy
blockages somewhere along one or more meridians. Each acupuncture point
along the meridian acts like a pass-through or gate. Energy can get
"bottlenecked" in these points, slowing down the flow, sometimes to the
point of standstill. This is the precursor to pain and illness.
By inserting a thin needle into the congested or "clogged" area, it
opens the gate and allows the energy to flow again. With qi flowing
smoothly, your body can re-regulate the flow of energy, repair itself
and maintain its own optimal level of health. Herbs and other therapies
such as guacha, cupping and moxibustion — the burning of herbs on or
over the skin — can be used to support the healing.
Acupuncture May Offer Drug-Free Pain Relief
In a 2012 analysis2,3
of 29 published studies involving more than 17,900 participants,
researchers concluded that acupuncture has a definite effect in reducing
chronic pain — more so than standard pain treatment. Real acupuncture
also produced slightly better results than using sham needles, which
suggests the benefits of needling are due to more than the placebo
effect.
By going the extra mile and retrieving the raw data on self-reported
pain, and standardizing the various study participants' responses, they
were also able to more accurately assess and compare them as a whole.
Overall, the team discovered a "clear and robust" effect of acupuncture
in the treatment of back pain, neck pain, shoulder pain, osteoarthritis
and headaches.
On a scale of zero to 100, participants who started out with a pain
rating of 60 experienced an average 30-point drop (a 50 percent
reduction) in response to the real acupuncture treatments (using
needles); a 25-point drop when receiving sham acupuncture; and a mere
17-point drop when receiving "standard pain care" that did not include
acupuncture. According to the lead author:4
"The effects of acupuncture are statistically significant and
different from those of sham or placebo treatments ... So we conclude
that the effects aren't due merely to the placebo effect."
Acupuncture Cuts Pain by Boosting Nitric Oxide
While there's been a great deal of controversy as to whether or not
acupuncture works "for real," and if so, how, new research presents an
answer to this question. The study5,6,7,8,9 in question was conducted by researchers at LA BioMed.10 The research laboratory has developed a noninvasive device capable of sampling biomolecules over specific skin regions.
Using this device, they were able to determine that when acupuncture
is properly administered, nitric oxide (NO) is released at the
"acupoints" — the acupuncture sites into which the needles are inserted.
NO is a soluble gas that is continually produced from the amino acid
L-arginine inside your cells. This gas plays an important role in
supporting normal endothelial function and protecting your cells'
powerhouses, the mitochondria. It's also a potent vasodilator.
By relaxing and dilating your blood vessels, NO improves blood flow
and lowers blood pressure. NO also encourages release of natural
analgesics (pain relieving chemicals) in your body. Together, this helps
explain why and how acupuncture works to reduce pain.
A number of acupuncture studies have produced negative results. The
reason for this may have to do with the way the acupuncture is done. In
order for NO release to occur, "de qi" had to be elicited. De qi feels a
bit like an electric shock. Westerners are not accustomed to this
sensation, which is why many Western acupuncturists won't do it.
De qi is elicited by twisting the inserted needle. In this study,
they twisted the needle for two minutes or until de qi was elicited.
They then manipulated the needles for two minutes every five minutes,
for a total of 20 minutes each treatment. Heat can also amplify the
effectiveness of the treatment and, here, the application of heat also
increased NO release at the acupoints.
Acupuncture Reduces Osteoarthritis Pain
A number of studies support the use of acupuncture for pain. A large, landmark study11,12 published in 2004, which assessed whether acupuncture might work for osteoarthritis pain, produced remarkably positive results.
A total of 570 patients diagnosed with osteoarthritis of the knee
were enrolled for this 26-week-long trial — the longest and largest
randomized, controlled phase III clinical trial of acupuncture ever
conducted. None of the participants had tried acupuncture before, and
none had had knee surgery in the previous six months. Nor had they used
steroid injections.
