Acupuncture for irritable bowel syndrome
Yes, there are benefits for people with irritable bowel syndrome. But it doesn’t seem to matter whether they receive real of sham acupuncture.
Reviewers from the University Hospital Heidelberg in Germany searched the medical literature for evidence of the effectiveness of acupuncture in gastrointestinal diseases.
They report that for patients with irritable bowel syndrome, improvement in quality of life was observed using any of the following treatments.
- Standardized (or fixed regimen) acupuncture
- Acupuncture individualized to meet the patient’s needs
- Penetrating sham acupuncture
- Non-penetrating sham acupuncture
The response to acupuncture was similar to that achieved with psychotherapeutic interventions and antidepressants, and it might be explained as a patient response to ‘handling,’ and signaling by the acupuncturist of a holistic understanding of the patient’s problems.
8/2/07 13:31 JR