Acupuncture could be used as an effective treatment for cancer pain. A study published in the journal BMC Complementary and Alternative Medicine tested which acupoints would provide the most relief for cancer patients from cancer pain.

• Acupuncture has been proven effective against different kinds of body pain.
• The researchers recruited 42 patients going through moderate to severe cancer pain. The participants were divided into three groups of 14 members each. All participants were to get through seven sessions, with each group testing a specific set of acupoints.
• The first group was to test si guan xue, the second group tested si guan xue combined with commonly used acupoints, while the third group served as the control and was treated using only commonly used acupoints.
• The study’s primary goal was to determine the reduction in cancer pain and the patients’ subjective experience to be measured using the Patient Global Impression of Change (PGIC). Its secondary goal was to determine the quality of life through the scores of the European Organization for Research and Treatment of Cancer Quality of Life Questionnaire-Core 30 (EORTC QLQ-C30) and Karnofsky’s Performance Status (KPS).
• Analysis revealed that the second group experienced the most reduction in pain by day five. No differences in scores in PGIC, EORTC QLQ-C30 or KPS was observed among the three groups.

The researchers concluded that si guan xue caused the greatest reduction of pain among the three acupoints used.

Read the full study at this link.

Journal Reference:

Lam TY, Lu LM, Ling WM, Lin LZ. A PILOT RANDOMIZED CONTROLLED TRIAL OF ACUPUNCTURE AT THE SI GUAN XUE FOR CANCER PAIN. BMC Complementary and Alternative Medicine. 2017;17(1). DOI: 10.1186/s12906-017-1838-5