Acupuncture for Women's Health
Did you know that oriental medicine and acupuncture effectively
diagnose, treat and manage many common health concerns for women?
Acupuncture and oriental medicine are growing in popularity for
women seeking help with fertility issues, hormonal imbalances,
menstrual irregularities, menopause, heart disease, and even
adjunct therapy for cancer prevention and treatment.
Hui Yan Cai, MD (China), PhD, LAc, a new faculty member in the
acupuncture and oriental medicine clinic at National University of
Health Sciences in Lombard, brings a wealth of experience in
women's health issues to clinic patients.
Dr. Cai says perhaps one of the most popular reasons women seek
acupuncture is to help increase their fertility. In her practice,
she sees many patients with fertility issues. "I find that hormone
problems respond very well to acupuncture: irregular menstrual
periods, infertility, uterine bleeding, etc." says Dr. Cai. "I also
treat many in-vitro fertilization (IVF) patients seeking to
increase their chance of conceiving and sustaining a pregnancy to
term."
Clinical Research
Clinical trials and case studies suggest that acupuncture can
improve the success rate of IVF and the quality of life of patients
undergoing IVF, and that it is a safe adjunct therapy. IVF results
in pregnancy about 35 percent of the time. Adding acupuncture might
boost that to around 45 percent, according to researchers assessing
trial data funded by the National Center for Complementary and
Alternative Medicine. Their analysis was published in a 2008 issue
of the British Medical Journal.
Through this and other research findings, the western world is
now discovering and proving the types of clinical benefits that
people in Asian countries have been experiencing with oriental
medicine for years.
Dr. Cai's Experience
Before she came to the United States in 1986, Dr. Hui Yan Cai
was an attending physician at a large hospital in China. In
addition to earning her MD in China, Dr. Cai completed two
fellowships in biomedicine, including one focusing on hormone
receptor research. She also completed her PhD in Traditional
Chinese Medicine in 2004. Dr. Cai travels to other oriental medical
colleges across the U.S. to give seminars on women's health and
cancer treatment.
At Dr. Cai's hospital it was quite routine for doctors to
combine western medical care with acupuncture and herbs. She
provides several examples of how combining the two approaches works
in women's health care:
"In China, when I performed C-section deliveries in the
obstetric ward, we would use acupuncture and herbal medicine as the
only anesthetic. This worked very well for both the mother and
baby. It was especially helpful when the fetus had heart beat
irregularities, making the use of pharmaceauticals more risky,"
recalls Dr. Cai.
Dr. Cai also combined surgery with oriental medicine in treating
women with cervical cancer. "We would perform a radical
hysterectomy, but also give the patients acupuncture before, during
and after the surgery along with herbal injections. The patients
receiving acupuncture and herbal injections combined with a small
amount of chemotherapy had much higher 5-year survival rates
compared to patients who only had surgery and chemo-therapy," says
Dr. Cai.
In regards to cancer patients, Dr. Cai notes that acupuncture
and herbal medicine can often reduce the devastating side effects
of chemotherapy. It is increasingly common to find acupuncture
being used as part of the overall care for cancer patients in
progressive hopitals across the United States.
In her work with cancer patients, Dr. Cai always uses tongue
diagnosis in conjunction with biopsy, MRI and CT scans to get a
more accurate picture. Part of her job in the hospital in China was
to oversee pap smear procedures. "In China, we always used a pap
smear in combination with assessing the vein color of the underside
of the tongue to give us information we needed to pick out the most
'at-risk' patients," she says.
Seeing an oriental medicine practitioner can also help diagnose
and prevent disease before it becomes a serious condition.
According to Dr. Cai, "In oriental medicine, we use tongue analysis
to make diagnoses of both current conditions and the patient's risk
for future health trouble," she explains. "By assessing the
condition and color of various locations on the tongue, we can
often determine patients who are at a higher risk for heart
problems and certain cancers, like breast cancer. If I see a
patient with certain tongue patterns that warn of potential serious
disease, I can recommend that she see a cardiologist or have a
cancer screening and possibly intercept a serious health problem
before a western doctor would normally detect it."
"For example, patients at risk for heart disease often have a
purple color or purplish blue spot and color changes on their
tongue and changes in the features and size of the vein on the
underside of their tongue," says Dr. Cai. "If we notice this, we
can help that patient by not only advising them to get a heart
check-up, but also by beginning dietary intervention and lifestyle
changes to prevent future problems."
Even though she practices only oriental medicine in the U.S.,
Dr. Cai still insists that her patients bring their complete
medical records to her office before she will treat them.
"Increasingly, patients are coming to me along with their MD. It is
good news that doctors in the United States are becoming more and
more open-minded about oriental medicine, and how we can best help
patients by working together."
Contact Us
To find out how acupuncture and oriental medicine might benefit
your overall health care, call National University of Health
Science Whole
Health Center.
