Right Place to Needle

The right place to needle depends on the trigger point concept. This concept is generally used to determine the needle insertion points.

These points are usually situated in the muscles and are areas which are very tender. Pain radiates from these points to distant areas in the body. TCM refers to these points as the “Ah Shi” points.

Another concept is to decide on the needling point and procedure based on the body segments. Spinal cord has a lot of segments with pairs of nerve roots extending from it along the length.

Based on which nerve roots supplies to which part of the skin it is possible to find out which are the segments supplying sensation to which part of the body.

At deeper levels, there are the myotomes which are related to muscles and sclerotomes which are related to the bones and joints. Medical acupuncture sometimes involves inserting the needles into the segments which correspond to the affected or diseased internal organs.

Electro acupuncture is one technique used by the Medical acupuncturists. This technique has been developed by acupuncturists from Europe and Japan.

The highlight of this technique is that it uses only 24 points. According to this method, each meridian has a test point, a tonification point and a sedation point.

The procedure involves the recording of the electrodermal current at the point to be tested which has been identified on the meridian. The recorded values are then placed on a chart.

These values are then analyzed to determine which of these meridians is hyper functioning and which ones are hypofunctioning. For hypofunctioning meridians, the needle is inserted in the tonification point. This increases the electronic impulse which is flowing through the meridian.

To set right the hyperfunctioning meridian, the sedation point is needled in order to decrease the electronic activity in the meridian. Thus the meridians are balanced and there are only 24 points that one has to remember on these meridians.