Study Finds Fake Acupunture Works as Well as

[Atheist God]

Link

CHICAGO (AP) -- Fake acupuncture works nearly as well as the real thing for low back pain, and either kind performs much better than usual 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 whether pain relief came from the body's reactions to any thin needle pricks or, possibly, the placebo effect.

I believe this study reinforces what most medical professionals assumed anyway that acupuncture only works because people believe it does... The Placebo Effect

[Cronus]

dude, WHAT is fake acupunture?? I know what acupunture is but I have no idea what fake acupunture is.

[chrisfreak]

Fake acupuncture is.... uhm... just put all those needles where ever you want?

[Atheist God]

dude, WHAT is fake acupunture?? I know what acupunture is but I have no idea what fake acupunture is.

Basically it is sticking acupuncture needles in a random fashion in no particular pattern at all. Actual acupuncture is when the needles are placed in certain points (pattern) of the body to relieve pain, stress and what have you.

This study confirms that acupuncture in reality has no effect at all physiologically as claimed by the practitioners and people who use this for of therapy. Rather it proves that acupuncture only works because people believe it works, essentially it doesn't make the pain go away you do. It is all simple psychology really....

I have said for a long time that this form of therapy is really not doing anything at all. This study proves that acupuncture is really nothing more then a placebo. A placebo is something that in actuality has no effect on you but because your mind believes it does it works. Basically you trick your brain into not feeling pain etc.

[RabidCat]

It is also factual that medical researchers, through the years, have shown the same is true for the medical profession in general.

More and more studies are indicating that the increased use of prescription drugs has also increased the death and illness rate.

Just look at the drug ads on TV, and the increase in the number of "diseases". Since the health care revolution by insurance industry, the medical profession and drug companies have found the need to increase earnings by invention of disease, such as "restless leg syndrome". Give me a break!

Let's not just take the word of the doctors and FDA about anything, OK? Just like the oil industry, it's all about money. If something natural or mental can alleviate a disease, what the hell is wrong with that?

This whole attitude makes me tired. Hell, if somebody finds that snake oil works for his ailments, then he can use it as far as I'm concerned, and it doesn't make a bit of difference what ANYBODY "proves", does it? The medics will go to whatever lengths necessary to protect their income; if it's necessary to denigrate a process that has shown success for several thousand years, they will do so, right or wrong.

My own opinion is that a family doctor should be paid some token amount so long as the family is healthy, but when one becomes ill, the payment is no longer made, since the doctor is NOT doing his job. Chew on that for a while.

[Atheist God]

Let's not just take the word of the doctors and FDA about anything, OK? Just like the oil industry, it's all about money. If something natural or mental can alleviate a disease, what the hell is wrong with that?

I agree but similar studies in nation where the doctors are NOT owned by big pharma also say that acupuncture has no real physiological effects. I'm not saying I'm against it actually I am for placebo therapies, if something that has no physiological effects can help people why not?

Placebo therapy is used all the time and it does benefit people with a number of ailments, all I was doing was simply stating what most of the medical community not only in the US but in other nations as well accept as fact.

[dmb]

Hell, if somebody finds that snake oil works for his ailments, then he can use it as far as I'm concerned, and it doesn't make a bit of difference what ANYBODY "proves", does it?

It does make a difference what somebody "proves". The point of medical treatment isn't merely to feel better, it is to truly be better. If a placebo masks the symptoms of a continuing or worsening disease that makes a huge difference. I'm not accusing accupuncture or any other particular therapy of this, but I don't care if somebody "finds" something works for their ailments, I would never reccomend, as a definitive treatment, a therapy which has no physiological basis. If the problem is physiological the definitive treatment must produce beneficial physiological effects...psychological effects alone are not enough, although they can certainly be a part of the treatment.

My own opinion is that a family doctor should be paid some token amount so long as the family is healthy, but when one becomes ill, the payment is no longer made, since the doctor is NOT doing his job. Chew on that for a while.

Do you honestly think this is a realistic health care structure? You couldn't possibly, that would be naive to the extreme.

