An Acupuncturist's Rant

By Guest Blogger:  Brandy Valentine MAcOM

DISCLAIMER: I have several friends and colleagues that are chiropractors and use acupuncture to increase chiropractic treatment efficacy. I have nothing against that, because my friends and colleagues understand the limitations of chiropractic acupuncture. The problems arise when other medical professionals forget or never realize the limits.

“Dry” Needling and Kool-Aid Injections


If you had a deadly bacterial infection, would you trust an Accountant to pretend to give you a shot of antibiotics? Most of you, if not all, would answer “No”. Accountants are smart, right? They have been to many years of school, and they passed a lot of tests. Surely they have the ability to pretend to give a shot. They may even be able to give an ACTUAL injection if they can somehow find a way to obtain the supplies or maybe just some Kool-Aid. Maybe they will even choose to charge more for the fake, lightly trained procedure than your MD would charge for the actual injection. I mean, why not?

Doesn’t this sound RIDICULOUS? Yes, yes it does. So why in the world would you choose to have a medical professional who may have endless education in their field but very little education in acupuncture pretend to give you acupuncture and charge you more for it? Need I say more?

The term “dry needling” refers to inserting solid needles into the body. The only needles made that are solid are acupuncture needles, so you could say that “dry needling” is the insertion of acupuncture needles into the body. Other medical professionals call it “dry needling” to make people think that it is some kind of cool method within their scope of practice, but us acupuncturists know exactly what it means. Nationally Certified Acupuncturists with Master’s Degrees or PhDs have thousands of hours of training to “dry needle”. Other professionals may have anywhere from 0 to 300 hours of training to be legally able to perform the procedure. Whatever you call it, it’s obvious who should be performing it. Sticking needles in trigger points is NOT acupuncture, just like walking on someone’s back to make it pop isn’t chiropractic.

In the end, everyone wants to make the most of what we are taught. With economic hardship, there is even more pressure to step on toes and stretch our knowledge base. I understand the desire for other medical professionals to want to “dry needle”, but it just is not as simple as they make it sound. Yes, a Chiropractor knows where trigger points, origins, and insertions are located. Yes, they could put needles in these points and possibly make someone feel better. The issue is that the use of acupuncture needles IS acupuncture to the client. Call it what you want, but the client calls it acupuncture. It is incomplete medicine, plain and simple. Quick! Now! Pull your shirt sleeve down and run directly out the door of your Accountant’s office and go to an acupuncturist for acupuncture, please. We charge less anyway.