09/25/2025
Stop Framing Acupuncture as Mere “Energy Flow” – A Call for Scientific and Historical Integrity
The persistent tendency in Western medical discourse to frame Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) acupuncture as a form of “energy healing” based solely on vague concepts like qi or “meridian energy flow” is not only scientifically irresponsible — it is intellectually dishonest and culturally dismissive.
🔹 Acupuncture Is a Neurophysiological Intervention — Not Mysticism
What is referred to as qi and meridians in classical East Asian medicine is not unscientific. These were pre-modern conceptual models developed to describe real, reproducible human physiological responses — particularly somato-visceral reflexes, autonomic regulation, and descending pain modulation through central nervous system pathways.
Modern neuroscience has validated that acupuncture involves:
• Activation of nociceptive and proprioceptive afferents
• Regulation of autonomic nervous system tone
• Stimulation of descending inhibitory pathways in the brain and spinal cord
• Neuroendocrine and immune modulation through hypothalamic-pituitary axis effects
Dismissing this as “energy work” while ignoring the neurobiological mechanisms is equivalent to calling cardiopulmonary resuscitation “ritual chest compressions.”
🔹 IMS Is Derived from TCM’s Ashi Point Techniques
Intramuscular Stimulation (IMS), often practiced by physical therapists with as little as 50 hours of training, is essentially a rebranded version of Ashi point acupuncture — a foundational method in TCM used for centuries to treat myofascial pain and neuromuscular dysfunctions.
Yet IMS practitioners routinely claim their method is “different from acupuncture,” attempting to distance themselves from TCM in order to gain institutional legitimacy — while simultaneously using the exact same tools (needles) and target tissues (trigger points).
This is not scientific innovation. It is academic appropriation.
🔹 Misrepresentation Undermines Both Science and Ethics
To portray acupuncture solely as “meridian energy flow” while claiming that IMS or “dry needling” is distinct and evidence-based is to:
1. Deny the historical and clinical reality of acupuncture as a somatic therapy grounded in empirical observation
2. Perpetuate a colonial bias, reducing non-Western medical systems to caricatures
3. Ignore converging evidence from pain science, neurology, and physiology that supports acupuncture’s systemic effects
🔹 A Call for Intellectual Honesty
If the medical and academic community seeks to promote scientific rigor, it must stop:
• Treating TCM terminology (qi, jing-luo) as inherently unscientific rather than contextually pre-modern
• Appropriating acupuncture techniques under different names (IMS, dry needling) without acknowledgment
• Framing East Asian medicine as “mystical energy work” while claiming neurophysiological legitimacy for functionally identical Western versions
The integrity of science demands intellectual honesty, cultural respect, and historical accuracy. Anything less is not medicine — it is propaganda.
