The conditions that can be successfully treated by acupuncture are many. While Chinese medicine seeks to treat the entire animal and not just an isolated condition such as a sore back there are some basic guidelines some of which have been discussed in our earlier remarks.

Acupuncture can reduce pain and cause a dramatic feeling of well being in an animal. Acupuncture used as a treatment for traumatic injuries, muscles and tendon strains, and sprains responds well. Ill defined vague locomotor and/or disposition problems are good candidates as are immune deficient patients and deteriorating older animals. Acupuncture is always something to consider when the patient does not respond to conventional Western medicine.

Musculoskeletal conditions are by far the most common condition encountered in veterinary medicine. They lend themselves very well to acupuncture, and are often the last resort by the owner for their pet. In many cases, the patient is not a good candidate for surgery, or else the owner declines to consider that option. In other instances there is nothing more that conventional Western medicine can offer for the patient's comfort and well-being. These include chronic degenerative joint disease (osteoarthritis), intervertebral disk disease (both cervical and lumbar), spondylosis, hip dysplasia, and many others. Techniques utilized have included even needling (dry needle technique), even needling with manual stimulation, electroacupuncture, aquapuncture, laser acupuncture, moxibustion, and gold bead implants.

Each patient is unique, therefore the treatment plan is individualized. Treatment is based upon the type of illness, the severity of the condition, the duration of the sickness, and the physical state of the patient. A course of treatment usually takes three to six sessions. In order to get the best therapeutic result, acute cases should be treated at least twice a week for several weeks, then in prolonged intervals. Chronic cases usually need two to three visit per week until there is a response. If the reaction to the treatment is slow, the patient should still be treated because most of these cases require more effort in restoring energy balance.

Effects of Medications
Traumatic Injuries
Muscle and Tendon Strains
Ill-Defined Locomotor
Behavior Problems
Immune Deficiency
Deteriorating Older Patients
Cancer in the Colon of a German Shepherd
Inoperable Brainstem Mass in a Dog
Eosinophilic Granulomatous Encephalitis in a Dog
Recurrent Fibrosarcoma in a Cat
Feline Urethral Obstruction With Cardiac Failure
Summary

Other medications taken concurrently can affect the results of acupuncture.

An example is "Megan" who has been on 50 - 60 mg/day of prednisone for osteoarthritis of the back and hips. Her owner is convinced that without these high levels of prednisone, she cannot walk at all. As a 13 year old spayed female Flat Coated Retriever, her retired owners cannot lift her if she cannot walk. Following three treatments, we did not see much significant improvement with Megan. It was only after nearly 9 or 10 treatments, that Megan is now a happy mobile member of the family. Her persons know that she will never fully recover, but she's in much better spirits, wants to go on her walks, and is eager to play ball, all activities that she had stopped doing.

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"Tillie" is a 12 year old Domestic Shorthair cat that fell off of the bed about 8 months ago. She was radiographed to determine that it was a pulled tendon of the left hock, and was put into a cast for one month and cage rested. According to her owner, she was never the same again, and has a funny way of walking. In addition to being a picky eater, she was very hostile to other cats, and appeared to be angry all the time.

Following three treatments of acupuncture, there was not much change. Her person, who knew nothing about acupuncture but was desperate to try anything to help her little friend, was uncertain as to what to do. We went ahead with a fourth treatment and she is doing very well, playful again which she had not been ever since the accident. Her person is of course delighted and has asked me to stick needles into her!

Most of the beneficial reactions start during the first four or five visits. Past experience has shown that you will notice a change in the patient within the first three visits. Therefore in my practice, we ask that owners commit themselves to at least three visits. Of course just like any other medical treatment, not all cases can be cured. Probably in Western medicine, we can effect a successful outcome in better than 80% and the same holds true for acupuncture. Thus if we combine the two modalities, our success rate is even higher.

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In the case of a 10 year old neutered male German Shepherd "Jiggs" who was out running and walking with his person when he suddenly took a high jump and landed very hard on his left foreleg, spraining his carpus. Taken to his regular veterinarian, they were told to rest him for a month with no therapy. He was not allowed to go on his usual walks and had become very depressed by the time we were called in on the case.