[RabidCat]

It does make a difference what somebody "proves". The point of medical treatment isn't merely to feel better, it is to truly be better. If a placebo masks the symptoms of a continuing or worsening disease that makes a huge difference. I'm not accusing accupuncture or any other particular therapy of this, but I don't care if somebody "finds" something works for their ailments, I would never reccomend, as a definitive treatment, a therapy which has no physiological basis. If the problem is physiological the definitive treatment must produce beneficial physiological effects...psychological effects alone are not enough, although they can certainly be a part of the treatment.

Do you honestly think this is a realistic health care structure? You couldn't possibly, that would be naive to the extreme.

Last first: no, I don't think this would be a realistic approach. However, you must admit that a means of payment, shall we say, that rewards the medics when a person is ill must, by its own nature, be counterproductive. Enough said.

I must ask how it is, or could be, that a placebo would "mask the symptoms" of any illness? Put it another way: IF an illness exists, and a placebo is administered, IF the illness (or the symptoms) goes away, then one must ask if the illness were real in the first place. Placebos affect the mind: if a placebo causes an effect on an illness, then it follows that the causal force was the mind, not the placebo. Shouldn't the mind be that which should be treated, since the mind was the cause in the first place?

You see, my philosophy contains a very large health aspect: that is that the vast majority of illnesses are either self-programmed or programmed by advertisement, "knowledge", or otherwise, and that by simply negating those effects, those illnesses disappear. I would go to a doctor for a broken leg or something of that nature; certainly not for a common cold or whatever.

Call me a naturopathological jerk or whatever: over many years of both self-observation and observation of others, the only conclusion I find reachable is the above. Most illness originates in the mind, and it is the mind which must be corrected to inhibit the disease.

[Atheist God]

I must ask how it is, or could be, that a placebo would "mask the symptoms" of any illness? Put it another way: IF an illness exists, and a placebo is administered, IF the illness (or the symptoms) goes away, then one must ask if the illness were real in the first place. Placebos affect the mind: if a placebo causes an effect on an illness, then it follows that the causal force was the mind, not the placebo. Shouldn't the mind be that which should be treated, since the mind was the cause in the first place?

A placebo is basically self hypnosis, your brain essentially tricks itself. Many people now have had surgeries fully conscious and awake and felt no pain at all due to hypnosis. You must remember that pain and other sensations are all hardwired in the brain. Hypnosis like a placebo only works if the participant believes it works. Those who are unaware that the placebo they are given but believe the said treatment actually works hypnotize themselves.

Placebos do work to rid people of pain however it will not cure an illness if it exists.

[dmb]

A purely psychological illness may be possible to treat with purely psychological treatments (ie placebos). But I specified diseases with a physiological basis.

A while ago at work I had some really bad heartburn. I asked my coworker, who also runs an accupuncture practice, if he had any remedies. He told me the heartburn was caused by my stomach's chi rebelling upwards and showed me a couple of pressure points to try which would reverse the problem. It didn't work (perhaps I was too skeptical for a placebo to work), and I continued to feel the heartburn. But if it had worked to relieve my pain via a placebo effect, I would still have hydrocholoric acid in my throat and esophagus, and the acid would still be damaging the tissues there.

[PMHNP]

Ok,

First: "Placebo therapy is used all the time" not true in fact it is an ethic's violation for a MD/NP etc to do this!

Second: "increased use of prescription drugs has also increased the death and illness rate." Huh? Life expectancy is way up in the past 100 years!!!

ROTFL... you guys are great... I was going to watch showtime. but this is way better.....

[RabidCat]

Ok,

First: "Placebo therapy is used all the time" not true in fact it is an ethic's violation for a MD/NP etc to do this!

Second: "increased use of prescription drugs has also increased the death and illness rate." Huh? Life expectancy is way up in the past 100 years!!!

ROTFL... you guys are great... I was going to watch showtime. but this is way better.....

Re your second thing there. That came from an AARP article, blame them if you want, but I tend to think they have a better idea of what the statistics show than simply stating that life expectancy is way up in the past 100 years. In point of fact, there are several, if not many, societal groups that are something less than "third world" whose life expectancy is well above that in the US.

