Back Pain Chinese Medicine

In traditional Chinese medicine, there is no such thing as simple back pain. More correctly, there is not just one type of back pain but several different types of back pain in Chinese medicine so that every individual back pain is classified and differentiated.

This is important to understand, because while acupuncture is widely recognized as being an effective treatment for back pain, the specific acupuncture points that would be used by a specialist would depend upon the type of pain from which you are suffering.

Amongst the different types of back pain recognized by traditional Chinese medicine, you will find:

• Deficiency type pain: This is a pain that is usually found in middle-aged or elderly people, one which is commonly characterized by a dull, aching pain that can be alleviated with rest.

• Blood stagnation or Qi (’energy flow’) pain: In traditional Chinese medicine, it is believed that muscles are able to move blood, energy (Qi) and other bodily fluids by stretching and contracting. Consequently, if muscles are not stretched sufficiently strongly or often enough (which is true for most people in modern society), your Qi will become congested and it is likely that you will suffer significant or perhaps serious levels of pain.

• Cold and damp obstruction pain: This is a pain form that is most widely felt first thing in the morning, one that is made worse by the cold and damp weather. In Western medical terms, this would be the kind of pain most commonly associated with arthritis or sciatica. As would be expected with these particular medical conditions, this is a pain that is often accompanied by numbness, a feeling of weight or heaviness, and swelling in the joints or muscles of the back. Because this particular type of pain is exacerbated by the cold and damp, it is one that can be most effectively dealt with by the application of heat.

In traditional Chinese medicine, the basic concept is that when you feel any bodily pain or discomfort, it is telling you that your body balance and harmony is somehow upset. Consequently, in order to reduce or remove back pain Chinese medicine style, it is necessary to restore balance and harmony and acupuncture is one of the primary modalities used to achieve this restoration.

Back Pain Chinese Medicine