The participants were randomly assigned to receive one of three
treatments: acupuncture, sham acupuncture or self-help strategies
recommended by the Arthritis Foundation (the latter served as a control
group). Significant differences in response was seen by week eight and
14, and at the end of the trial, the group receiving real acupuncture
had a 40 percent decrease in pain and a nearly 40 percent improvement in
function compared to baseline assessments — a 33 percent difference in
improvement over the sham group.
According to the late Dr. Stephen E. Straus, who served as the first
director of the National Center for Complementary and Alternative
Medicine (NCCAM), which is a part of the National Institutes of Health:13
"For the first time, a clinical trial with sufficient rigor, size
and duration has shown that acupuncture reduces the pain and functional
impairment of osteoarthritis of the knee. These results also indicate
that acupuncture can serve as an effective addition to a standard
regimen of care and improve quality of life for knee osteoarthritis
sufferers.
NCCAM has been building a portfolio of basic and clinical
research that is now revealing the power and promise of applying
stringent research methods to ancient practices like acupuncture."
Other Evidence Showing What Acupuncture 'Does'
Boosting NO release isn't the only mechanism by which acupuncture
reduces pain. Previous research suggests acupuncture stimulates your
central nervous system to release natural chemicals that alter bodily
systems, pain and other biological processes. In 2003, the World Health
Organization (WHO) conducted an extensive review and analysis of
clinical trials involving acupuncture.14 According to this report,15 acupuncture:
Stimulates the conduction of electromagnetic signals, which may release immune system cells or painkilling chemicals
Activates your body's natural opioid system, which may help reduce pain or induce sleep
Stimulates your hypothalamus and pituitary gland, which modulate numerous body systems
Alters secretion of neurotransmitters and neurohormones, which may positively influence brain chemistry
According to the WHO's analysis, "Some of these studies have provided
incontrovertible scientific evidence that acupuncture is more
successful than placebo treatments in certain conditions." The report
again confirmed its benefits for pain, saying:
"The proportion of chronic pain relieved by acupuncture is
generally in the range 55–85 percent, which compares favorably with that
of potent drugs (morphine helps in 70 percent of cases) and far
outweighs the placebo effect (30–35 percent)"
Acupuncture Reduces Pain by Shutting Down Certain Brain Regions
In the BBC documentary, "The Science of Acupuncture," which
originally aired in 2015, a team of researchers conducted an experiment
that had never been done before. Using high-tech MRI imaging, they
visually demonstrated that acupuncture has a very real effect on the
brain. Acupuncture, it turns out, does something completely unexpected —
it deactivates certain parts of the brain, particularly in the limbic
system, decreasing neuronal activity, opposed to having an activating
impact.
Their experiment also clearly showed that superficial sham needling
does not have this effect. Your limbic system is associated with the
experience of pain, adding further evidence that something unique
happens during acupuncture. It quite literally alters your experience of
pain by shutting down these deeper brain regions.
Another Simple Way to Boost NO Production
As mentioned, NO can help reduce pain, and a simple way to boost your
body's NO production is by performing high intensity exercises. In the
video above, I demonstrate an updated version of the "nitric oxide dump"
exercise developed by Dr. Zach Bush. If you have previously watched
this video, please review it again as I recently updated it to correct a
couple of errors and omissions that sneaked into my previous video.
You don't need any weights, and all it takes is three minutes, two to
three times a day, with at least two hours between sessions. A key
component I forgot in my earlier video is to make sure you're breathing
through your nose and not your mouth.
I am convinced that this gentler strategy — although it has not been
evaluated or compared to other high intensity interval training
protocols (HIIT) — is a far healthier strategy to obtain the benefits of
HIIT without any of the downsides. I only wish I had known about this
more effective approach earlier. Depending on the type of pain you're
struggling with, you might conceivably be able to control it through
this natural NO boosting exercise.