Over the period of several months, his walks were resumed and he was on a regimen of weekly acupuncture for about 6 - 8 weeks. His spirits were lifted immediately and the owners reported that he was a "different dog." Although he continued to limp, some of the change was due to his renewed interest and being allowed to go on walks. As a consequence, his owner took him on longer and longer walks too soon. When this was reduced to a gradual increase in walks over a longer period of time, he made a very nice recovery.

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"Greta" is a 6 year old spayed female Weimaraner who out running with her person, ran into a tree. Lame in the left foreleg, she was taken to her regular veterinarian. Radiographs and Rimadyl were not of any benefit and she was not able to keep up with her owner on walks without coming up lame. As the lameness had not cleared up, her muscles were starting to atrophy on the left side.

Due to her young age and healthy diet and life style, Greta was able to recover fully after the second treatment. Following the third treatment, she has remained sound and in good health.

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"Jennifer Kitten" is a 6 year old spayed female Domestic Shorthair who has been biting at her tail for no known reason since she was a kitten. Her owner had taken her to her regular veterinarian for treatment, and the final solution was to amputate the end portion of her tail because of all the self-inflicted trauma that they were unable to control.

At the time of the visit, she was still biting her tail nearly to the point of bleeding, and still exhibiting a lot of anger and jealousy with the owners whenever they did not pay attention to her.

Following a series of acupuncture treatments, she has calmed down considerably, does not attack her tail anymore, and remains calm when her owners are not paying attention to her. At first they would see her try to go at her tail and then stop, and look confused. It was very gradual. They are delighted with the effects of the treatment and want everyone to know that not only are the benefits high for the patient but also for the owners, who were taking a lot of time out of their busy lives to try to help their friend get well.

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One of the first cases that I encountered under this category was a regular patient of my veterinary hospital who was getting repeated skin infections every time she began scratching due to fleas. Of all the dogs that scratched, she always ended up with a staphy pyoderma. A round of antibiotics usually cleared up the condition, but her owner was concerned by the repeated bouts of infection and use of antibiotics.

We began her on a series of acupuncture treatments to help boost her immune system and she responded immediately, being only 4 or 5 years of age at that time. From then on, we had her on a regimen of nutritional supplements and vitamins and occasional topical steroid therapy whenever there was a flare up of her skin. She never required any more anitibiotics for her skin infections.

Since then, there have been many more cases similar to that early case, and they have all responded well to acupuncture therapy along with herbs, nutritional supplements, vitamins, and frequent baths.

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As we all know, older patients quite frequently have multiple conditions going on and require many different methods of treatment. Juggling them all together can often be overwhelming for the owner and difficult also for the patient. In my experience, it is often that we can assist the older patient by boosting its overall energy level and enabling it to better handle all of his/her myriad of conditions.

Traditional Chinese medicine refers to the kidney yuan qi as gradually being consumed with age, and with acupuncture, we can often boost the qi levels sufficiently for a period of time to enable the patient to continue to live a meaningful life.

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“Schatzi” was a 10 year old spayed female German Shepherd that was being treated for weak rear quarters, diagnosed by her regular veterinarian as degenerative joint disease coupled with intervertebral disk syndrome. Over the course of about 2-3 months, she improved sufficiently that we were on a maintenance schedule of acupuncture every 3-4 months for a series.

About 18 months later, she was diagnosed with a apocrine adenocarcinoma with metastasis to the sublumbar lymph nodes and spleen. After chemotherapy was instituted, she developed aspiration pneumonia from vomiting, plus azotemia, and hydronephrosis of the kidney due to the metastasis. She was unable to walk at all or even get up.

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“Rocket”, was a 9 year old neutered male Labrador/Pointer cross, who was diagnosed at University of California at Davis with an inoperable brainstem mass with a prognosis of possibly 48 hours at the most for survival. On initial exam, he had a history of 5 days of a head tilt, confusion, and stumbling. Swallowing reflex was also impaired, and the owner had to hand feed him carefully so as to avoid development of aspiration pneumonia. His prognosis on discharge from UCD was guarded at best.

