Canadian RMT Magazine Spring 2016 Apr. 2016 | Page 22

Neurofunctional
Acupuncture:

A mechanism-based model for pain treatment
By Alejandro Elorriaga Claraco, MD (Spain),
Director McMaster Contemporary Acupuncture Program

P

ain problems involve a complex combination of movement dysfunctions, sensory signals, and emotions. To
treat pain successfully we need a treatment model that
considers all relevant contributions by the nervous system such
as peripheral and central sensitization phenomena.
A great contemporary therapeutic intervention based on that
model is neurofunctional acupuncture, a science-based modality with multiple effects in the central and peripheral nervous
system. In a simple definition, neurofunctional acupuncture
consists of the stimulation of peripheral nerves
and their receptors with
acupuncture needles and
electricity for therapeutic
purposes.
Effects to this stimulation include the production of analgesia in muscle
pain by at least two specific
mechanisms: 1) improvement of perfusion in the
painful muscle mediated
by autonomic vascular
reflexes and the release of
nitric oxide; 2) activation
of central endogenous pain
inhibitory systems that
modulate nocicep ѥٔ