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Does acupuncture work?

"The didactic portion of the course will focus on bridging the gap between acupuncture practice and science."

The only bridge between science and anything is more science.

Game over. Insert 20¢.
 
Here is an excerpt from University of California San Francisco, UCSF Medical Center:

Conditions
Acupuncture can be helpful in maintaining good health and in treating patients with a wide range of health problems. Acupuncture may be used alone or in combination with other complementary or conventional medicine treatments.
If you are not sure whether acupuncture is an appropriate treatment for your condition, first schedule an integrative medicine consultation, where one of our specialists will go over the various services provided at the Osher Center for Integrative Medicine and help you figure out what might best fit your needs.
Acupuncture can be used to treat a number of condition and health problems, including:
• Side Effects of Cancer Treatment — Acupuncture can help ease the nausea associated with chemotherapy, increase the immune response, relieve pain and improve energy levels.
• Headache — Acupuncture can help reduce the severity and frequency of chronic headaches, including tension headaches and migraines.
• Chronic Neck and Back Pain — Acupuncture may be helpful in relieving chronic pain caused by spinal stenosis, disc herniation, spondolithesis and ankylosing spondylitis.
• Women's Reproductive Health Issues — Acupuncture can be used to enhance fertility, relieve symptoms of premenstrual syndrome (PMS) and minimize bothersome symptoms of menopause, including mood changes, hot flashes and insomnia.
• Chronic Fatigue Syndrome — Chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS) is a disorder that causes debilitating fatigue, including exhaustion and reduced stamina, neurological problems, and a variety of flu-like symptoms.

Chinese medicine considers symptoms of fatigue and exhaustion as originating from weakened organs. Acupuncture may help to revive and stimulate the affected organs from their depleted states.
• Fibromyalgia — Fibromyalgia is a chronic pain disorder characterized by fatigue and widespread pain in the fibrous tissues of the muscles, ligaments and tendons. Acupuncture may help relieve the pain associated with this condition.
• Asthma — Research in the past decade has shown that acupuncture can be very effective in alleviating the symptoms of respiratory diseases, including asthma. It may also reduce the frequency and intensity of asthma attacks.
• Sports Injuries — Acupuncture can be used to treat various sports and repetitive stress injuries.
• Gastrointestinal Disorders — Acupuncture may be helpful in relieving some of the discomfort caused by gastrointestinal disorders, including chronic liver disease, irritable bowel syndrome, gastroesophageal reflux disease (GERD)and inflammatory bowel disease.
https://www.ucsfhealth.org/treatments/acupuncture/

steenkh said:
It seems that Harvard also needs extra funding by providing pseudo-scientific courses.
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Steenkh, what I presented on the previous page is not pseudoscience!
 
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ViewsofMars said:
Steenkh, what I presented on the previous page is not pseudoscience!
Click to expand...

It's textbook pseudoscience; vague in both form and function, un-repeatable results, won't work in a double blind environment, full of wishy-washy mystical language, can't describe the methodology by which it even supposedly works, the whole "We don't treat the disease we treat the whole body" nonsense and its entire pitch is basically a bog standard "Big bad evil Western science won't believe me" guilt trip.
 
Sherman Bay said:
Can you find a meridian? When you can show these exist, I'll look into acupuncture. Until then, it is the very definition of pseudoscience.
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JoeBentley said:
It's textbook pseudoscience; vague in both form and function, un-repeatable results, won't work in a double blind environment, full of wishy-washy mystical language, can't describe the methodology by which it even supposedly works, the whole "We don't treat the disease we treat the whole body" nonsense and its entire pitch is basically a bog standard "Big bad evil Western science won't believe me" guilt trip.
Click to expand...

It's a long, uphill row to how, and in stony soil.

Stone the first: it would have to be demonstrated that acupuncture does, in fact have demonstrable, measurable, repeatable, objective effects (in well-designed, double-blinded studies with a large number of participants).

Stone the second: it would have to be demonstrated that acupuncture were more effective at producing those results than placebo.

