Why I turned myself into a pin cushion to cure my arthritis (From Worcester News)

Why I turned myself into a pin cushion to cure my arthritis

8:30am Wednesday 9th July 2008

• Print
• Email
• Share
• Comments(1)

By James Connell »

WHAT do you do if you’re 96 years old and in excruciating pain from arthritis?

The answer for many people would be to book an appointment with a GP, take some painkillers and rest up in bed.

But Margaret Langford, aged 96, of St Clement’s Close, St John’s, Worcester, who has Parkinson’s disease and arthritis, has tried an altogether different solution – traditional Chinese medicine in the form of acupuncture.

She developed arthritis at the aged of 54 and it has now spread all over her body and even affects her throat, making it difficult for her to talk.

She has now started a course of acupuncture at Natural Healing in The Shambles, Worcester. She goes once a week and has so far had 20 sessions lasting 45 minutes each.

The great-grandmother said: “It helps you feel more relaxed and helps with my arthritis which I have in my throat. Since I had acupuncture I haven’t had the terrible bouts that stop me breathing properly. I felt I was choking. That has now eased. I used to roll around in bed in agony all night. I have not had that.”

The needles are put in the top of the head around the crown, in her toes, ankles, spine, calves and shoulders.

She said: “I have them practically everywhere. It feels a bit like being a pin cushion.”

The treatment has also had an effect on her Parkinson’s disease, which became so bad she would have to steady her chin by pushing her fist against it.

She says, thanks to acupuncture, her shakes are not as severe and she is able to manage her symptoms more effectively.

Acupuncture is an integral part of the rapid growth of complementary therapy in the UK, with more and more people seeking treatment.

The British Acupuncture Council (BAcC) describes the treatment as a holistic approach to health based on over 2,000 years of development and refinement in the Far East. The tradition is as much about the maintenance of health as the management of disease.

Western or medical acupuncture is a more recent development practised predominantly by doctors and physiotherapists which uses acupuncture techniques within their existing scope of practice on the basis of a western medical diagnosis.

Although sometimes described merely as a means of pain relief, traditional acupuncture is actually used to treat people with a wide range of illnesses. Its focus is on improving the overall wellbeing of the patient, rather than the isolated treatment of specific symptoms. The skill of an acupuncturist lies in their ability to make a traditional diagnosis from what is often a “complex pattern of disharmony”. The exact pattern and degree of disharmony is unique to each person and so after diagnosis, the acupuncturist puts together a personalised treatment plan.

According to traditional Chinese philosophy, our health is dependent on the body’s motivating energy – known as qi – moving in a smooth and balanced way through a series of meridians (channels) beneath the skin. The flow of qi can be disturbed by many factors, physical, mental and emotional.

Factors may include anxiety, stress, anger, fear or grief, poor nutrition, weather conditions, hereditary factors, infections, poisons and trauma. By inserting fine needles into the channels of energy, an acupuncturist claims to stimulate the body’s own healing response and help to restore its natural balance.

Former nurse and midwife Jennie Sheringham, aged 58, of the Wheel of Life Centre, North Malvern Road, Malvern, received three years of training in acupuncture in Sussex.

Mrs Sheringham says acupuncture can treat a wide range of health issues together with western medicine, including improving fertility and even what she calls “cosmetic acupuncture”, a non-surgical alternative to botox.

She said acupuncture could re-balance the energy in the body, reducing the effects of physical and emotional stress.

Mrs Sheringham, who specialises in fertility treatments, said: “Acupuncture works on the body’s own energy to help it heal itself. You feel very revitalised.”

Practitioners of acupuncture claim it can have a range of benefits which help improve fertility, relax people and strengthen the immune system.

HOW THE CHINESE INVENTED ACUPUNCTURE

Acupuncture may have originated as long as 5,000 years ago after the Chinese mapped out the complex relationship between stimulating a point on the skin to influence a particular organ or organ pathway and started inserting thin needles into acupuncture points to cure various ailments.Acupuncture may have originated as long as 5,000 years ago after the Chinese mapped out the complex relationship between stimulating a point on the skin to influence a particular organ or organ pathway and started inserting thin needles into acupuncture points to cure various ailments. The Chinese discovered the circulatory system more than 2,000 years before William Harvey did in the West in 1628. The ancient Chinese had a very advanced scientific understanding of the body and how it works, but they defined it in terms and symbols not known to those in the western world. The acupuncture theory of the ancient Chinese takes into account their deep understanding of the lymphatic, circulatory, vascular, and nervous systems. They were able to influence all of these systems through their selection of acupuncture points on the 14 major pathways.Acupuncture may have originated as long as 5,000 years ago after the Chinese mapped out the complex relationship between stimulating a point on the skin to influence a particular organ or organ pathway and started inserting thin needles into acupuncture points to cure various ailments.

The Chinese discovered the circulatory system more than 2,000 years before William Harvey did in the West in 1628. The ancient Chinese had a very advanced scientific understanding of the body and how it works, but they defined it in terms and symbols not known to those in the western world. The acupuncture theory of the ancient Chinese takes into account their deep understanding of the lymphatic, circulatory, vascular, and nervous systems. They were able to influence all of these systems through their selection of acupuncture points on the 14 major pathways. The Chinese discovered the circulatory system more than 2,000 years before William Harvey did in the West in 1628. The ancient Chinese had a very advanced scientific understanding of the body and how it works, but they defined it in terms and symbols not known to those in the western world. The acupuncture theory of the ancient Chinese takes into account their deep understanding of the lymphatic, circulatory, vascular, and nervous systems. They were able to influence all of these systems through their selection of acupuncture points on the 14 major pathways.

• Print
• Email
• Share
• Comments(1)