I run into many people who "don't believe in" acupuncture. Luckily, you don't have to believe in it for it to be effective. I sure didn't believe in it when I got my first acupuncture treatment, and it blew me away with how well it worked. There are plenty of objective physiological effects that can be measured for changes before and after an acupuncture treatment which verify how the body responds regardless of what the mind thinks (blood pressure(1), hormone levels(2), neurotransmitter activity(3), etc). Animals respond very well to acupuncture in Woodbury MN and they are immune to placebo effect.

---

perspectives in Woodbury MN

The doubters generally come from some combination of the following perspectives:

1) It's ancient superstitious nonsense.

It is true that acupuncture is very old (2000 years in fact), and was originally not based in much of what we consider solid science today. However, modern acupuncture is a very different system than is was in antiquity. It has evolved and adapted as science, technology, and lifestyles have changed. Modern acupuncturists use lasers and e-stim devices, interpret your lab results and apply them to your treatment, and can get credentialed with health insurance companies.

2) Acupuncturists are quacks and charlatans.

Well, if we are, we pay dearly for the privilege. To be a licensed acupuncturist you must complete 3-4 years of graduate school at an accredited school (length of program varies according to wether you want herbal medicine within your scope of practice), and emerge with a Master's of Science degree. The programs include a curriculum split between western medical classes (similar to medical school) and eastern medical classes, and includes approximately a thousand hours of hands-on clinical residency hours. Then follows a series of difficult and expensive national board exams for licensure, and continuing education requirements for the length of your career.

3) There is no evidence to support acupuncture/science can't explain it.

It is a logistical nightmare to design a placebo controlled double blind study for acupuncture. How do you fake putting a needle into someone's skin? And how do you keep the person placing the needle from knowing wether they actually did or not? Many studies have tried very hard to accomplish this, but all are imperfect in the attempt and thus open to criticism. Because of those imperfections there is no true placebo control in these studies to accurately measure the effect of acupuncture, so the results are all over the place and inconclusive. Other types of studies, such as using an MRI to verify specific brain activity following acupuncture, tend to be easier to accept with less argument.(4) Broad statistical meta analysis of high numbers of the imperfect studies also come out in favor of acupuncture being effective more of the time than it is not.(5)

The World Health Organization recognized acupuncture as a legitimate treatment for a long list of conditions in 2003.(6) Most health and auto insurance companies cover acupuncture to some extent, depending on your plan. Both the US military and the VW employ acupuncturists across the country. Acupuncture is now also practiced by MDs, nurses, chiropractors, and physical therapists, though their training addresses only a small sliver of the scope of possibilities (and a fraction of the time practicing with the needles).

So is acupuncture fake? Probably not. Come try it and decide for yourself.