Ancient relief goes mainstream

Traditional Chinese medicine is getting a modern American spin -- and it's turning up where you'd least expect it.

In the U.S. military.

We've spent a decade fighting one war and almost a decade embroiled in another -- and regardless of how you feel about those operations, there's no denying the toll they've taken on soldiers and their families.

Now, some injured troops are being given acupuncture when all else fails -- and the results have been positively stunning.

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Arms & acupuncture
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What's truly amazing here is that the U.S. military isn't just grudgingly allowing servicemen and women to pursue alternative treatments.

They're actually engaged in what can only be described as the world's most cutting-edge experiments in acupuncture -- because they've been using those needles to treat mild traumatic brain injuries.

According to a recent Wall Street Journal report, the U.S. Navy put a team of doctors through a 300-hour acupuncture course in 2008... but not with any grand ideas in mind, not at first anyway.

Cmdr. Keith Stuessi told the paper he was planning to use the technique exactly how you might expect -- on sprained ankles and balky backs.

But after reading about how acupuncture helped with post-traumatic stress disorder, he wondered if it could work for brain injuries with similar symptoms -- and asked some desperate soldiers if they'd be willing to give it a try.

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Easing pain, restoring sleep
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So far, Cmdr. Stuessi has treated more than 20 Marines -- and only two or three have shown no improvement.

The rest have seen headaches vanish and anxiety melt away -- and many have even been able sleep well for the first time since being injured.

Next up: The Veterans Administration is planning a study of acupuncture in brain injuries and stress disorders.

With one in five troops who've done time in Iraq or Afghanistan returning home with these types of injures, the VA would welcome a safe, effective and -- most importantly -- cheap way to treat them all.

Expect to hear a lot more about this in the coming years.

But you don't have to suffer a combat injury to get a referral for traditional Chinese medicine or other alternative treatments -- because mainstream docs are also embracing them like never before.

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Yoga & meditation on the menu
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The connection between the body and mind was once dismissed as esoteric New Age nonsense.

Today, it's gaining acceptance even from stodgy mainstream doctors.

Researchers from Harvard University say a growing number of Americans are turning to yoga and meditation not out of personal interest... but because their doctors recommended it.

The researchers analyzed data from 23,000 households that took part in the 2007 National Health Survey and found that 3 percent had been referred to mind-body therapies by mainstream doctors.

Extrapolating those numbers, they say it means 6.3 million people have received those referrals.

But there's a lot of room for improvement here -- because the researchers wrote in the Archives of Internal Medicine that many of these patients were sicker and were heavy users of the healthcare system, but getting no results... until their doctors sent them out for alternatives.

"It makes us wonder whether referring patients for these therapies earlier in the treatment process could lead to less use of the health-care system and, possibly, better outcomes for these patients," Dr. Aditi Nerurkar said in a news release.

Wonder no more, doc. Just look at the outcomes the U.S. military has been getting.

On a mission for your health,
Ed Martin
Editor, House Calls

p.s. This isn't the first time the U.S. military has backed alternative medicine. Last year, Defense Secretary Robert Gates mentioned an experimental unit that was getting "serious results."