Guest guest Posted March 25, 2003 Report Share Posted March 25, 2003 Hi All, & Hi Z'ev Z'ev WROTE: > From what I've seen of Deke Kendall's and Ji Shenghan's writings, > is the working hypothesis that the points and channels access the > nervous system and send specific signals to the brain. While this > is interesting, it is in early stages of research and development. Deke's view of AP mechanisms has some truth, but IMO, he goes too far in his dismissal of many more esoteric theories. IMO, the neural theory of acupuncture (inputs to the sensory nerves, spinal cord and brain, activating a powerful reflex cascade via neuroendocrine, autonomic and immune homeostatic systems) is far more than a " working hypothesis ... in early stages of research and development " . In the early 1970's, Chinese and French researchers (Niboyet et al) showed that blood or CSF from acupunctured lab animals contained then unknown humoral compounds that could transmit regional analgesia, leucocytotic factor, etc to naive recipients. In 1976, I wrote (in a letter to the Americal Journal of Acupuncture) that endogenous opiate-type compounds could explain some of the analgesic effects of AP. In 1977, Bruce Pomeranz published the first experimental evidence that endorphins were involved in AP analgesia. Since then, many experiments in animals and humans confirmed that interruption of neural input signals anywhere between the AP points and the PAG of the midbrain could abolish or reduce the AP response. Other work showed that serotonin-, opiate-, and other neuropeptide- agonists or antagonists could block or boost the AP effect. CAT scans after iv injection of radio-labelled deoxyglucose have shown what neural centres fire when certain points are stimulated, etc. IMO, there is a significant body of evidence that neural input to the AP points exerts its physiological/therapeutic effects via the neuroendocrine-immune homeostatic mechanisms of the body. For me, the neural theory is more than a mere " working hypothesis " ; it is a reasonably well proven FACT. That said, the neural theory falls far short of explaining many clinical effects to which any busy AP clinician can attest from personal experience. Best regards, WORK : Teagasc Staff Development Unit, Sandymount Ave., Dublin 4, Ireland WWW : Email: < Tel : 353-; [in the Republic: 0] HOME : 1 Esker Lawns, Lucan, Dublin, Ireland WWW : http://homepage.eircom.net/~progers/searchap.htm Email: < Tel : 353-; [in the Republic: 0] Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted March 25, 2003 Report Share Posted March 25, 2003 IMO, there is a significant body of evidence that neural input to the AP points exerts its physiological/therapeutic effects via the neuroendocrine-immune homeostatic mechanisms of the body. For me, the neural theory is more than a mere "working hypothesis"; it is a reasonably well proven FACT.>>>Also by anesthetizing the point all acupuncture effects are lost alon Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted March 26, 2003 Report Share Posted March 26, 2003 , " " <@e...> wrote: .. > > IMO, there is a significant body of evidence that neural input to the > AP points exerts its physiological/therapeutic effects via the > neuroendocrine-immune homeostatic mechanisms of the body. For > me, the neural theory is more than a mere " working hypothesis " ; it > is a reasonably well proven FACT. I agree. the evidence is overwhelming. > > That said, the neural theory falls far short of explaining many > clinical effects to which any busy AP clinician can attest from > personal experience. Arguably, acupuncture theory provides a holistic partial understanding of neurology and perhaps researchers should use acupuncture theory to guide some of their research rather being the subject thereof. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted March 26, 2003 Report Share Posted March 26, 2003 Yes!Arguably, acupuncture theory provides a holistic partial understanding of neurology and perhaps researchers should use acupuncture theory to guide some of their research rather being the subject thereof.Todd I can't begin to tell you how much I agree. I'm sure that it's more than a "partial understanding". I'd love to see meridian theory applied to so many areas in current research. I'd love to see cellular meridians suggested for vectorial translocation of proteins across the interior of cell landscapes. Bill Macher at UC Berkeley was among my mentors in this area of research. Bill figured out all the signaling inside the cell for movements of proteins across cytoplasmic space and into mitochondria. (Most current molecular scientists assume Bill will bet a Nobel prize in 10-15 years.) But there's no physical highways from