Acupuncture originated thousands of years ago as an ancient eastern medicine practice.  It involves tapping needles into various sites of the body to bring about desired outcomes.  Just a small number of these potential benefits are listed below.  The needles are however only very small (with a width of a fraction of a millimetre), so discomfort upon application is usually very limited, and you even may not feel anything at all.  The course I studied combined both eastern and western approaches.  The latter tends to adopt a methodology that uses explanations that more of my clients will likely be familiar with, as this targets areas of muscular and connective tissue tightness that can cause musculoskeletal complaints within the body.  This is particularly helpful when wanting to treat an area of tightness that is particularly deep and/or localised, where it would be difficult to release using sports massage treatment without causing greater discomfort to the patient, or indeed the therapist's hands.  Much of this tightness that is causing or contributing to an ailment can be located in areas that do not necessarily lie where the pain is - after all, where the pain is, the problem often isn't! 

 

The western viewpoint on acupuncture (otherwise known as Dry Needling) tends to be where I direct more focus, as in my experience this tends to fit in better to other therapies in my own practice, particularly in regards to treating sports injuries.  That being said, I do still adopt techniques from the eastern methodology for certain issues, particularly for things that are not strictly musculoskeletal in origin.  Also, I still think it is important to have an awareness of the eastern viewpoint, as that is where this ancient practice originated, and it is nonetheless interesting.  The eastern practice works with the idea that the body contains hundreds of meridians travelling as lines through the body, each line emanating from a particular organ and branching out (see picture below).  Examples of meridians are the Heart, Lung, Spleen and Liver to name a few.  It is thought that inserting needles into these points help to balance the energy through the body, each point corresponding to a certain function.

 

*Please note that normally I would practice acupuncture techniques or dry needling to compliment a sports massage appointment, however under certain circumstances I can also practice it in isolation.              

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