With over 8 million Americans afflicted with some form of depression, it is safe to say that depression is one of the biggest and most wide spread illness’ of the 21st century.
It is one of the main catalysts of suicide which claims well over 30,000 lives each year in the US. According to some projections and estimates by the medical industry, roughly 20% of all people will suffer a significant episode of depression at some point during their life. The symptom identification and subsequent treatment of depression is one of the biggest mini industries to arise in western medicine in the last 15 years. Antidepressant drugs are more prescribed to more people than any other type or form of medication. While some antidepressants are indeed capable of regulating the serotonin levels of the brain, which can be very beneficial to someone suffering from clinical depression, many of the most popular and prescribed types of antidepressants are a huge risk due to their unpredictable and heavy side effects. Compounding this problem is the fact that most patients who are prescribed these types of medications generally must stay on them for an extended period of time, which in turn compromises their health, in order to maintain their artificial happiness. Surely, there must be some alternative to a lifetime prescription of drugs?
Acupuncture, and acupuncture partnered with Chinese herbs and medicine, has shown to be very effective as a way to treat depression, stress, anxiety, fatigue and mood swings. Acupuncture treatment can produce lasting and long-term benefits.
The main difference between acupuncture and relying on prescription antidepressants is that acupuncture treatments attempt to deal directly with the root cause of the depression – the internal imbalance caused by the continued exposure to and harboring of external stress as opposed to dealing only with symptoms. Stress, gone un-treated, can cause changes of the neurotransmitters. These changes manifest as a decrease of the serotonin levels-resulting in symptoms such as anxiety, poor sleeping habits, constant fatigue, and eventually, depression.
Acupuncture assists the brain in a natural way by stimulating the central nervous system and increasing the production of endorphins and enkephalins, naturally occurring drugs which are primarily responsible for a person’s mood and feeling of well being, happiness, etc. Depression, anxiety and stress occur by abnormal emotions, which reduce the normal flow of life energy. Acupuncture treatment is mainly based on the increasing or balancing the life energy, which is regulating emotional, mental, and physical balance of the body. Or, to put it a bit more plainly, acupuncture points stimulate the central nervous system, releasing chemicals into the muscles, spinal cord, and brain, promoting the body’s natural healing abilities. Chinese medicine doesn’t regard depression as an illness in and of itself; instead it views the symptoms as a whole in order to remedy the problem.
The actual treatment involves pricking the skin with a set of needles at specific locations on the skin. Insertion of fine needles at specific points of the body helps to normalize the flow of vital energy (chi) and restore the lost energy balance. Restoring the energy balance reduces the symptoms of stress, anxiety and depression. While the human body has over 2000 acupuncture points, the ones located on the chest, scalp and the wrists are considered to be the acupuncture points for treating depression.
If you currently are taking prescription medications for depression and are considering trying acupuncture, it would be advisable not to throw away your medications just yet – it may take some time for the body to adjust to the acupuncture as acupuncture is not meant to be an immediate cure-all (*unlike how most antidepressant pills and medications are generally marketed to the general population). If you’ve been taking prescription medications for depressions, it will take some time to reduce your usage and allow your body and brain to “un-learn” the reliance of the drugs and their effects, so too will it take your body and brain some time to get accustomed to acupuncture.
HealthCMI provides online acupuncture courses recognized throughout the US and Canada, as well as credits towards license renewal. Visit their online course catalog today for a comprehensive listing of all the courses and credits.