Acupuncture and Pain Management

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Back and Neck Pain

According to idataresearch.com, there were 1.36 million spinal surgeries performed in 2021, and an estimated 1.52 million surgeries to be done in 2024. As an acupuncturist, I can tell you that even though the success rate of spinal surgeries is high, these patients are inevitably ending up on acupuncturists' tables anyway, complaining of chronic pain. Since the opioid crisis, acupuncture has been deemed a natural, positive, and helpful way to lower any bodily pain. However, given these statistics of current spinal surgeries, it is interesting to note that patients are still in pain post-surgery. Doctors today are quick to recommend surgery and pain management options over acupuncture, even though exists backing for acupuncture as a form of pain relief. Current modes of acceptable treatments today are pain management shots, steroids, muscle relaxers, and/or nerve blocks/ablations. In other words, even though acupuncture is a research-proven modality that greatly helps with pain, we are still resorting to surgical and prescription methods as primary sources of care for pain. Acupuncture greatly helps reduce pain levels while increasing movement ability, and has a place in pre- and post-operative care.