Acupuncture & Natural Medicine              Dr. Peng, Rockville, MD

History of Acupuncture

Acupuncture is a main component of Traditional Chinese Medicine. It
has more than 3000 years old history. Acupuncture points, distribution
of meridians have been documented throughout history.

In ancient time, there was "Huang Di Nei Jing"-the bible of Traditional
Chinese Medicine (200BC), in which it documented the principles of
acupuncture and Traditional Chinese Medicine. Ming Tang Jing
(publishing date unknown) was first known book systemically
described meridians, acupuncture points. In 282AD, Dr. Haung Pu Mi
wrote a book, Zhen Jiu Jia Yi Jing. He detailed 349 acupuncture points.
Later, Zhen Jiu Da Cheng (1601AD) becomes one of the best known
textbook that described in detail the acupuncture theory, acupuncture
points, meridians, and treatment of various diseases.

In modern time, acupuncture is widely practiced in China in almost
every hospital in China. As monotherapy or complementary therapy,
acupuncture has been used to treat many diseases including pain
associated diseases, neuromuscular diseases, gastrointestinal
diseases, and inflammatory diseases. It also gained notable success
in acupuncture anesthesia. Extensive research on acupuncture has
been conducted for last thirty years in both basic and clinic areas. It
has produced a large quantity of publications on mechanism and the
clinic efficacy of acupuncture. Within China, there are more than 500
clinic studies published each year. For example, 350 clinic studies
ranging from small trial to large scale controlled studied published in
Chinese Acupuncture & Moxibustion in 2002. Similarly, many clinical
trial results on acupuncture were published worldwide in last 5-10
years.

Acupuncture started to gain popularity in US from 1972 when
president Nixon visited China. Acupuncture as a complementary
modality has been accepted or been known in US since 1970s'.
Currently, more than ten thousands acupuncturists practice
acupuncture. The number of people who received acupuncture are in
hundred thousands to millions. To better understand and evaluate
acupuncture and other alternative therapies, US congress mandated
National Institutes of Health to establish an agency now called
National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine (NCCAM)
to study alternative medicine including acupuncture. With gradually
increased funding, clinic trials to evaluate acupuncture therapy are
expanding. Efficacy of acupuncture on certain diseases such as
oesteoarthritis, chemotherapy-induced nausea/vomiting and chronic
low back pain has been confirmed in the large clinic trials. Still, more
trials are on-going. Acupuncture is increasingly accepted by more and
more people. Acupucnture appears headed to a bright future.