Try Acupuncture for High
Blood Pressure? Maybe --

"Sure," someone says, "that's acupuncture." Okay, someone is going to stick super thin needles into my body and cure my high blood pressure. Well, read on non-believers.

I've always thought that this was pretty weird, but partially that is because I was raised in a western medical tradition.

Western medicine is based on the philosophy of materialism, which means that only matter counts, and mechanism, which means that all cures are mechanical.

There are other medical traditions based on different philosophies of the body, mind and spirit.

Traditional Chinese medicine is one of those. Hence, we get acupuncture for high blood pressure.

Stone treatment needles have been found in Mongolia dating from 3000 years ago. Clearer archeological evidence comes from 2200 years ago in China. A surprising find of a 5000 year old mummy preserved in ice in the Alps revealed marks on his body at some acupuncture points.

So, were talking old here, way before materialism became the fad.

We start with the Yin/Yang philosophy. Simply put, Yin is matter, and Yang is spirit (not wholly accurate, but as close as we can come in the West).

Disease derives from systems of the Yin/Yang dropping out of alignment. Cure is by realignment.

There are 12 meridians running over and through the body. On these meridians are the points of insertion for the hair like needles.

The placement of these needles must be exact, based on diagnosis of one's non-optimum body condition.

This explanation is over simplified, but accurate.

When one's Yin/Yang systems are misaligned such as to raise pressure above normal blood pressure, specialists in this method know which of the about 2000 needle insertion points to use.

According to the latest experiments, the needles, properly inserted, can lower high blood pressure by stimulating the renal angiotensin system and by blocking the beta acceptors in the sympathetic nervous system, thus mimicking some medications that medical doctors prescribe.

One variation of the traditional approach is to apply low frequency electrical impulses through the needles. Thus apparently, the brain is stimulated to produce chemicals that lower the excitatory responses of the cardiovascular system, lowering heart activity and need for oxygen. This in turn lowers blood pressure significantly.

Sometimes, practitioners use Chinese herbs in conjunction.

Many patients find the treatment to be calming and stress reducing. This along with overall regulation of the body helps lower blood pressure as well.

In many cases normal blood pressure has been approached, if not achieved, through acupuncture for high blood pressure.

However, get on a proper blood pressure diet as your first line of defense.

You can find acupuncturists in the Yellow Pages and on the Internet.

But, you might not want to put all your eggs in that basket without checking out the many other methods available for lowering blood pressure.

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