While treatment plans for allergies vary greatly, with results ranging from temporary relief to complete remission, acupuncture and related therapies can often relieve allergy symptoms within a short period of time. The first objective is to reduce the acute allergy symptoms so that an effective strategy can be developed to address the underlying condition. As we are able to develop a holistic program we can effectively work to prevent the disease process from reoccurring in the future.

Allergies usually occur when our immune system is unable to digest or effectively process (i.e. metabolize or protect against) something within our environment. Allergens can vary from pollen, pet dander, mold, various foods, drugs and more. The body tends to react via an inflammatory process as a means of trying to remove the allergen or protect the body from it doing further harm.

When a client presents with allergy symptoms, we’ll need to perform a full intake and make the proper diagnosis. Symptoms may include a stuffy nose, copious mucus, lung/sinus congestion, fatigue, headache, indigestion, irritable bowels, redness, swelling, etc. To develop a holistic program to reduce or eliminate the condition it is important that we consider the whole pattern of symptoms that the client is experiencing. This includes considering dietary habits, energy levels, sleep patterns as well as other lifestyle practices.

Together with your practitioner, you can begin to understand how all those elements of your life may relate to the allergy symptoms you are experiencing. Effective therapy strategies will first focus on the acute symptoms in an effort to reduce them enough to address the underlying condition, then follow-up care for the chronic, remission stage begins. Oftentimes the acute stage is so influential that the chronic symptoms must be address in the opposite season (i.e. fall vs spring, winter vs summer) to make an effective investment in the underlying cause.

Acupuncture as well as chiropractic therapy supported by dietary therapy and herbal therapy will form the main components of most people’s health program for the treatment of allergies. Acupuncture may include the use of point local near the nose/sinuses, on the arms/hands and legs. Dietary changes are likely to be very beneficial in the effort to control the symptoms through the elimination of food and drinks that may cause mucus to form. When our diet is optimized for our constitution and for our presenting condition, clients will experience less mucous, less inflammation, increased energy, better breathing and a greater sense of well-being.

Ernst et al. claimed “acupuncture is neither a safe procedure nor superior to placebo.”

One of the last review articles on acupuncture research from Professor Edzard Ernst, prior to the announcement of his retirement, was met with broad dissatisfaction from the acupuncture research community, with concerns raised that he had presented a biased picture of the state of the science. A summary of the published letters rebutting Professor Ernst’s conclusions is presented below. We urge acupuncture researchers and practitioners to read Professor Ernst’s article in Pain (as well as the full complement of letters to the editor published in a subsequent issue of the journal (Witt et al.; Manheimer and Berman; Karst; Baumler; Usichenko; Henke 2011). For the sake of brevity, we summarize the letters to the editors.

A letter by Witt and colleagues found the article “highly misleading” and criticized the authors’ choice of evidence from different levels within the evidence hierarchy for different parts of the paper. In particular, the writers of the letter criticize the use of case studies to determine the safety of acupuncture and cite several larger-scale studies that had different results.

A letter by Manheimer and colleagues criticized Ernst et al.’s methods of data analysis and evaluation as neither systematic, reproducible, nor transparent and found Ernst et al.’s evaluation criteria for assessing the quality and results of systematic reviews to be poorly defined. The writers of the letter also suggest that Ernst et al. succumbed to presentation bias, presenting data in the Discussion section which were not included in the review.

A letter by Matthias Karst notes that the paper misinterprets one of the cited cases, and suggests that the paper’s other conclusions should be suspect, and also warns of a possible “efficacy paradox” which can lead to false positives when testing complex interventions by means of randomized controlled trials.

A letter by Baumler and colleagues pointed out several inconsistencies and accuses the authors of failing to incorporate basic scientific methodology. Specifically, the writers of the letter find the paper’s aim vague, study eligibility criteria absent, and (like Witt et al.) the choice of case reports in the assessment of acupuncture risk questionable. Like Manheimer et al., the letter-writers found Ernst et al.’s methods of determining the quality and outcome of each review unclear. The letter-writers determine that the paper is “not … based on a careful and scientific analysis of the literature.”

A letter by Usichenko and colleagues, like Witt et al. and Baumler et al., criticized the authors’ use of case studies to determine the adverse effects of acupuncture.

A letter by Christian Henke points out the relatively high instance of drug-related adverse events compared to acupuncture-related adverse events and criticizes Ernst et al.’s choice to include the conclusions of various acupuncture experiments in their discussion, despite the fact that conclusions of papers do not reflect statistical outcomes. The letter-writers also note that some important studies were overlooked.

Finally, a letter by James Mooney criticizes the authors’ addressing of the broad spectrum of acupuncture as little more than a single treatment. The letter-writers note that if only the highest-quality reviews are examined, the results are no longer condemning of acupuncture. Mooney also dismisses the authors’ conclusion that acupuncture should be questioned since it reduces pain in “some conditions while failing to work in many others,” noting that the same can be said about acetaminophen.

