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WEDNESDAY MAY 13, 2009 9
Study says acupuncture is better than drugs
Sticking it to
mainstream
New research has found that
acupuncture brought more
relief to people with back pain
than standard treatments,
whether it was done with a
toothpick or a real needle.
The study, by US researchers
has raised new questions
about how acupuncture works.
For many patients, that ben-
efit lasted for a year, the team
reported in the Archives of
Internal Medicine.
“Our study shows that you
don’t need to stick needles into
people to get the same effect,”
said Dr Daniel Cherkin, from
the Group Health Centre for
Health Studies in Seattle, who
led the study.
“Historically, some types of
acupuncture have used non-
penetrating needles. Such
treatments may involve phys-
iological effects that make a
clinical difference,” Karen
Sherman, also from Group
Health, who worked on the
study, said.
The team wanted to study
the effects of different types of
acupuncture in a large, care-
fully controlled study of 638
patients with chronic low
back pain.
They divided patients into
several groups.
One got seven weeks of stan-
dardised acupuncture treat-
ment known to be effective in PRICKED: The acupuncture study showed significant improvement
back pain. Another group got
an individually prescribed of acupuncture reported signif- deep needling of an acupunc-
acupuncture treatment. icant improvement in their ture point elicited similar
A third group was treated ability to function compared blood oxygen level-dependent
using a toothpick in a needle with those who got standard responses,” the team wrote.
guide tube that did not pierce medical care alone. Another study even found
the skin as regular acupunc- But there was no significant that lightly touching the skin
ture does, but targeted the cor- difference in pain relief people can induce some emotional
rect acupuncture ‘points’. got from needles or toothpicks. and hormonal reactions,
A fourth group just got The researchers said there is which could explain the bene-
standard medical treatment, some evidence that even nee- fit, they wrote.
which included medication dles were used 2,000 years ago Or, it may simply be the
and physical therapy. in acupuncture treatment, and experience of visiting an
After eight weeks, 60 per cent some imaging studies have acupuncturist for treatments
of the patients who got any type shown that “superficial and that helps.
Extremists gas third girls’ school
Nearly 100 young girls were the same symptoms shown kept its girls’ schools open
taken to hospital after a by victims of suspected gas while the austere Islamists
suspected gas attack at attacks on two girls’ ruled most of the country.
their school in Afghanistan schools in nearby Charikar The government was
yesterday, the third in a town, said Abdul Rahim investigating the poisonings,
series of such incidents Ayaar, spokesman for the the interior ministry’s
north of Kabul, Afghan Kapisa governor. Bashary said, but it was too
police and officials said. One poisoning took place early to determine who was
The early morning mass at a girls’ school in behind them. There have also
poisoning at Qazaaq Charikar on Monday and been no clues as to what the
primary school in Kapisa another on April 26. gas was in either case.
province has put 98 people The students were all out of Attacks on girls schools
in hospital, mostly students danger, Kapisa police chief have increased in the past
but also three teachers and Matiullah Safi said, confir- year, particularly in the
two guards, said Interior ming the toll of 94 injured. Taliban’s eastern and south-
Ministry spokesman Unusually, the three ern heartlands, as a Taliban
Zemaray Bashary. incidents took place in a insurgency has gathered
The patients were vomiting part of the country that was strength. When in power,
and dizzy and some had never under the firm control the Taliban banned women
been knocked unconscious, of the hardline Taliban and from work and schools.
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