Acupuncture - Evidence-based medicine
There is a common misconception that acupuncture does not have the research to indicate its effectiveness in treating different disease conditions. The cannot be further from the truth. Over the past 20 years, the amount of research in acupuncture has grown exponentially with over 13,000 studies across the globe, and hundreds of meta-analysis providing a clear overview of what acupuncture can treat.
The Acupuncture Evidence Project was authored by John McDonald and Stephen Janz in 2017. The publication reviewed the research on acupuncture for 122 conditions. They found evidence for some level of effectiveness in 117 conditions. Of these, 46 conditions showed the strongest evidence of benefit from acupuncture treatments. The authors listed these 46 conditions under two areas: Evidence of Positive Effect and Evidence of Potential Positive Effect.
https://www.evidencebasedacupuncture.org/acupuncture-scientific-evidence/
https://www.evidencebasedacupuncture.org/acupuncture-scientific-evidence/
https://www.evidencebasedacupuncture.org/acupuncture-scientific-evidence/
For those suffering from any of the 46 listed conditions in The Acupuncture Evidence Project, I recommend considering acupuncture as a potential non-conventional evidence-based treatment.
When treated by a Physician or Licensed Acupuncturist trained in Medical Acupuncture and/or Traditional Chinese Medicine, the potential benefits of acupuncture can be tremendous, while the side effects and risks for this procedure are low.
If what you're suffering from is not listed, I still recommend trying a course of 4-8 acupuncture treatments because these treatments may still help you. Just because your condition is not listed currently, doesn’t mean acupuncture couldn’t be effective. Research on acupuncture is ongoing. As noted earlier, the authors of this study found acupuncture to have some level of effectiveness in 117 conditions. This means there were 71 conditions not included in the list above. These 71 conditions have ongoing research, or need further research to determine how effective acupuncture might be as a treatment option. So, as research continues the current list of 46 conditions is likely to keep growing.
Be well.
