The choice of Acupuncture points for AP therapy

CONSTRUCTION OF AP POINT PRESCRIPTIONS

As one accumulates textbooks one may wish to construct a cumulative index of the points recommended by the various authors for each condition. Each reference should be coded, in order to avoid confusion as to the source and to avoid mistakes in the location of the points.

As new texts are studied, data can be added to the index, under a new reference code. For example, suppose one were studying Klide and Kung in relation to AP in horses and one were using the Sobin data (p 69 of Klide and Kung), one would find the following data under the various points:

Point Indication

Head & Neck01 Tetanus, encephalitis, encephalomyelitis, encephaloedema

02 Purulent frontal sinusitis, cerebral hyperaemia

03 Cerebral hyperaemia, cerebral anaemia, neck rheumatism

04 Same as HN03

. .

Tail 114 Over-exertion, heat stroke, common cold, bowel spasm

First, one would go through the data and pick out the complete list of key-words or pathological conditions, mentioned in the text:

Tetanus, Encephalitis, Encephalomyelitis, Encephaloedema, Sinusitis (frontal, purulent), Cerebral hyperaemia, Cerebral anaemia, Neck rheumatism, Overexertion, Heatstroke, Common cold, Bowel spasm etc.

One would then go through the data again and enter the identity of each point under the relevant conditions, giving a code (say) (K-S (for Klide/Kung-Sobin) before each point combination and giving an appropriate alphanumeric code to each point, for example HN01 for Head and Neck 1, T114 for Tail 114.

Bowel spasm (K-S) T114 (T= Tail)

Cerebral hyperaemia (K-S) HN02,03,04

Encephalitis (K-S) HN01

Encephaloedema (K-S) HN01

Encephalomyelitis (K-S) HN01

Tetanus (K-S) HN01

 etc

If a new reference, for example author X, had points under these headings, they would be added later. For example:

Cerebral hyperaemia (K-S) HN02,03,04....

(X) 99, 112, 115...

Tetanus (K-S) HN01...

(X) 115, 119, 126...

 etc

The problem with this system (traditional vet AP) is that there is no standard chart for any one species. It is not possible to relate (K-S) HN02 with (X) 99 etc on the standard chart. Therefore some major integration (referring back to the individual source charts) is necessary either before the cumulative index is attempted or after it is done. Either way, it becomes very time-consuming for the individual practitioner. However, one would expect that research workers interested in vet AP will integrate all existing vet traditional texts into one "standard" text for each species within the next few years.

Meanwhile, integration of human texts is much easier, as they are normally based on a standard chart of the AP points (except for a few instances in which points such as BL36-54 and ST01-8 may have different alphanumeric coding in some texts:

Outer BL Points (IVAS BL40=WeiZhong, mid-popliteal crease)

IVAS 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54

Other 50 51 52 53 54 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49

Inner line - - - - - --12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 28 30

Codes for ST01-08