At the time of presentation, he could hardly eat, was drooling heavily, and exhibited marked mental depression. Through a series of acupuncture and Chinese herbs, he survived over one year following his diagnosis with a very good quality of life. His swallowing reflex returned nearly 100 %, and his head tilt diminished significantly. This quickly resolved over the early treatments of Chinese Herbs and acupuncture.

“Rocket” was also being closely monitored by his regular veterinarian for any changes in his blood panel, as well as minor health problems that occurred, such as dog bite wounds from other dogs in the household. His regular veterinarian had him also on Prednisone every other day, and until the end, he was very stable.

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“Sugar” is a 6.5 year old spayed female Old English Sheepdog was originally seen about 3 years ago for arthritis in the hip joints. About 6 months after starting acupuncture therapy, she developed seizures which were diagnosed by the neurologist on MRI as granulomatous meningioencephalitis. Under heavy medication and weak from seizures and the hospitalization she was unable to eat or to get herself up and walk around. At this point, acupuncture was requested for her in the hospital.

In addition to the Phenobarbital, Prednisone, and Lefonamide, she was put on Chinese herbs and nutritional supplements and acupuncture was started up. Over the next few days, she began to get up and her appetite returned. Within a week, she was well enough to go home, eating and walking around.

Over the past 2 years, she has continued to be in very good shape, although she is still under the care of her internal medicine specialist and is taking Prednisone and Lefonamide, but the dosages have been reduced very slowly, to Prednisone every 4 th day, and her nutritional supplements less as well. Her acupuncture treatments are now only 4 times per year, primarily for her arthritis of the back and hips.

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“Iggy” is an 11.5 year old neutered male DOMESTIC SHORTHAIR CATwho has had a series of surgeries for a recurrent vaccine related fibrosarcoma on the mid-back just behind the base of his neck. He has received a series of chemotherapy treatments and had reacted negatively with vomiting and diarrhea, to a series of treatments late last year, after which acupuncture was requested.

He has had a total of 4 treatments, and although he did not respond after the first 2 treatments, following the 3 rd, his appetite returned and the vomiting and diarrhea had stopped. At the time of the 4 th treatment, his owner/guardian reported that it was the smallest that they had ever seen the tumor. I understand that he’s doing great, continuing with the chemotherapy, and has had an additional surgery on the tumor.

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“Nicholas” is a 15.5 year old neutered male Domestic Shorthair Cat that came down with a urethral obstruction which developed into kidney insufficiency and cardiac failure. He developed severe pleural effusion and became very depressed and prostrate. Acupuncture was recommended to his person by the internal medicine specialist, and he has responded very well.

According to his owner, who visited him 2 hours after the first treatment, “Nicholas” was back to his old self when she came to visit. He continued to improve sufficiently that he was able to be sent home for the week-end.

Although he reblocked very shortly after returning home from the hospital, a perineal urethrostomy was performed successfully the following week and he is back home, eating and drinking normally. His person reports that he’s now back to his normal behavior patterns (greeting her at the door, etc.) and also meowing as normally. Current blood tests indicate that the formerly very high BUN has been consistently dropping, although still above normal.

His values have gone from over 200 mg% BUN down to as low as 63mg% although at the moment he has come down with a viral upper respiratory infection and his BUN has risen up to 119 mg%. Nevertheless the Creatinine and Phosporous has continued to decrease in value from highs of over 12 mg% Creatinine.

In such a case as “Nicholas,” we will recommend that he continue to take Chinese herbs and acupuncture to nourish his kidneys. He remains with a guarded prognosis.

Nevertheless, his combined therapy has brought him home and given him additional quality time with his owner.

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In summary, I’ve introduced you to a few representative cases where acupuncture was useful in a practice as the exclusive approach after other more conventional methods of Western veterinary medicine have been used with limited success. In many instances, the diagnostics are all done by the referring veterinarian and in this manner, we have eliminated any possibility as much as is possible, of overlooking any aspect the patient’s complete medical condition. To be sure, there are always the limitations of our instrumentation as well as the limitations of what the client is willing to pursue in the way of diagnostic services.

The most complex and rewarding cases are those where the use of acupuncture is applied along with all of the conventional Western veterinary medical approaches at the same time. These cases are not as often encountered, but I venture to say that we should be seeing more of this in the future, as everyone is more and more aware of the benefits of complementary therapy.

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