Other Nondrug Solutions for Pain Relief
There are many other ways to address pain beside acupuncture. Below
is a long list of suggestions. Clearly, there are times when pain is so
severe that a narcotic pain reliever may be warranted. But even in those
instances, the options that follow may allow you to at least reduce the
amount you take, or the frequency at which you need to take them.
If you need an acute pain reliever, you can consider an over-the-counter (OTC) option. Research16
shows prescription-strength naproxen (Naprosyn, sold OTC in lower
dosages as Aleve) provides the same pain relief as more dangerous
narcotic painkillers.
However, while naproxen may be a better alternative to narcotic
painkillers, it still comes with a very long list of potential side
effects,17
and the risks increase with frequency of use, which is why I discourage
anyone from taking them, especially long term. It would be far better
to try some of the nontoxic options below.
Eliminate or radically reduce most grains and sugars from your diet
Avoiding grains and sugars will lower your insulin and leptin levels
and decrease insulin and leptin resistance, which is one of the most
important reasons why inflammatory prostaglandins are produced. That is
why stopping sugar and sweets is so important to controlling your pain and other types of chronic illnesses.
Take a high-quality, animal-based omega-3 fat
Omega-3 fats are precursors to mediators of inflammation called
prostaglandins. (In fact, that is how anti-inflammatory painkillers
work, by manipulating prostaglandins.) Good sources include wild caught
Alaskan salmon, sardines and anchovies, which are all high in healthy
omega-3s while being low in contaminants such as mercury. As for
supplements, my favorite is krill oil, as it has a number of benefits
superior to fish oil.
Optimize your sun exposure and production of vitamin D
Optimize your vitamin D by getting regular, appropriate sun exposure,
which will work through a variety of different mechanisms to reduce
your pain. Sun exposure
also has anti-inflammatory and pain relieving effects that are
unrelated to vitamin D production, and these benefits cannot be obtained
from a vitamin D supplement.
Red, near-, mid- and far-infrared light therapy (photobiology) and/or infrared saunas may also be quite helpful as it promotes and speeds tissue healing, even deep inside the body.
Medical cannabis
Medical marijuana
has a long history as a natural analgesic and is now legal in 29 states
including Washington DC. You can learn more about the laws in your
state on medicalmarijuana.procon.org.18
Kratom
Kratom (Mitragyna speciosa) is another plant remedy that has become a popular opioid substitute.19
In August 2016, the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration issued a
notice saying it was planning to ban kratom, listing it as a Schedule 1
controlled substance. However, following massive outrage from kratom
users who say opioids are their only alternative, the agency reversed
its decision.20
Kratom is likely safer than an opioid for someone in serious and
chronic pain. However, it's important to recognize that it is a
psychoactive substance and should not be used carelessly. There's very
little research showing how to use it safely and effectively, and it may
have a very different effect from one person to the next.
Also, while it may be useful for weaning people off opioids, kratom
is in itself addictive. So, while it appears to be a far safer
alternative to opioids, it's still a powerful and potentially addictive
substance. So please, do your own research before trying it.
Emotional Freedom Techniques (EFT)
EFT is a drug-free approach for
pain management of all kinds. EFT borrows from the principles of
acupuncture in that it helps you balance out your subtle energy system.
It helps resolve underlying, often subconscious, and negative emotions
that may be exacerbating your physical pain. By stimulating (tapping)
well-established acupuncture points with your fingertips, you rebalance
your energy system, which tends to dissipate pain
Meditation and Mindfulness Training
Among volunteers who had never meditated before, those who attended
four 20-minute classes to learn a meditation technique called focused
attention (a form of mindfulness meditation)
experienced significant pain relief — a 40 percent reduction in pain
intensity and a 57 percent reduction in pain unpleasantness.21
K-Laser, Class 4 Laser Therapy
If you suffer pain from an injury, arthritis or other inflammation-based pain, I'd strongly encourage you to try K-Laser therapy.
