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Acupuncture Infertility & Chinese Medicine

Everyone has an opinion about something. When it comes to the topic of acupuncture it is more than true. Scientifically, it’s proven that acupuncture can cure or help many diseases and conditions. But still many people don’t believe it. Take acupuncture for infertility, as an example, tremendous scientific research has been done in China in the past 50 years, indicating, that acupuncture can affect our body in almost every way. Such as in our molecular, cell, tissue and system levels, etc. Many countries in the world started to use acupuncture for medical purposes, to help people. The National Institute of Health (NIH) of the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services conducted a Consensus Development Statement at a symposium in 1997, which concluded that acupuncture can help many diseases and conditions. About 10 years ago, there was research done in Europe that states acupuncture increases the pregnancy rate at a 50% chance. But in recent years, a study found an opposite conclusion, which states that acupuncture can only relax people instead of help people become pregnant. In medical fields, there are many theories, that continuously change over time, depending on the latest development about them. For example, take the CPR procedure and the principal of dealing with shock patients. These theories go back and forth, proving and disproving each other. We don’t think one research can really represent the truth. If, only one research or two can just conclude a truth about acupuncture it is very unfortunate. The reality of acupuncture helping infertility issues in our daily practice as seen in countless clinics, indicates that acupuncture is working very well.

In the past years, we have helped many infertility patients ranging from the ages 30-45, naturally without IVF or IUI. We helped patients get pregnant naturally with our protocol at ages 45, 47 and even 49. Our first patient of this kind was a 35 years old woman from Brazil, in 2002. In the initial visit, she told us her OB/GYN and the IVF specialist told her that she will never get pregnant, according to her situation, there was no hope. After consultation and examination with Traditional Chinese Medicine methodologies, we concluded that she was not hopeless. She still had a good chance to get pregnant naturally. After 15 sessions of acupuncture treatment with traditional Chinese herbal medicine, within two months she became pregnant naturally. Then 12 months later, she surprised me by coming to my office with her baby in the stroller. She told everyone in the office that we made the impossible, possible. This patient is just one of many examples. We’ve also helped many M.D. Physicians from different medical facilities, such as: New York Presbyterian Hospital, Mount Sinai Medical School Hospital, New York Hospital, etc. to become pregnant in similar ways. One of our M.D. Physician patients from New York Hospital, who experienced 3 failed IVF procedures, was referred to us by her patient. We found that she had an irregular period, always tired with ice-cold extremities, which means her hormones were imbalanced. We told her to stop trying IVF until her body was ready. Within 2 months she had 12 acupuncture sessions. Her period was regulated and she stopped experiencing ice-cold extremities. We suggested that she should continue acupuncture treatments with IVF procedures, and in 4 months she was pregnant. Ten months later she gave birth to a healthy baby. Some physicians have tried IVF as many as 5 times without any results, many of them after combining IVF with acupuncture treatment became pregnant too. We’ve had a patient from Australia that told us she tried IVF 18 times without any results, which is far too many times for one person. After checking her, we asked her to go back to Australia and find a good acupuncturist to balance her body for about 2-3 months, we are yet to hear the results.

In the last 40 days, at our clinic, we’ve had 4 out of 7 couples get pregnant. Three of these couples became pregnant naturally, ages 34-37, who were heading for IVF procedure. But, either their friends or our clinic suggested they try to conceive naturally with acupuncture before doing anything else. One couple had 12 acupuncture sessions and became pregnant within 2 months, the second couple got pregnant in the 3rd month, the third couple tried 24 sessions and within 4 months they were pregnant.

To understand why acupuncture can help infertility we must first become familiar with Chinese culture and tradition. One of the most important rules in Chinese culture and the tradition is: you must reproduce. Otherwise, it’s a sign of disrespect to your parents, family and ancestors. Essentially, you would be blamed for discontinuing the family lineage. Therefore, one of the important duties for Chinese doctors is to help patients conceive and have their own babies. This practice dates back at least 2,000 years. Chinese doctors have spent centuries developing a practice for infertility issues for both men and women. We have procedures for female reproductive health which includes the care of: menstruation, pregnancy, breast-feeding/lactation, inducing labor, and puerperium; while for males this includes: ED, ejaculation problems etc. According to TCM and acupuncture theory, unless your missing an essential organ(s), some fundamentals to becoming pregnant as a woman are: a regular and normal menstrual cycle with normal discharge and a regular monthly sex drive at its peak about 2 weeks after your period. We don’t understand why this does not concern many specialists and why they do not tell their patients about these fundamentals.

Nowadays, specifically in the United States, the cause of infertility for women, according to our clinical experience – apart from having organ problems – are: stress, aging/too low Anti-Müllerian Hormone (AMH), an imbalance of hormones due to diet/drugs, and other related diseases such as thyroid problems. If the related diseases and conditions is not our specialty, we refer the patient to doctors that are specialized to help them. To let the patient understand what we are doing is also important. If the patient cannot get the whole picture of this process, the results of the treatment will be poor. We truly believe that the cooperation between patient and doctor is very important. That is why, in our clinic, when we see patients we always give them a clear picture of the whole procedure in a very detailed way according to our knowledge and experience, then the patients can comply completely.

The most unique part of Chinese medicine, for thousands of years, is the pure trial and error based only on human beings instead of the testing on animals than to the human body. That is why the principles and treatments of Traditional Chinese Medicine, some people believe, are closer to the reality of human beings diseases and conditions. That is why some people say that Chinese medicine and acupuncture contribute a very big role to the Chinese population, obviously, it shows today with its large population. Many Chinese follow the Chinese medicine rules in their daily life activities for well-being and to maintain their well-being, especially, when they have medical problems such as infertility and it’s related problems.