Posted on 31st May 2010 @ 5:08 PM

Acupuncture relieves pain approved by neuroscientists

The neuroscientists of U.S.A have found that acupuncture can ease pain by stimulating the body to produce a natural painkilling chemical called adenosine.

Acupuncture has been applied as therapeutic methods in Traditional Chinese Medicine with a history of several thousand years. It was developed in the ancient of China but has a great contribution to the health care and medical treatment for Chinese people.

Critics say that the benefit maybe come from the process is all in the mind, such as the care, attention and the belief of the result of the treatment.

But Maiken Nedergaard, the leading neuroscientist of the research group, reported his research revealed a physical mechanism through which acupuncture reduced pain.

The research group performed acupuncture on mice with sore paws. They mimicked a standard acupuncture treatment.

During and just after this operation, levels of adenosine in the tissues surrounding the needle surged 24 times. The mouse's discomfort -- measurable by the rodents' response time to touch and heat -- was reduced by two-thirds.

Increasing levels of adenosine without acupuncture also had a soothing effect, the Journal Nature Neuroscience reports.