🌿 Folk Prescriptions

I often encounter patients asking in clinical practice: "We've been treating a certain illness with other methods for a long time, but the effect has been poor—can acupuncture help?" In fact, if such diseases are promptly treated with acupuncture, not only can treatment time be shortened, but no toxic side effects will be caused to the body. We have every reason to believe that the therapeutic and health-preserving effects of acupuncture on diseases remain far from fully recognized or utilized by people.
A patient had experienced umbilical infection and swelling pain for two weeks. The red and swollen area was as large as a bowl, so swollen that the navel was completely hidden. Touching it caused severe pain, and the temperature was significantly higher than surrounding areas, accompanied by systemic fever. After nearly one week of treatment with the best antibiotics at a hospital, there was no improvement, and the patient could not stand upright, having to hunch forward to relieve abdominal muscle tension and reduce pain. Later, a friend referred him to me, asking whether acupuncture could help. I said yes. After analyzing his condition, I selected two acupoints on his lower limbs and inserted needles. The patient experienced an intense electric-like sensation radiating to the inner thigh and toes. At the same time, I gently massaged the painful swollen area for about half an hour. The pain greatly decreased after needle removal, and he was able to straighten up. Upon checking the umbilical area, the swelling had visibly reduced. His sleep also improved that night. After four treatments, only a small hard lump remained around the navel, while all other areas were normal. Subsequent surgical incision at the hospital revealed a black, bean-sized foreign body, after which the patient fully recovered.
Patient Liu, a judo athlete, developed a boil on his thigh measuring approximately 6×6 cm, with redness, swelling, heat, and pain. He had frequently suffered boils before, and based on past experience, recovery usually took at least ten days. However, this was during the Asian Games, held every four years, and failure to heal in time would affect his performance. Therefore, I decided to treat him with acupuncture. He was surprised, thinking acupuncture couldn't cure bacterial diseases, but out of concern for his competition, he reluctantly agreed. After the first acupuncture session, he immediately felt significant relief from redness, swelling, and pain. Within several days, he was fully healed.
Seeing these cases, some may be puzzled: Can acupuncture kill bacteria? Impossible, right?
Indeed, acupuncture cannot directly kill bacteria. The therapeutic effect of acupuncture on bacterial diseases does not act directly on bacteria themselves. Instead, it improves the internal environment of the body, disrupting the conditions necessary for bacterial survival. Once these conditions are disrupted, bacterial growth and reproduction are inhibited, leading naturally to disease resolution.
Looking again at these cases, why did continuous antibiotic infusion fail to achieve therapeutic results? Clinically, we often observe this phenomenon. People commonly attribute it to bacterial drug resistance, which is indeed one possible factor. However, we know that in infected sites, swelling is prominent, and blood circulation is severely impaired. All clinically used antibiotics must travel through the bloodstream to reach the lesion site. This poor microcirculation makes it extremely difficult for antibiotics to arrive at the target. Thus, poor efficacy of antibiotic therapy in many infectious diseases cannot ignore the critical role of poor local microcirculation.
Additionally, when healthy, the body's qi and blood circulate smoothly, enabling various specific and non-specific antibacterial factors to inhibit or directly/indirectly kill bacteria. When blood circulation is obstructed at the diseased site, these protective mechanisms weaken or disappear entirely. Careful analysis reveals that wherever bacteria overproliferate, there is almost always an underlying issue within the body—specifically, poor local circulation. In essence, impaired microcirculation is a prerequisite for bacterial survival and proliferation. Acupuncture effectively improves this state, destroying the environment bacteria depend on, allowing antibacterial factors to reach the affected area. Thus, the disease naturally heals.