An unconventional approach to chest wall pain
Would acupuncture provide some relief while this patient waited for an x-ray to identify the source of his left lateral chest wall pain?
Our patient. We inserted semi-permanent needles with a needle length of 2 mm into 4 locations on the ear. (These needles can remain in the ear for several days and fall out on their own or they may be removed by pulling the stud ends.) As noted earlier, our patient reported pain relief within 15 minutes and was pain free by the next day.
THE TAKEAWAY
Auricular acupuncture can treat acute and chronic pain. As proof, the BFA technique is widely used by health care providers throughout the US military and Department of Veterans Affairs. In this case, the immediate pain relief and x-ray documentation of atelectasis resolution within 6 hours of treatment provide support that auricular acupuncture was beneficial in reversing the cause of this atelectasis, which was pain-induced hypoventilation.
While the acute pain control observed with this patient is not unusual in our experience, what is unusual is the rare visual confirmation of the striking degree of pain reduction possible with auricular acupuncture.