When I was a kid, we were told that life expectancy was around 72 years. Last I heard (but the fact is that I don't listen to that junk very well, since it is nothing more than a statistic) the life expectancy is still 65-75 years. Big deal.

If you're quoting me as placebos being used all the time, I never stated such. Nor would I, since I have little knowledge of such.

As to the hardwired brain someone else mentioned, more research with a more open mind would be called for, since current theory on this matter implies that the electrical indications occur within the brain BEFORE the physical indications: in other words, the thought precedes the action, as it always has. The same is true for every physical activity, always has been, always will be.

Chances are most of you will be unable to answer this: how many of the "illnesses" being treated only treat the symptoms and not the illness? Put it more simply: why do people take sleeping pills?

[Atheist God]

Re your second thing there. That came from an AARP article, blame them if you want, but I tend to think they have a better idea of what the statistics show than simply stating that life expectancy is way up in the past 100 years. In point of fact, there are several, if not many, societal groups that are something less than "third world" whose life expectancy is well above that in the US.

Come on the life expectancy in the US is still one of the highest in the world and the only reason why say nations like Japan for example and other nations in Asia have higher life expectancies is because they don't fill their bodies with the crap most in the US consider food.

As to the hardwired brain someone else mentioned, more research with a more open mind would be called for, since current theory on this matter implies that the electrical indications occur within the brain BEFORE the physical indications: in other words, the thought precedes the action, as it always has. The same is true for every physical activity, always has been, always will be.

It has nothing to do with being open minded at all.

Think of the brain like a CPU and your body as a mother board. Your brain like a CPU receives, decodes and sends information, your body is like the mother board which sends information to the brain to be decoded and then received again.

The brain can be duped into blocking out certain information and this has been proven time and time again via placebo and hypnosis experiments.

When you decide to say move your fingers your brain lights up. You don't even really have to think about it as the information is sent so fast it happens nearly instantaneously these types of processes do originate in the brain. Physical sensation like pain or itching is involuntary and begins in the body first this information is sent to the brain which it is then decoded into the said sensation which is relayed back to the area of origin and thus feeling.

Chances are most of you will be unable to answer this: how many of the "illnesses" being treated only treat the symptoms and not the illness? Put it more simply: why do people take sleeping pills?

Some illnesses can't be cured, some go away after time, some never go away, and some can be controlled by whatever means necessary. Insomnia is a disease that is for the most part incurable the only thing that can be done for most is to take a sleep aid. I have been an insomniac since I was a kid I once went almost 2 weeks without a wink of sleep until i passed out due to exhaustion.

I control this now with sleep aids.

Many times the symptoms of an illness are the only thing that can be controlled.

[RabidCat]

Come on the life expectancy in the US is still one of the highest in the world and the only reason why say nations like Japan for example and other nations in Asia have higher life expectancies is because they don't fill their bodies with the crap most in the US consider food.

It has nothing to do with being open minded at all.

Think of the brain like a CPU and your body as a mother board. Your brain like a CPU receives, decodes and sends information, your body is like the mother board which sends information to the brain to be decoded and then received again.

The brain can be duped into blocking out certain information and this has been proven time and time again via placebo and hypnosis experiments.

When you decide to say move your fingers your brain lights up. You don't even really have to think about it as the information is sent so fast it happens nearly instantaneously these types of processes do originate in the brain. Physical sensation like pain or itching is involuntary and begins in the body first this information is sent to the brain which it is then decoded into the said sensation which is relayed back to the area of origin and thus feeling.

Some illnesses can't be cured, some go away after time, some never go away, and some can be controlled by whatever means necessary. Insomnia is a disease that is for the most part incurable the only thing that can be done for most is to take a sleep aid. I have been an insomniac since I was a kid I once went almost 2 weeks without a wink of sleep until i passed out due to exhaustion.

I control this now with sleep aids.

Many times the symptoms of an illness are the only thing that can be controlled.

Perhaps you need to shift your paradigms. There ARE other philosophies just as valid.

[questionmark]

Before we go out on a big fight if traditional methods are better or worse than academic methods, just let me remark that there are cases of double blind studies where even so called "incurable"cancer receded in the placebo group.

There most be something in our bodies that wants us to heal, or not, and needs just a little push.