Can anyone answer my questions on acupunture?

Question

My husband has a bulging disc in his back. It is very small and he is putting off surgery hoping that at his age it will possibly correct itself. He is only 26. He is manging his pain with a pain management doctor. Has anyone heard or know of anybody with back pains using acupunture and working? Could this possibly help his back? Any information will help I neither of us know anything about acupunture.

Answer 1

Acupuncture and the proper herbal combination will help prevent further injury.  It will also invigorate the blood flow to the area, helping reduce the severity of the pain.

Search for a qualified & fully licensed Acupuncturist before making an appointment.

One of the quickest ways to search for a Licensed Acupuncturist/Chinese Herbalist is www.acufinder.com.  Look for those in your area, then call & ask specific questions about their experience dealing with bulging discs.

Fyi... A minimum of a Master's Degree (4 year program) as well as a National testing & certification by www.nccaom.org is required before someone can call themselves a Licensed Acupuncturist.

Avoid going to an MD or Chiropractor with minimal training in acupuncture (and no Chinese Medicine degree) in order to find a qualified herbalist and acupuncturist.

I wish you both good health.

Answer 2

My mother used it for a year or so to relieve chronic pain from a botched back surgery.  

I'd certainly suggest seeking out a practitioner that also is certified in Traditional Chinese Medicine and herbology.

I've found that combination to be far more effective than acu alone.

Answer 3

Accupuncture is great for this sort of condition especially, as the other poster mentions, combined with traditiona chinese medicine. The practitioner can combine the accupuncture with the use of appropriate herbs and massage techniques that would best suit the condition.

I have used accupuncture for many conditions of my own as well ad healing my dog from a fractured spine.

Answer 4

Accupuncture can help a lot with the pain for your husband's condition, but any competent accupuncturist is going to tell you to actually fix the problem instead of masking it (especially since the means to do so are contained within chinese medicine).

There are a few things which I know of that could be causing what you're describing.  They are as follows

a) you have some sort of infection in your back, or an autoimmune respone occuring.

b) theres a bad back alingment with is causing anatomical damage to that disk and or pushing it our of position.

c) something in your energy is really messed up (although this is unlikley anymore than what would be caused by b or c)

My recomendation would be to see a competent osteopath or chiropractor (although they may be somewhat hard to find) and see if they can figure out whats causing the disk problem and give you a way to fix it.

Odds are whatever method you are given can have its effectiveness improved by accu, but other than just the pain accupuncture cannot cure it alone.

If your problem is just in the back alingment realm, then learning a chi gung form known as energy gates can be very helpful (and there's a book on it with the same title that explains the forms to utilize for helping the back).

Also, if the problem is primarily an inflammatory response, DMSO can work wonders for reducing the problem.  (but if you use it, you need to make sure to apply it to smoothe skin).

Other than that, unfortunately seeing an orthopedist tends to not be a good idea, and the methods they have tend to not really fix the probem (let it recurr later) and damage the body a lot.

Hope that helps!