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Acupuncture

5 Tips to Help Your Diabetes

Blog-img 5 Tips to Help Your Diabetes - Doc_640There are about 29 million people in the United States who suffer from type 2 diabetes, an illness that is becoming increasingly common and is also highly preventable. With lifestyle changes, diabetes can be managed and prevented.

Aim for a healthy weight

When you have extra weight, this can cause an increase in blood sugar. Maintaining a healthy weight can keep your blood sugar at more normal levels and better overall health.

Exercise

Exercise is very important when it comes to managing or preventing type 2 diabetes. Regular exercise can help lower weight, lower stress levels, blood pressure, cholesterol and triglyceride. Even just by adding in walks into your day can make a difference. Aim for 30 minutes of aerobic exercise at least four times a week. continue reading »

7 Steps to Eliminate Depression Naturally

Suffering from depression can make you feel hopeless, frustrated and like your quality of life will never get better. Many feel that prescription medications don’t help, and simply mask the problem instead of helping solve it. If you are dealing with depression, it is easy to get discouraged about your treatment options. Below are ways that you can naturally reduce your depression and get you back on a road to a healthier mind and body.
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Acupuncture for Obsessive Complusive Disorder (OCD)

Blog - overcoming ocd_300bwMental health problems are extremely common, and many times more than people expect. There are a whole host of reasons why some suffer from mental health disorders. Genetics, upbringing and environment can all play a role in a person’s wellbeing and mental health. Prescription medication to deal with these issues are also one of the most over prescribed type of drug. A lot of times these drugs mask the problem, rather than getting to the root cause and curing. They can also lead to harmful and long-lasting side effects.

OCD, obsessive compulsive disorder, is one of the most common mental health disorders. A lot of us have low levels of OCD about certain things, which is completely normal. When one suffers from serious OCD, it can greatly impede on their quality of living and everyday activities. continue reading »

Acupuncture and Prostate Health

AcupunctureandProstateHealth_300Whether you are looking to reduce your risk of prostate disease or treat an existing condition, acupuncture may be able to help. Because of its holistic approach, acupuncture can help relieve symptoms associated with prostate problems like frequent and painful urination.

A report titled Traditional Chinese Medicine and Prostate Health published by Pacific College found Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) to be effective in the treatment of prostatitis, urinary tract infections, and symptoms associated with prostate cancer supportive care. continue reading »

Acupuncture for Sleep Apnea

sleepy-owlOver 12 million Americans suffer from sleep apnea, which causes them to stop breathing multiple times during sleep.  This results in fatigue and can lead to serious consequences such as hypertension, dysrhythmia, heart attack, and stroke. Sleep apnea can also lead to poor memory, weight gain, headaches, impotence, and job impairment.  After this Brazilian study came out as a treatment for obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) which showed immediate effects in reducing noctural respiratory events, we started using these protocols in our clinic and we love the results.

The researchers hypothesize that this improvement is due to acupuncture’s effects on serotonergic pathways and also acupuncture’s anti-inflammatory effects.

The researchers note that the acupuncture points of the neck are of specific interest because they stimulate the genioglossus muscle (secondarily, the mylohyoid muscle) on deep insertion. They note that stimulation of this lingual muscle affects airflow dynamics and may be a key
reason as to why acupuncture is effective for improving the symptoms of patients with sleep apnea.
Reference:
Immediate effect of acupuncture on the sleep pattern of patients with obstructive sleep apnea
Anaflávia O Freire, Gisele C M Sugai, Sônia Maria Togeiro, Luiz Eugênio Mello, Sérgio Tufik; Acupunct Med 2010;28:115-119. Department of Physiology, Universidade Federal de Sao Paulo, Unifesp Rua Botucatu 862, 04023-062 São Paulo/SP, Brazil. a.freire@unifesp.br
Abstract
BACKGROUND:
Most patients with obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) do not tolerate treatment with nasal continuous positive airway pressure, the ‘gold standard’ treatment for this condition. It was shown in a pilot study
that acupuncture was more effective than placebo treatment (sham acupuncture) in producing significant changes in the respiratory events assessed by polysomnography (PSG).
OBJECTIVES:
To investigate the immediate effect of manual acupuncture (MA) and electroacupuncture (EA)
on the sleep pattern of patients presenting with moderate OSA.
METHODS:
40 patients with an Apnea-Hypopnea Index (AHI) of 15-30/h were randomly allocated to MA treatment (n=10), EA 10 Hz treatment (n=10), EA 2 Hz treatment (n=10) and a no-treatment control group
(n=10). The patients received MA or EA (2 or 10 Hz) just before the PSG study at 20:00.
RESULTS:
The AHI (p=0.005; p=0.005), the Apnea Index (p=0.038; p=0.009) and the respiratory events
(p=0.039; p=0.014) decreased significantly in the MA and EA 10 Hz groups, respectively (AHI (21.9, 11.2),
Apnea Index (5.15, 0.7), respiratory events (120.5, 61.0)
in the MA group before and after. AHI (20.6, 9.9),
Apnea Index (8.2, 0.3), respiratory events (117.0, 56.0)
in the EA 10 Hz group before and after). The micro-
arousals decreased only in the MA group (146.0 vs 88.5,
p=0.0002). There were no significant changes in the EA
2 Hz group or in the control group.
CONCLUSION:
A single session of either MA or EA 10 Hz had an acute effect in reducing the AHI as well as the number of nocturnal respiratory events of patients presenting with moderate OSA.
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