
Acupuncture Linked to Periodontal Health Benefits
Acupuncture Linked to Periodontal Health Benefits Acupuncture, a complementary medicine that involves pricking the skin with needles in an effort to alleviate pain and or treat physical, mental, and emotional conditions, may also modulate the host’s immune inflammatory response. While
Acupuncture Linked to Periodontal Health Benefits
Acupuncture, a complementary medicine that involves pricking the skin with needles in an effort to alleviate pain and/or treat physical, mental, and emotional conditions, may also modulate the host’s immune-inflammatory response. While the popularity of this ancient Chinese practice has grown, its full potential may have been underestimated, as Brazilian researchers found that acupuncture was capable of reducing periodontal tissue destruction. The research article “Effects of Electroacupuncture on Experimental Periodontitis in Rats” was published online in March by the Journal of Periodontology.
The study, which included 32 rats with ligature-induced periodontitis, found that the subjects who received acupuncture at the acupoints LI4, LI11, ST36, and ST44 experienced a decrease in the number of pro-inflammatory mediators—including IL-1 beta and MMP-8—as well as reduced periodontal tissue destruction compared to controls after 10 days of treatment. Additional studies of larger subject groups with longer treatment times are warranted to validate these findings.
Hygiene Connection E-Newsletter
April 2015