Acupuncture

Opinions on acupuncture vary. This treatment method has gained a strong position during several thousand years of use in China. However, western medicine does not accept it completely or generally. Some doctors and scientists consider it to be a pseudo-science, other experts do not have a particular opinion about it and some doctors use the method in their practices.

Acupuncture is a method that treats patients by insertion of needles into the acupuncture points of a patient. According to traditional Chinese medicine these poins lie in acupuncture-energetic channels known as meridians. Based on this theory, the life energy flows in those channels which connect all organs. Acupuncture tries to prevent and correct imbalances in the flow of this hypothetical energy.

Methods of acupuncture
 

• Insertion of needles into exactly specified acupuncture points lying in meridians. Sizes of acupuncture points vary from 0.2 to 5 mm. Current acupuncture medicine accepts approximately 700 acupuncture points, out of which about 150 are most frequently used.
• Moxibustion (moxa), e.g. stimulation of acupuncture points by heat. Moxibustion can be practised in more ways, e.g. using cigar-shaped sticks or by heating an applied acupuncture needle.
• Acupuncture points can also be stimulated by magnets, pressure, electric current, light, laser.

These methods can be combined.