It can be an excellent choice for many painful conditions, including
acute injuries. By addressing the underlying cause of the pain, you will
no longer need to rely on painkillers.
K-Laser is a class 4 infrared laser therapy treatment that helps
reduce pain, reduce inflammation and enhance tissue healing — both in
hard and soft tissues, including muscles, ligaments or even bones. The
infrared wavelengths used in the K-Laser allow for targeting specific
areas of your body and can penetrate deeply into the body to reach areas
such as your spine and hip.
Chiropractic
Many studies have confirmed that chiropractic management is much
safer and less expensive than allopathic medical treatments, especially
when used for pain such as low back pain.
Qualified chiropractic, osteopathic and naturopathic physicians are
reliable, as they have received extensive training in the management of
musculoskeletal disorders during their course of graduate health care
training, which lasts between four to six years. These health experts
have comprehensive training in musculoskeletal management.
Physical therapy
Physical therapyhas been shown to be as good as surgery for painful conditions such as torn cartilage and arthritis.
Foundation Training
Foundation training
is an innovative method developed by Dr. Eric Goodman to treat his own
chronic low back pain. It's an excellent alternative to painkillers and
surgery, as it actually addresses the cause of the problem.
Massage
A systematic review and meta-analysis published in the journal Pain
Medicine included 60 high-quality and seven low-quality studies that
looked into the use of massage for various types of pain, including
muscle and bone pain, headaches, deep internal pain, fibromyalgia pain
and spinal cord pain.22
The review revealed massage therapy relieves pain better than getting
no treatment at all. When compared to other pain treatments like
acupuncture and physical therapy, massage therapy still proved
beneficial and had few side effects. In addition to relieving pain,
massage therapy also improved anxiety and health-related quality of
life.
Astaxanthin
Astaxanthinis one of the most effective fat-soluble antioxidants
known. It has very potent anti-inflammatory properties and in many
cases works far more effectively than anti-inflammatory drugs. Higher
doses are typically required and you may need 8 milligrams (mg) or more
per day to achieve this benefit.
Ginger
This herb has potent anti-inflammatory activity and offers pain relief and stomach-settling properties. Fresh ginger works well steeped in boiling water as a tea or grated into vegetable juice.
Curcumin
In a study of osteoarthritis patients, those who added 200 mg of curcumin
a day to their treatment plan had reduced pain and increased mobility. A
past study also found that a turmeric extract composed of curcuminoids
blocked inflammatory pathways, effectively preventing the overproduction
of a protein that triggers swelling and pain.23
Boswellia
Also known as boswellin or "Indian frankincense," this herb contains specific active anti-inflammatory ingredients.
Bromelain
This enzyme, found in pineapples, is a natural anti-inflammatory. It
can be taken in supplement form but eating fresh pineapple, including
some of the bromelain-rich stem, may also be helpful.
Cetyl Myristoleate (CMO)
This oil, found in fish and dairy butter, acts as a joint lubricant
and anti-inflammatory. I have used this for myself to relieve ganglion
cysts and carpal tunnel syndrome. I used a topical preparation for this.
These contain the essential fatty acid gamma-linolenic acid (GLA), which is particularly useful for treating arthritic pain.
Cayenne Cream
Also called capsaicin cream, this spice comes from dried hot peppers.
It alleviates pain by depleting the body's supply of substance P, a
chemical component of nerve cells that transmits pain signals to your
brain.
Mind-Body Therapies
Methods such as hot and cold packs, aquatic therapy, yoga, various mind-body techniques and cognitive behavioral therapy24 can also result in astonishing pain relief without drugs.
Grounding
Walking barefoot on the earth may also provide a certain measure of pain relief by combating inflammation.
Naltrexone is an opiate antagonist, originally developed in the early
1960s for the treatment of opioid addiction. When taken at very low
doses (LDN, available only by prescription), it triggers endorphin
production, which can boost your immune function and ease pain.
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