Plinio Prioreschi, the earliest known historical record of acupuncture is the Shih-Chi “Record of History”, written by a historian around 100 BC. 28 It is believed that this text was documenting what was established practice at cupping in China. In 2008 a study determined that the use of acupuncture-needle treatment on children was “questionable” due to 2008. Hand acupuncture, developed in Korea, canters auscultation and olfaction, inquiring, and palpation. If de-qi can not be generated, then inaccurate location of the acupoint, improper depth of needle insertion, inadequate manual manipulation, or in places not associated with meridians. 74 The under-performance of acupuncture in such trials may indicate that therapeutic effects are due entirely to non-specific effects, or that the sham treatments are not inert, or that systematic protocols yield less than optimal treatment. 75 76 A 2014 Nature Reviews Cancer review article found that “contrary to the claimed mechanism of redirecting the flow of qi through meridians, researchers usually find that it generally does not matter where the needles are inserted, how often that is, no dose-response effect is observed, or even if needles are actually inserted.

Acupuncture.became.he.ost.opular alternative medicine in the US. 260 Politicians from the Chinese Communist Party said acupuncture was superstitious and conflicted with the party's commitment to science. 279 Communist Party Chairman Mao Zedong later reversed this position, 279 arguing that the practice was based on scientific principles. 280 In 1971, a New York Times reporter published an article on his acupuncture experiences in China, which led to more investigation of and support for acupuncture. 27 The US President Richard Nixon visited China in 1972 . 281 During one part of the visit, the delegation was shown a patient undergoing major surgery while fully awake, ostensibly receiving acupuncture rather than anaesthesia . 281 Later it was found that the patients selected for the surgery had both a high pain tolerance and received heavy indoctrination before the acupuncture”. David Ramey, no single “method or theory” was ever predominantly adopted as the standard. 271 At the time, scientific knowledge of medicine was not yet developed, especially because in China dissection of the deceased was forbidden, preventing the development of basic anatomical knowledge. 27 It is not certain when specific acupuncture points were introduced, but the autobiography of lien Chhio from around 400–500 BC references inserting needles at designated areas. 29 Brian Sue believed there was a single acupuncture point at the top of one's skull that he called the point “of the hundred meetings.” 29 :83 Additionally, by the 18th century, scientific rationality was becoming more popular than traditional superstitious beliefs. 27 By 1757 a book documenting the history of Chinese medicine called acupuncture a “lost art”. 29 :160 Its decline was attributed in part to the popularity of prescriptions and medications, as well as its association with the lower classes. 275 In 1822, the Chinese Emperor signed a decree excluding the practice of acupuncture from the Imperial Medical Institute. 27 He said it was unfit for practice by gentlemen-scholars. 276 In China acupuncture was increasingly associated with lower-class, illiterate practitioners. 277 It was restored for a time, but banned again in 1929 in favour of science-based Western medicine. Diagrams of the flow of spiritual energy, for example, Sun simian published acupuncture-related diagrams and charts that established standardized methods for finding acupuncture sites on people of different sizes and categorized acupuncture sites in a set of modules. 29 Acupuncture became more established in China as improvements in paper led to the publication of more acupuncture books.

In.999,.he.ational.nter for Complementary and acupuncture to cause bleeding, while others mixed the ideas of blood-letting and spiritual Ph'i energy. Even.f.hey.Gould agree, the ACM theories are so nebulous that no amount of scientific study will enable ACM to offer rational care.” 5 Some modern practitioners support the use of acupuncture to treat pain, but have abandoned the use of qi, meridians, yin, yang and other energies based in mysticism, as explanatory frameworks. 8 25 26 The use of qi as an explanatory framework has been decreasing in China, even as it becomes more prominent during discussions of acupuncture in the US. 257 Academic discussions of acupuncture still make reference to pseudo-scientific concepts such as qi and meridians despite the lack of scientific evidence. 257 Many within the scientific community consider attempts to rationalize acupuncture in science to be quackery, pseudo-science and “theatrical placebo”. 258 Academics Massimo Pigliucci and marten Boudry describe it as a “borderlands science” lying between science and pseudo-science. 259 Many acupuncturists attribute pain relief to the release of endorphins when nneedles penetrate, but no longer support the idea that acupuncture can affect a disease. 26 257 It is a generally held belief within the acupuncture community that acupuncture points and meridians structures are special conduits for electrical signals but no research has established any consistent anatomical structure or function for either acupuncture points or meridians. n 1 24 Human tests to determine whether electrical continuity was significantly different near meridians than other places in the body have been inconclusive. 24 Some studies suggest acupuncture causes a series of events within the central nervous system, 260 and that it is possible to inhibit acupuncture's analgesic effects with the opioid antagonist naloxone . 261 Mechanical deformation of the skin by acupuncture needles appears to result in the release of adenosine . 2 The anti-nociceptive effect of acupuncture may be mediated by the adenosine A1 receptor . 262 A 2014 Nature Reviews Cancer review article found that since the key mouse studies that suggested acupuncture relieves transdermal electrical nerve stimulation TENS masquerading as acupuncture”. 57 Fire needle acupuncture also known as fire needling is a technique which involves quickly inserting a flame-heated needle into areas on the body. 58 Sonopuncture is a stimulation of the body similar to acupuncture using sound instead of needles. 59 This may be done using purpose-built transducers to direct a narrow ultrasound beam to a depth of 6–8 centimetres at acupuncture meridian points on the body. 60 Alternatively, tuning forks or other sound emitting devices are used. 61 Acupuncture point injection is the injection of various substances such as drugs, vitamins or herbal extracts into acupoints. 62 Auriculotherapy, commonly known as ear acupuncture, auricular acupuncture, or auriculoacupuncture, is considered to date back to ancient China. The.eedles used in acupuncture are regulated in the US by the Food and Drug Administration . 302 In some states acupuncture is acupuncture education regulated by a board of medical examiners, while in others by the board of licensing, health or education. 299 In Japan, acupuncturists are licensed by the auscultation and olfaction, inquiring, and palpation.