Migraine headaches are debilitating for those who suffer from the pain. According to the Migraine Research Foundation, approximately 39 million people in the U.S. suffer from migraine disease. Some migraine studies predict that up to 12% of adults in the U.S. have migraines, with 4 million suffering from chronic migraines. Worldwide, it is estimated that 1 billion men, women, and even children suffer from migraine disease. 

Migraines are serious and often incapacitating. Here are some additional statistics from the Migraine Research Foundation:

• Migraine disease is the 6th most disabling illness in the world
• Every 10 seconds, someone in the U.S. goes to the emergency room complaining of head pain, and approximately 1.2 million visits are for acute migraine attacks
• While most sufferers experience attacks once or twice a month, more than 4 million people have chronic daily migraine, which is defined as at least 15 migraine days per month
• More than 90% of migraine sufferers are unable to work or function normally during their migraine

three benefits to using acupuncture to treat migraines

1) Prevention 

Evidence also shows that acupuncture can reduce migraine frequency and possibly even prevent the onset of migraines in some people. A 2015 study published by the American Headache Society found that acupuncture may help prevent migraine headaches or decrease occurrences and could be more effective than more traditional headache remedies including prescription drugs1. 

2) Saving Money

It’s also important to note that some migraine treatments are expensive. Acupuncture treatments just might help you reduce the cost of managing your chronic migraine pain.

3) Fewer Side Effects

Most people suffering from migraine disease deal with it by taking prescription medication. However, studies show acupuncture may help relieve the pain associated with migraines. According to a 2016 Cochrane review, approximately half of people regularly seeing an acupuncturist say they have reduced their reliance on painkillers after they have received acupuncture treatment2. As with many prescription medications, some carry significant side effects. Acupuncture is a wonderful drug-free option to investigate if you suffer from chronic migraine pain.

Find out what treatment options are available for your chronic migraine pain. Keeping a log of headache symptoms both before and after acupuncture sessions can help you understand your potential triggers and show you how impactful the treatments are. 

Don’t spend another day with chronic migraine pain. Make an appointment with me today and get the help you need. 

Sources:

1. https://americanheadachesociety.org/news/headache-quality-measurement/
2. https://training.cochrane.org/handbook/current/chapter-26

The post Three Benefits of Using Acupuncture to Treat Your Migraines appeared first on Tybee Acupuncture.

As we enter a new year, it is natural to want to look back on the last one. As humans, we have the gift and the hurdle of marking time, so it can feel helpful to recall memories we want to hold on to or look for lessons we can take with us.  

To that end, here are three categories in which research into the type, application and efficacy of acupuncture saw significant advancements in 2020, findings that will certainly help guide us as we move forward. In a year that saw so much focus on our health, these findings offer some good news in the fields of pain management without opioids, migraine headaches, and insight into why it is that acupuncture is effective as an anti-inflammatory. 

Category 1: Non-opioid Pain Treatment

Because of the safety and non-addictive nature of acupuncture, researchers have been studying its effects as a pain-reliever for at least a decade, hoping to find an alternative to opioid painkillers. In October, researchers from the Tufts University School of Medicine in Boston published the results of their analysis of 16 medical reviews and 11 clinical trials that looked at the efficacy of acupuncture for treating pain related to knee osteoarthritis, back pain and fibromyalgia. They found acupuncture is effective in all three cases. The analysis also corroborates there is evidence that acupuncture stimulates the body’s natural opioid systems to achieve pain reduction, which we have talked about before. 

The winner of this year’s research competition through the American Academy of Medical Acupuncture was a submission about acupuncture as an effective non-opioid pain therapy in pediatric sickle cell cases. Researchers at Columbia University Medical Center studied patients in the New York-Presbyterian Morgan Stanley Children’s Hospital Pediatric Hematology unit over a period of seven years. They found that acupuncture significantly decreased their patient’s pain scores approximately 65 percent of the time without any adverse side effects.

Research published in October by the journal Anesthesiology found acupuncture helped reduce post-operative pain levels. The study looked at a group of 106 veterans getting different surgeries. When compared to the control group of patients, the veterans who received acupuncture before their surgeries experienced less pain afterward, less anxiety and used fewer opioid painkillers to manage their pain after the surgery. This study, while it needs followup research, has important implications for reducing opioid dependency. Six percent of veterans who are given opioids after surgery become dependent on them, and veterans are twice as likely to die from overdoses as civilians, according to the study’s author, Brinda Krish. 

Category 2: Migraine Headaches

Highlighting the encouraging results from previous studies on acupuncture for migraine headaches, a 2020 analysis from researchers at Harvard Medical School, Georgetown University, University of Arizona, Creighton University, and Louisiana State University shows acupuncture is a safe way to alleviate or eliminate migraine headaches. Migraines affect over 15 percent of people in the United States, and they can be debilitating. In another study published this year, researchers found they can tailor acupuncture treatments to patients for better success rates by first understanding their specific brain structure through MRI scans. Using the scans and machine learning, specific patterns in patients’ brain gray matter were correlated with better responses to the acupuncture treatments.

Category 3: Anti-inflammatory Effects 

Last but not least, another study out of Harvard Medical School showed acupuncture can regulate the body’s response to certain bacterial infections. They found acupuncture improved patients’ survival rates and prevented disease progression of these bacterial infections. They also found their results were even more effective if the patients received acupuncture treatments before they were infected, adding to the body of evidence suggesting acupuncture is an important preventive medicine. The study showed acupuncture regulates systemic inflammation by activating certain neural pathways when specific acupoints were used. 

And that’s a wrap. These are just a few of the important studies to come out of the field of acupuncture research this year, and they all have important implications for our health moving forward. 

The post Acupuncture Wrapped: An overview of some of the most exciting discoveries in 2020 appeared first on Tybee Acupuncture.