Two daughters brought their 88 years old mother to see me. The mother suffered from postherpetic neuralgia. She had shingles two months ago and was treated by anti-viral medication. The blisters went away but not the debilitating pain. She could not sleep well or move around. She had been bed-bound, weakened, and was beginning to lose muscle tone and mass. After three acupuncture treatments the pain was under control. Her sleep improved and she was able to exercise by walking. The pain continued to improve and her energy level returned with subsequent treatments. Every time she came in she would make a few jokes with me: her own personality reemerged.

Acupuncture is effective for chronic pains where drugs fail because it treats pain in a different way. Traditional drugs target pain cells directly to numb the pain. This may work for acute pain where the neurons are responding normally to a pain stimulus. Chronic pain, however, works differently. Here the original pain stimulus may no longer be present, but the pain neurons are stimulated to continue firing by surrounding glia cells. Often there is nerve damage caused by injury, viral infection, diabetes, cancer-related surgery, chemotherapy or nutritional deficits. The result is intensely unpleasant sensations that may include numbing, burning, prickling, heat, cold and swelling. Normally non-painful touch or temperature may become painful, making normal daily activities such as putting on clothes difficult. Sensitivity to painful stimuli may be increased. Abnormal sensations, such as burning, may occur in response to touch. Pain drugs do not work because they target pain neurons that are no longer functioning normally.

Acupuncture works differently. Instead of addressing the malfunctioning pain cells, acupuncture stimulates the release of natural opioids, our body’s natural painkillers, and the inhibitory descending pathways of the central nervous system to control the pain. ST-36, SP-6, GB-30 and GB-34 are acupuncture points that have been shown to have powerful analgesic effects in both laboratory and clinical tests. Acupuncture can control pain effectively without the harmful side-effects of drugs, one of which is addiction. I have a patient who used to come for acupuncture every week. In August his father’s health took a plunge. He had to relegate his resources to support him so he stopped his own acupuncture treatments. He contacted me in January to tell me that during the interim his sciatica acted up and he became addicted to pain killers and eventually ended up in drug rehab. He has returned for regular treatments and has been improving every week.