Acupuncture has been integrated into Western medicine, although considerably altered. Western or Bio-medical acupuncture may be viewed as a simplified form of traditional acupuncture, deprived of anything that cannot be scientifically explained. Therefore, Qi or meridians are not referenced and acupoints have either local, adjacent, segmental or central action.
However, most acupuncturists, even the most radical bio-medical acupuncturists, acknowledge the need for the study of traditional acupuncture and a sound knowledge of the traditional nomenclature, if only for reasons of interdisciplinary communication. It would be a terrible waste of time and resources to throw away the whole corpus of an ancient system, considering that it actually works, despite its philosophical background not being totally compatible with modern science.
The most common indication for acupuncture treatment in the West is pain, in particular musculoskeletal pain. This kind of pain is where Orthopedics merge with Acupuncture, sometimes even Related Techniques, such as moxibustion and Tuina massage. It is rather peculiar that Western science acknowledges pain when coming from bones, joints, nerves, even vessels, but not so much when coming from muscles. Nevertheless, the muscles constitute the biggest part of the human body and quite often the exact location for the patient’s complaints.
The first question usually addressed to a modern physician, engaged in Bio-medical acupuncture, is “How does acupuncture work?”. An honest answer to this would be “we don’ t really know. There are numerous hypotheses, but none has been proven fully”. Then, the second question would be “Does it work?”. An equally honest and frank answer would be “yes, in selected cases it does work, either with or without other medical modalities. However, the main problem of acupuncture is its vast heterogeneity, leading to technical difficulties in its assessment by western measures”.