Health

Fake acupuncture works too
by Nina Gotzmannova

Conventional therapy of treating low back pain loses a point. The alternative medicine wins. In a search for the best treatment for suffering patients even the fake acupuncture works better than the "normal" healing methods. These are the results of a German study of treating back pain. In the largest acupuncture research were 1.100 people involved. They were divided into three groups. The first group received a real acupuncture treatment, the second one fake acupuncture, where the needle wasn't as deep as it should be and the needles weren't in the traditional acupuncture points. The third group received conventional medical procedures such as painkillers, massage or physical therapy. After six months the patients were questioned about their health. The results of the research were amazing. Almost a half (47%) of the real acupuncture patients felt better. Slightly less (44%) of people who received fake acupuncture felt better too. And the improvement on their health in the third group noticed only 27%. The researchers from Ruhr University in Bochum, Germany, are still not sure, what caused this surprising result. It may be the expectations the patients had, the distrust in traditional medicine or placebo effect as well. It is still not clear how Eastern medicine including acupuncture works. The Chinese believe disease is a result of disharmony between yin and yang energy and by stimulating certain sensitive parts of the body by inserting needles inside or pressuring them the disease can be healed. The Western medicine has several explanations, but they are only theories. Finally this research led to a practical conclusion. German insurance companies would include acupuncture as a regular therapy to people affected by low back pain.

related story: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070924/ap_on_he_me/back_pain_acupuncture;_ylt=Ak.d4fE53vDvQYTwPODIXLSs0NUE

by Nina Gotzmannova for PocketNews (http://pocketnews.tv)

PocketNews is a new real-time news broadcaster delivering the latest and hottest news right to your pocket ! With global clients who want to be kept up to date, PocketNews is everyone's way of keeping in touch with the World.

posted by Blog TechSource @ 12:13 PM