Acupuncture: Your Alternative to Drugs for Chronic Pain

November 13, 2017November 13, 2017
by admin

New Life Wellness Center Frisco - Acupuncture and Physical Therapy — New Life Wellness Center Frisco – Acupuncture and Physical Therapy

Acupuncture: Your Alternative to Drugs for Chronic Pain

What is pain?

In Merriam-Webster Dictionary, Pain is defined as usually localized physical suffering associated with bodily disorder (such as a disease or an injury) and acute mental or emotional distress or suffering.

Did you notice anything from the definition of pain? It not just bodily/physical suffering but also mental/emotional suffering. Pain indeed affects every aspect of our well-being. Physical and mental pain can have negative effects on each other. So, what are people doing about it? More than 100 million Americans suffer from chronic pain and it’s costing more than $635 billion dollars in medical expenses and losses in daily productivity at work.

Use of Opioids for Pain Management

Did you know that since 2000, over 500,000 Americans have died from narcotic overdoses? Recently, President Trump declared a public health emergency as a result ofan epidemic in opioid abuse. In a recent study, even Emergency rooms and hospitals are trying to limit their distribution of opioid prescriptionsdue to high tendencies of dependency. Emergency Rooms are trying combinations of Tylenol and Motrin to alleviate pain for their patients. But who says that’s even safe for long-term use?

Acupuncture and Chronic Pain

At a recent Annual Meeting of Academy of Integrative Pain Management, Dr. Farshad M. Ahadian, MD presented a great data on efficacy of acupuncture for headache, osteoarthritis (OA), and musculoskeletal pain¹. In his summary, Dr. Ahadian discussed a review done which was independently funded by the National Institute for Health Research in the United Kingdom. In this study, researchers screened about 1000 publications and picked out 29 of the highest-quality randomized control trials with “one of the most academically rigorous” analyses. These studies compared “true” acupuncture with “sham” acupuncture or no acupuncture in approximately 18,000 patients². The researchers determined that acupuncture had “clinically meaningful effects with increased functional connectivity.”

I am very excited to see that more and more clinical research and controlled studies are being conducted to confirm what we have already known about acupuncture. Acupuncture is a beneficial remedy to incorporate into everyone’s daily health regimen in order to not only alleviate chronic pain, but also to prepare our body’s sustainability against preventing and fighting illnesses. Don’t always settle for pain medication that may possibly cause harmful side effects, but know that there are other great options for treating your chronic pain such as Acupuncture!

If you have any questions or concerns, please feel free to contact us at any time. I would be more than happy to discuss this blog or any other health inquiries you may have.

I have posted links to these articles so that you can also view them online.

Sincerely,

Dr. Andrew Lee, L.Ac, DPT

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