Are there side effects in Acupuncture?
Once in a while patients come back complaining they have been having side effects from Acupuncture treatments. As asking in details what kinds of side effects they are suffering from, some says their ill condition has gotten worse, and another says they have developed new symptoms. Or, others say they cannot exactly pin-point what has gotten worse but they have felt tired after the treatment.
Natural body reactions you may experience after Acupuncture treatments.
As a matter of fact, most of these symptoms are not side effects, but natural reactions of our body after Acupuncture treatments. And, yet again, they are easily misunderstood as side effects because we all expect ourselves to improve in health after treatments, not the other way around. So, let’s talk about it.
In Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) and Acupuncture, these reactions (phenomenon) from Acupuncture treatments are known as ‘Healing Crisis (瞑眩)’ or ‘Needle Sickness (針暈)’. Then, why on earth would one have such reactions with Acupuncture? And, which are natural reactions and which are not?
The fundamental principle of Acupuncture treatments is forcefully to cause a physiological change in our body for healing purpose. Therefore, when undergoing an Acupuncture treatment, our body reacts more than when we are pricked with a sewing needle. At this point, some of those reactions may come out a little extremely because of our physical condition at the time of the treatment, intensity of Acupuncture needle stimulation by practitioners, and so on.
If feeling a little bit dizzy and tired after Acupuncture treatments…: Needle Sickness
First, Acupuncture is a treatment method to heal a patient using a lot of his/her own energy (氣 Qi in TCM). So, it is very much important to consider the state of the patient’s vital energy (正氣 Zheng Qi in TCM) at the time of each treatment. For an instance, a patient may feel this physiological change during the Acupuncture treatment seems too much to handle because he/she presents with severe deficiency of Qi and blood. In this case, people may feel dizzy, light headed, nauseated, sick in stomach, weak in limbs, cold sweat, general body ache with no reason, and so on. These are symptoms of ‘Needle Sickness,’ and arise only when the patient’s vital energy or Qi is low.
‘Needle Sickness’ can be easily managed, as any experienced practitioner would do, by extending the recovery time between treatments, or taking certain supplements or types of food to help nourish the vitality. In other words, ‘Needle Sickness’ is not a side effect, and, once informed about these symptoms of ‘Needle Sickness’, your practitioner can easily control it by increasing the recovery time between treatments as well as replenishing vital energy and blood. However, the only problem is that a patient almost never experience ‘Needle Sickness’ from the Acupuncture treatment as long as he/she is more or less physically on the usual self, or has not suddenly been thrown into a chaotic health crisis on the day of the treatment. So, please do not worry about experiencing this ‘Needle Sickness’, and simply let your practitioner know so as to adjust the course of your treatments according to the change of your condition.
That feeling of discomfort when your body makes a dramatic recovery… : Healing Crisis
Now, there is ‘Healing Crisis’, slightly different from ‘Needle Sickness’. This ‘Healing Crisis’ is referred to the temporary ache or discomfort that occurs while recovering the symptoms of your illness. However, it is a little bit obscure to draw a definite line between ‘Healing Crisis’ and ‘Needle Sickness.’
In other words, ‘Healing Crisis’ appears, even though the Acupuncture treatment has been genuinely appropriate, because the effectiveness of the treatment is rather too dramatic in progress. For instance, all of sudden the vital energy and blood are unblocked, and their circulation in the body is recovered. That is when our body experiences all sorts of discomfort from the healing change. You may even complain of severe pain. Imagine that you are getting out of the chair after long hours of sitting at the desk. At that moment, you may notice that your legs have gone asleep. As you are putting an enormous effort to take a single step, you will feel all the nerves numbing and tingling (or even aching) down the legs and feet. It is because the blood circulation that was temporarily obstructed has come back to its full action, and your body is overwhelmed with this sudden physiological change. Likewise, we can understand the temporary discomfort from the rapid change in your body, and expect the ultimate improvement in your health throughout the course of Acupuncture treatments. We can now understand ‘Healing Crisis’ means the course of your treatments is working.
Differentiating Needle Sickness, Healing Crisis & Side Effect
It is not easy, but critical, to distinguish side effects from ‘Healing Crisis’ in Acupuncture treatments. In case of ‘Needle Sickness’ and ‘Healing Crisis’, the diagnosis and treatment principle remain unchanged, but the treatment plan needs adjusted according to the condition of the patient at the time of the treatment, that is, a smaller number of needles, gentler needle stimulation, different treatment modalities, longer recovery time between treatments, etc. However, when side effects are present, the diagnosis has to be re-evaluated immediately. Practitioners are human, and mistakes can be made. Therefore, there may be sometimes a change of side effects. What matters most is to identify if the reactions from Acupuncture treatments are naturally occurring or side effects, and to handle them accordingly.
In general, ‘Needle Sickness’ or ‘Healing Crisis’ lasts for a few days, and you may feel worst a first couple of days after the treatment. Day by day you should feel most of the symptoms becoming milder, and, at the same time, you should find that the symptoms of your illness also improve. However, in case of side effects, as time passes, the discomforting symptoms from the treatments get worse. What is worse, after these symptoms have disappeared, you will find the pre-existing illness still present. Therefore, as a patient, it is absolutely necessary to inform these changes from the treatment to your practitioners so as to identify if these new symptoms are ‘Needle Sickness’, ‘Healing Crisis’, or side effects.
