Acupuncture / Acupressure

MODALITY: ACUPUNCTURE / ACUPRESSURE APPROACHES

Legislative Risks

Acupuncture / Acupressure approaches to natural healthcare are in the process of being affected by the following EU law.

Click on the links below to read about how this legislation may affect you: 

Medical Devices Directive
    European Commission summary
    ANH summary

  
Scientific Risks

This section is under construction.    

Media Risks

In January 2006, the BBC series 'Alternative Medicine' broadcast its first episode which included a sequence in which acupuncture was used instead of a general anaesthetic during open heart surgery in China. We understand that good reviews and high profile news stories ensued, but by the 14th February an article had appeared in the Telegraph, questioning what really took place. Then on the 25th March 2006  the Guardian published an article by the same reporter, announcing that the 'scientists who worked on it [the program] say it was flawed and hyped'.

Yet the Guardian article also informs us that some of the scientists involved in the series appeared to be of a different opinion. Professor George Lewith, we understand, later criticised the way the experiment was presented, but actually described the results in the programme as 'quite special', and 'something unique to acupuncture'. We are told that a spokesman for Dr Jack Tinker, one of the scientific consultants for the series, said that the doctor 'remained happy with the tone and content of the films'. The spokesman apparently also stated that 'fellow medics at the Royal Society, including one eminent professor, said it was the best medical series they had seen on television'. 

It is interesting to learn that [the Guardian article states that the BBC claimed this] Professor Edzard Ernst, the other scientific consultant for the series, had signed off the program script, and apparently failed to declare his reservations until 'so long after' the series was aired!

So why, we ask ourselves, would these particular scientists apparently change their minds about all this after the series was aired? 

Various complaints about the series were made to the BBC, which we believe were rejected. Eventually, we understand, the reporter Simon Singh appealed to the BBC Board of Trustees, and in April 2007, two of his various complaints about the series were upheld. One of these specifically related to the episode featuring the acupuncture.

Various articles then appeared announcing this development. See 'BBC admits some bad science reporting (at last)'. 

(Note: within the response to the upheld complaint about the open heart surgery being misleading due to the impression being given that 'the acupuncture was used instead of a general anaesthetic', the BBC Trustees did state that the surgery had been 'reviewed by an anaesthetist who believed it was a ''superb insight'' of a ''specific clinical situation'' using ''minimal doses of sedative and local drugs, supplemented by the psychological effect of acupuncture'' '.)     
 

Professional Bodies / Useful Organisations/ further information

There follows only some British Associations. This section is still under construction. We apologise for the incompleteness of this list.

British Acupuncture Council Body (BacC)

The Acupuncture Society

British Medical Acupuncture Society Association (BMAS)