The authors’ response ran in the same issue of PAIN: Ernst E. Response from Author. Letters to the Editor / PAIN 152 (2011) 2184–2186. As of Oct 13, it is noted this is withdrawn at authors’ request.

Ernst E, Lee MS, Choi TY. Acupuncture: does it alleviate pain and are there serious risks? A review of reviews. Pain. 2011 Apr;152(4):755-64.

Karst M. Comment on ''Acupuncture: does it alleviate pain and are there serious risks? A review of reviews" Ernst et al. [Pain 2011;152:755-764]. Pain. 2011 Sep;152(9):2181

Bäumler P, Irnich D. Pain. 2011 Sep;152(9):2181-2

Henke C. Pain. 2011 Sep;152(9):2183-4.

Manheimer E, Berman BM. Pain. 2011 Sep;152(9):2179-80

CAM is a group of diverse medical and health care systems, practices, and products that are not generally considered part of conventional medicine. Complementary medicine is used together with conventional medicine, and alternative medicine is used in place of conventional medicine. Integrative medicine combines conventional and CAM treatments for which there is evidence of safety and effectiveness.

Barnes PM, Bloom B, Nahin R. CDC National Health Statistics Report #12 - NCCAM/NIH

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Functional medicine focuses on prevention and understanding a person's core clinical imbalances that underlie various disease conditions. Functional medicine seeks prevention as the key component for the cultivation of health especially with regards to chronic disease. By targeting the underlying cause of disease versus focusing on just accommodating symptoms functional medicine seeks to improve outcomes by targeting one objective, the disease, to accomplish multiple benefits, reducing the symptoms. In the cases of chronic disease with the goal of understanding each individual's physiological, environmental, and psychosocial contexts becomes a necessary part of the diagnostic process.

While functional medicine is perspective of more recent terminology the historical systems of healing (e.g. Chinese Medicine, Ayurvedic medicine, Tibetan medicine, etc.) have utilized the holistic view as a means of approaching disease. All of the healing systems mentioned above seek to target the disease to reduce symptoms in concert with constitutional/personal diagnosis all of which Everspring Health embraces and offers as a part of our service offerings.

This question was once addressed by Dr. Bernie Siegel where he mentioned that we may not be able to cure every disease but people can indeed be healed. The concept here is noting a difference in perspective. The discussion surrounding a cure is focused on a disease and the context of specifically eliminating the disease whereas the discussion of healing is in relation to the individual as a whole. When we seek to cure a disease our focus is on the disease and the process of eliminating that disease. Since healing involves improving the quality of life for the individual as a whole, a disease may still be targeted but in concert with the intent to improve the quality of one's daily life.

An example of healing would be the process where a disease is controlled or reduced to a point where a person's quality of life may be such that the disease no longer interferes with their daily productivity. So while an individual may still have diabetes, for example, they may have no signs of the disease and/or the disease no longer hinders the quality of one's experience in daily living. A key benchmark in the process of healing includes liberation from the disease even if the disease may still be present. This liberation is the experience where one's perspective shifts from focusing on, and possibly being dictated by a disease, to being focused on the appreciation of one's life as a whole. This perspective may still include the presence of a disease but more importantly the focus shifts to the many opportunities they have before them.

This definition of healing is why Everspring Health incorporates healing into the functional mission of our cooperative. We are a lifestyle, health and healing cooperative because each of those concepts is at the heart of what we do everyday. Healing is the process of cultivating quality of life and quality of life is our mission.

Integrative medicine is a healthcare resource that combines conventional, complementary and alternative (CAM) treatments for which there is evidence of safety and effectiveness.

In the clinic setting integrated medicine means that all effective medical resources are considered to address the chief complaint, identify the most accessible options to obtain the chief objective and to consider options for preventing concerns that may be predicted to arise in the future. The benefit of integrative medicine where the whole picture is considered we observe and note a more complete picture of one's life thus taking a diagnosis further and extending a healing program as far as possible towards the cultivation of quality of life.

Andrew Weil, M.D. - What is Integrative Medicine? from Andrew Weil, M.D. on Vimeo.

Integrative health is a somewhat evolving terminology with a definition that is equally still evolving. However, Everspring Health suggests that integrative health is a metric that we can use to gain perspective of our health as a whole and in turn use that information for our benefit. The perspective of integrative health requires us to consider all intersecting aspects of an individual's life and lifestyle before a final diagnosis is made and subsequent plan is implemented.

Through the use of integrated protocols (see Integrative Medicine) we make note of a web of symptoms or experiences where the final diagnosis is based on the value of the intersecting points and the relation of all possible factors within one's experience. We finalize this process by asking how do these experiences relate to one's overall quality of life. The diagnosis in relation to one's quality of life becomes our chief objective for developing a plan for integrative health, namely quality of life.

To benefit from this perspective the client needs to find a practitioner who is well trained to determine which intersecting points are valid to the diagnosis and most importantly which are valid to the client's quality of life. Quality of life is our mission and integrative health is the service we strive to provide at Everspring Health.