Stone the third: the supposed mechanism for those results would need to be explained, and demonstrated; that is, if it is claimed that acupuncture is effective because it disrupts "chi" flowing in "medians", the mere existence of "chi" as a measurable force and the mere existence (and location) of "median lines" would need to be physically demonstrated, in the lab and in the human body.

Stone the fourth: it would need to be demonstrated that the purported cause(s) of the "effects" of acupuncture do(es), in fact, have the capacity to produce the claimed results); that is, having demonstrated the existence of "chic" and "median lines", it would have to be demonstrated that "disrupting chi" by "breaking" a "median line" had an actual, repeatable, result in the body and in the lab.

Stone the fifth, at the top of the hill: Then, and only then, might a there be formulated upon which to base a claim that acupuncture actually works to do what it is claimed to do for the reasons it is claimed to do it.

Until that happens, "acupuncture cured my neighbor's prima's endometriosis-related headaches" is the very model of pseudoscience.
 
Here is an excerpt from the University of California, San Francisco, ObGyn&RS, Zuckerberg San Francisco General CenteringPregnancy®:

Where Centering Happens

If you plan to get your prenatal care through the ZSFG Women's Clinic (5M), your Centering groups will take place at a community agency near the hospital. This agency has many services for pregnant women and their families, like yoga, childbirth classes, bellycasting, acupuncture, massage, and help with housing and other social services.

https://obgyn.ucsf.edu/san-francisco-general-hospital/centeringpregnancy®

"The only way that we reach our full human potential is if we're able to unlock the gifts of every person around the world." — Priscilla Chan and Mark Zuckerberg
https://chanzuckerberg.com/
 
ViewsofMars said:
Here is an excerpt from the University of California, San Francisco, ObGyn&RS, Zuckerberg San Francisco General CenteringPregnancy®:

Where Centering Happens

If you plan to get your prenatal care through the ZSFG Women's Clinic (5M), your Centering groups will take place at a community agency near the hospital. This agency has many services for pregnant women and their families, like yoga, childbirth classes, bellycasting, acupuncture, massage, and help with housing and other social services.

https://obgyn.ucsf.edu/san-francisco-general-hospital/centeringpregnancy®

"The only way that we reach our full human potential is if we're able to unlock the gifts of every person around the world." — Priscilla Chan and Mark Zuckerberg
https://chanzuckerberg.com/
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Okay and?
 
*Shrugs* Even beyond that it's meaningless.

Plenty of legit hospitals, clinics, and such are happy to offer some Woo on the side, there's money to be had in it.

And even more sadly gussying up legit medicine in Woo speak for purely advertising and marketing reasons isn't exactly unheard of.

Idiots are a viable marketing demographic. If enough people started believing that smearing dog feces on their testicles with a paintbrush while whistling Dixie and standing on their heads would cure cancer legit cancer clinics would start offering classes on it along side the stuff that actually works just to shut the idiots up and because it's a venal sin to allow suckers to keep their money.

Medicine in most the Westernized world, no more so then in America, is a business as much as a science. Create the demand enough and legit people will forget their standards to create the supply.

Making a point that at the end of the day isn't pointing out anything more than that doesn't lend credence to the Woo they are being sold.
 
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ViewsofMars said:
Here is an excerpt from the University of California, San Francisco, ObGyn&RS, Zuckerberg San Francisco General CenteringPregnancy®:

Where Centering Happens

If you plan to get your prenatal care through the ZSFG Women's Clinic (5M), your Centering groups will take place at a community agency near the hospital. This agency has many services for pregnant women and their families, like yoga, childbirth classes, bellycasting, acupuncture, massage, and help with housing and other social services.

https://obgyn.ucsf.edu/san-francisco-general-hospital/centeringpregnancy®

"The only way that we reach our full human potential is if we're able to unlock the gifts of every person around the world." — Priscilla Chan and Mark Zuckerberg
https://chanzuckerberg.com/
Click to expand...
All this says is that acupuncture exists, which no-one is denying. It doesn't say anything at all about whether it works or not.

Oh, but why would they use it if it doesn't work?

That's a very good question.
 
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