Tuesday, February 28, 2012

Acupuncture - anyone can do it!


I occasionally get angry comments left on my youtube page, and recently had one stating that 'quackery' such as acupuncture shouldn't be tolerated 'in such modern times'. I replied that there was a growing body of scientific evidence for acupuncture, and was then confronted with a BMJ acupuncture trial from 2009. The trial concluded that acupuncture only has a mild effect in pain relief, and most of this could probably be put down to practitioner bias etc. I thought the suggestions the authors made for future trials were very revealing, and highlight the kind of obstacles that stand in the way of acupuncture's acceptance into mainstream healthcare:

'We suggest that future trials on acupuncture for pain ... try to reduce bias by ensuring blinding when possible. For example, blinding of the healthcare provider can be achieved by having the needling done by acupuncture naïve clinicians blinded to the hypothesis of the trial.'

In other words, the best way to achieve a fair test of acupuncture is to have it performed by someone who has never done it before! And these trials, presumably, would be used to 'prove' that traditional acupuncture has no merit. This seems to reveal the authors' own bias - traditional acupuncture can't possibly work, so the training of the practitioner shouldn't affect the results. Would a fair test of a surgical procedure be to see if it worked when a 'surgery naive clinician' cut people open?

As I've talked about in other posts the insistence on a placebo control really does hinder acupuncture research. Why not look more seriously at comparative trials - i.e. is acupuncture undertaken by a trained professional more or less effective than other interventions?  Maybe because these trials tend to produce much more positive results... 

Please note: this blog is intended for educational and general interest purposes only. If you have any health concerns, please discuss them with your doctor. www.tomtheacupuncturist.co.uk

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