Bastyr's faculty experts weigh in on 32 percent national spike in acupuncture visits

Consider this: It's possible more people have visited acupuncturists than any other type of practitioner in all of human history, with some dating the practice back to 3,000 B.C. Now thousands of years after acupuncture needles first appeared, it seems Americans are realizing the benefits of acupuncture and Oriental medicine therapies.

A recent national study conducted by the National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine (NCCAM) and the Center for Disease Control’s (CDC) National Center for Health Statistics found that more than three million U.S. adults made more than 17.5 million visits to acupuncturists in 2007, spending roughly $827 million on those treatments. The visits represented a 32 percent rise since 2002. Those are big numbers for a profession that wasn't officially recognized in the U.S. until 1973, when Maryland, Nevada and Oregon all passed acupuncture "practice act" legislation. Non-physician acupuncturists are now recognized in 44 states and the District of Columbia, while MDs can practice acupuncture in all 50 states.

The numbers aren't surprising to the acupuncture and Oriental medicine faculty at Bastyr University, who in recent years have noted how patient demand for acupuncture services has led to both state licensure advancements and a growing number of hospitals, clinics and health centers integrating acupuncture treatment into their offerings.

"Patient demand has initiated a lot of these changes," says Steve Given, DAOM, LAc, director of the Doctor of Acupuncture and Oriental Medicine (DAOM) program at Bastyr University. "For many years our health care system was physician-directed, but it's progressively become a more patient-directed and -focused system. Health centers and hospitals have to ask themselves, 'What are the tools our patients want?', if they want to remain competitive."

For example, Dr. Given says when he completed his master's degree in traditional Oriental medicine in 1992, training options for acupuncturists at external clinics in hospitals or health centers simply didn't exist. Now, he says, a recent survey of 55 acupuncture colleges across the country found there are well over 100 of these external training sites. At Bastyr, the School of Acupuncture and Oriental Medicine provides students clinical training opportunities in a number of community-based integrative health-care settings, including Highpoint Medical Center, Providence Regional Medical Center and Skagit Valley Hospital’s Regional Cancer Care Center. Terry Courtney, MPH, LAc, dean of the School of Acupuncture and Oriental Medicine at Bastyr, says the University could easily have more such clinical training relationships. In the last year alone, she's fielded about 10 inquiries — ranging in origin from nursing homes to oncology centers — asking if Bastyr would be interested in setting up training sites.

What accounts for this consumer demand for acupuncture services? Dr. Given, who also serves as vice president of the Council of Colleges of Acupuncture and Oriental Medicine (CCAOM), points to three core triggers:

• People are discovering acupuncture can serve as an excellent complement to conventional treatment for serious diseases: "Acupuncture is not the modality of choice for everybody, but a large number of people can benefit from it, especially those with serious diseases who are doing all they can to get better," Dr. Given says. "After Western medicine, surgery and other mainstream therapeutic options are exhausted, people often try acupuncture and find it helpful."
• Acupuncture research is increasing: Dr. Given says Western science is now taking a deeper look into the efficacy of acupuncture. In particular, he says research into integrative treatment regimens that include acupuncture has grown noticeably in recent years, with studies showing it to be an effective complementary therapy for many conditions.
• Economics: "Acupuncture, for those conditions that it is most effective, is an extremely cost-effective option," Dr. Given says, noting that medications, surgery and long-term care can be incredibly expensive. "Even if acupuncture is 'just as' helpful as conventional treatments, it is considered as an option because it costs less."

Courtney, a past commissioner and chair of the national Accreditation Commission for Acupuncture and Oriental Medicine (ACAOM), says an increase in accessibility has also played a role in boosting consumer demand. With acupuncturists now licensed to practice in most states, and many states seeing a dramatic rise in the number of licensed practitioners in recent years, more people than ever are discovering how the contemporary practice of acupuncture and Oriental medicine can benefit their health.

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