Acupuncture, real or fake, gets results in study

Acupuncture, real or fake, gets results in study:


Fake acupuncture works nearly as well as the real thing for low back pain, and either kind performs much better than conventional care, German researchers have found.

Almost half the patients treated with acupuncture needles felt relief that lasted months. In contrast, only about a quarter of the patients receiving medications and other Western medical treatments felt better.

Even fake acupuncture worked better than conventional care, leading researchers to wonder if pain relief came from the body’s reactions to thin needle pricks or, possibly, the placebo effect.

“Acupuncture represents a highly promising and effective treatment option for chronic back pain,”

Hmm. Very, very interesting, that the faux treatment is still more effective than the standard ones. Says a lot about how we treat back problems, no?

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  • http://franksblog.hofer.us/ frank

    Take a look at this analysis of the media reports:
    http://scienceblogs.com/insolence/2007/09/yawnanother_acupuncture_study.php
    From the Science Blogs article:
    “What it does say is that, if you have chronic back pain that’s due to a herniated disc, spondylosis, an injury causing a fracture (even if that fracture healed) a systemic disorder like rheumatoid arthritis, or other causes that can be seen on radiological studies, the results of this this study does not apply to you, at least not very well at all.”
    More interesting tidbits there.

  • http://www.vicster.net vicster

    Well, considering I’ve been suffering through the worst bout of back pain I’ve ever had (believe me, Flip, I truly WISH it was all in my head!), I can tell you that acupuncture has been working wonders for me. The first treatment didn’t seem to do much (I was pretty far gone by the time I went for treatment), but by the end of the second treatment, I had a lot more flexibility and strength. Between the acupuncture and some very gentle stretching, I’m about 45-50% healed (which, actually is pretty good considering I was nearly crippled a week ago).

  • Flip

    Or for many of the people complaining about an ailment that doesn’t exist. It’s just in their head.