A to B in the cellular cytoplasm outside the endoplasmic reticulum, so meridians would make some sense in this scenario. Likewise on a gross anatomy level in embryology how to get eyes to travel from the side of the head to the front of the head in a matter of days? That's a lot of transformation of tissues and organs in an absurdly short time. How about the embryology of meridians? How do we go from having gills and the circulatory system of a fish and proceed on through phylogenetic levels to become a primate. The chances of a wholesale application of paradigm rules from CM to WM would require a well established academic program with well funded research in CM. This has begun to exist in Taiwan, Japan and China. As of the 1980s there were five foundations established through the influence of Dr. Charles Chiang's (Min Tong) family: 3 in Taiwan, 1 in China, 1 in Japan. Each foundation has a combined administration from academia, industry and government. Then, of course, there is all of the well established academic research at universities in Tokyo, Beijing, Shanghai and many other large centers. Even at smaller centers throughout all of the provinces of China there's much rigorous research going on with regard to CM. A big fly in the ointment for now is the fact that they are familiar with all of the current molecular/cellular/clinical research at Berkeley, Stanford and Harvard, but people here not only can't read the Asian research, they are completely unaware of it's existence. The emergence of China as a huge economic powerhouse in the 21st Century may change that. Meanwhile hold your ground. There's nothing metaphysical about empirical results. I can not apply the first principles of genetics and molecular biology to Schroedinger's quantum mechanics. Part of the problem is they are many orders of magnification apart. The same holds true regarding the rules of CM and WM for now. Qi, meridians and acupuncture points exist. The Chinese paradigm of medicine with respect to language and cosmology has crossed the thresholds of hundreds of "new ages". So you are embarrassed by the "new agey" cultural motivations of your cohort? You posit this as your motivation to apply the mismatched rules of another paradigm? Is this fearfulness a correct motivation? Does this sound like Michael Jackson wanting to be a white guy? Or suburban white kids wanting to be black kids? CM is not WM. If you are embarrassed by your credentials, then get an MD or basic science Ph.D.. Be an MD/Ph.D. doing clinical or basic science research while being informed of CM. If you like doing CM (which it seems you do), then it will take some courage. I said some time ago on a previous post, that I consider all Americans practicing or supporting CM to be cultural heroes. It takes a lot of patience and idealism to work at my own job with herbs. I'm derisively called Dr. Herb by more than one of my fellow faculty members. That's school yard stuff ... literally. So this is one more season in the American development of CM. I can only tell you that we all have to hold our ground. History is on our side. Don't run from your own paradigm of competence and knowledge. Emmanuel Segmen Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted March 28, 2003 Report Share Posted March 28, 2003 Little more on acupuncture and nervous system Alon Neural mechanism of acupuncture-induced gastric relaxations in rats. Dig Dis Sci 2003 Jan;48(1):59-68. Acupuncture has been used to treat gastrointestinal symptoms in China for more than 3000 years. However, the mechanism of the beneficial effects of acupuncture remains unknown. Strain gauge transducers were implanted on the serosal surface of the stomach to record circular muscle contractions in thiobutabarbital-anesthetized rats. Acupuncture on the right lower abdomen caused a transient relaxation of the stomach. Acupuncture-induced gastric relaxations were abolished by guanethidine, propranolol, splanchnic ganglionectomy, spinal cord transection, and spinomedullary transection. In contrast, N(G)-nitro-L-arginine, phentolamine, truncal vagotomy, and pontomedullary transection had no effect. Acupuncture increased the number of c-Fos immunopositive cells at the ventrolateral medulla (VLM). It is concluded that acupuncture-induced gastric relaxations are mediated via the somatosympathetic reflex. Its afferent limb is composed of abdominal cutaneous and muscle afferent nerves. Its efferent limb is the gastric sympathetic nerve and the reflex center is within the medulla. VLM neurons may play an important role in mediating this reflex. Collect selectedreferences in personalfile on server See abstractsof selectedreferences Import format for reference managers Import format