talkmagic.co.uk

Before you all start to flame me, read my post first.

This suddenly occurred to me as I was sat on this boring Sunday afternoon.

A couple of weeks, or maybe months ago, my wife was watching this programme called "Embarassing Bodies" with that Dr. Christian guy.

Anyway this woman came on with stupidly sweaty hands, what I found interesting was the cure. No not acupuncture, however the treatment to stop her sweating in her hands was to cauterise a nerve in her chest. This not only worked but is a widely accepted solution to this particular problem. Not medical theory but surgical fact.

This got me wondering. If cauterising a nerve in the chest can solve sweaty hands, by the same reasoning is acupuncture at least viable as a form of treatment on the basis that certain nerves can affect apparently unrelated areas of the human body.

Also, can it be utilised to inspire certain emotions because from a mentalism viewpoint that could be incredibly useful.

The more medically knowledgeable among you may be able to correct my possibly poor memories of this and steer me in an appropriate direction.

I'll try and dig out the video of it.

i could have sworn i read somewhere that accupuncture has scientific/medical proof behind it now?

Really? I'll go attack Google then and see what's what.

Thanks Iain.

It is relatively accepted, from what research I've seen on the matter, that acupuncture has certain proven benefits. It can relieve pain and increase blood flow to the areas it is used on.

However, its effects, or at least those known about at this time, are limited. Many of claims around it are still considered to be a load of cobblers.

Acupuncture has very limited application for short term pain relief. Much of the more off-the-wall evidence is highly suspect. There was a recent BBC documentary which purported to show a woman undergoing surgery whilst not under anaesthetic but receiving acupuncture. The documentary makers were later forced to admit that the woman had received three different types of tranquiliser and was as high as a kite throughout.

Much of the problem with trialling acupuncture is creating a viable placebo control. As these placebo controls have become more sophisticated (shallow needles, stage-dagger needles, etc) the effect that acupuncture has demonstrated above placebo has diminished. Other trials, that pit acupuncture against sham acupuncture (where the needles are placed at random) show no additional benefit. This means that the chi channel theory on which acupunture is founded is not true.

The Cochrane Collaboration is probably the best starting point if you want to look at clinical evidence for acupuncture, or any treatment for that matter.

The main idea behind why acupuncture is effective for short term pain relief is the "nerve gate" theory. That by stimulating small pain receptors, you somehow shut off larger pain sensations. This is not yet fully understood.

http://rawstory.com/rs/2010/0530/resear ... n-therapy/

http://news.sciencemag.org/sciencenow/2 ... onic-.html

Cool chunks.

In terms of the OP there may be some viability. I've just been reading about phantom limb syndrome. It's suggested that we have a sensory map of our body in our brains. If we lose a limb, then suddenly the brain stops receiving input from it. The theory goes that as a result of this sudden loss of signal, the brain starts to interpret signals that are near the missing limb on the map (but not necessarily the body) as being from the missing limb itself. Chap by the name of Ramachandran successfully established on the face of a man who suffered from a phantom hand, points that corellated with the hand. He could blindfold the guy, touch the guys face, and the guy would feel sensations in his hand accordingly.

There's a further idea about foot fetishism; that the genitals and the feet are on the same nerve path, and so the two are connected, which is why stimulating the foot in a sexual context can be... erm... pleasing.

Ramachandran is one of my heroes in the general field of neurology and psychology.

One interesting thing that's recently been realised about phantom limbs is that the phantom is essentially frozen in the position it held when the limb was lost. The very painful phantoms tend to be from limbs that were badly damaged, distorted, etc. before they were amputated. Using a combination of hypnosis-type suggestion and optical illusion, a patient can transfer the sensation of the phantom to a visible artificial limb in the same posture. Then when the visible artificial limb is "treated" or posed in a better position, the phantom follows and becomes comfortable.

This also suggests that limbs should be made as comfortable as possible before amputation, to prevent the development of painful phantoms afterwards.

Ah! That explains the mirror box, then! The book I'm reading is Embracing The Wild Sky by Daniel Tammet. He mentions the mirror box, but skimps on the connection it has to the mismapping.

I used to get phantom b****k syndrome.....weird but true

Mr_Grue wrote:Chap by the name of Ramachandran successfully established on the face of a man who suffered from a phantom hand, points that corellated with the hand. He could blindfold the guy, touch the guys face, and the guy would feel sensations in his hand accordingly.

greedoniz wrote:I used to get phantom b****k syndrome.....weird but true

You keep feeling invisible balls on your chin?

I know I haven't been to the London meetings for quite a while but it seems things have really escalated in my absence.