for spreadsheets and databases Home page Quick Help: English Chinese French German Japanese Italian Russian Spanish Turkish Ukranian Download Users This site ishosted byMedical Informatics Department at Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted March 31, 2003 Report Share Posted March 31, 2003 Alon, Thank you for the article. I can't tell if this is the one you were referring to which showed there was some hard-wiring between acupuncture points and the central nervous system. This does not see to address that. Actually it seems like a rather odd experiment. I tried looking up the Dig Dis Sci abbreviation to see if it's a peer-reviewed journal. I couldn't find anything. I've yet to check on Medline. Anyway what they are checking here is how the sypathetic nervous system will shut down normal function of the stomach's pacemaker rhythms. Which is yes it will. I'm looking at this abstract thinking I'd better read the whole paper if I can find it at UC. The reason is I can't figure out how shoving a needle into the general area of the lower right abdomen is different from breaking it's leg. They both will induce a sympathetic reaction which turns off the stomach. I'm slightly intrigued by the various neural ligations. The spinal cord ligation versus the vagus ligation only shows that it's a sympathetic and not a parasympathetic reaction. Okay. If you bring your fist down on the poor creature rather than acupuncture it, you get the same reaction. It would be somewhat more elegant if they had tried to increase G.I. motility. Then we would have seen some interesting acupunture outcomes. Alas, it's 5 PM and I have to drive across the Bay Bridge. I'll look up more details on this as I have time. I'll also address why I don't believe acupuncture points are hard-wired to the brain. They definitely regulate subcortical centers and bring about endocrine regulation along with a whole host of other activities. This I believe is due to Qi flow in the meridians (what ever is decided that is ... subtle emf? magnetism?) It's just my opinion. But I'm pretty clear it's not hard-wiring. In Gratitude, Emmanuel Segmen Little more on acupuncture and nervous system Alon Neural mechanism of acupuncture-induced gastric relaxations in rats. Dig Dis Sci 2003 Jan;48(1):59-68. Acupuncture has been used to treat gastrointestinal symptoms in China for more than 3000 years. However, the mechanism of the beneficial effects of acupuncture remains unknown. Strain gauge transducers were implanted on the serosal surface of the stomach to record circular muscle contractions in thiobutabarbital-anesthetized rats. Acupuncture on the right lower abdomen caused a transient relaxation of the stomach. Acupuncture-induced gastric relaxations were abolished by guanethidine, propranolol, splanchnic ganglionectomy, spinal cord transection, and spinomedullary transection. In contrast, N(G)-nitro-L-arginine, phentolamine, truncal vagotomy, and pontomedullary transection had no effect. Acupuncture increased the number of c-Fos immunopositive cells at the ventrolateral medulla (VLM). It is concluded that acupuncture-induced gastric relaxations are mediated via the somatosympathetic reflex. Its afferent limb is composed of abdominal cutaneous and muscle afferent nerves. Its efferent limb is the gastric sympathetic nerve and the reflex center is within the medulla. VLM neurons may play an important role in mediating this reflex. Collect selectedreferences in personalfile on server See abstractsof selectedreferences Import format for reference managers Import format for spreadsheets and databases Home page Quick Help: English Chinese French German Japanese Italian Russian Spanish Turkish Ukranian Download Users This site ishosted byMedical Informatics Department atChinese Herbal Medicine, a voluntary organization of licensed healthcare practitioners, matriculated students and postgraduate academics specializing in Chinese Herbal Medicine, provides a variety of professional services, including board approved online continuing education. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted March 31, 2003 Report Share Posted March 31, 2003 But I'm pretty clear it's not hard-wiring. >>I do not believe anybody thinks there is hard-wiring. Its more that the nervous system can not be taken out of the picture. If it is blocked so is the acupuncture activity. I agree with your reservation on the study and a lot of the research on acupuncture can be explained by its general sympathetic irritation. So is much of the hormonal and analgesic actions which are a normal consequence of any noxious stimulation. alon Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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