Jeff Rippey

Yes, acupuncture can usually help with allergy and allergy symptoms.

Please make sure you're seeing a board certified, state licensed acupuncturist. You want a provider with a Dipl AC or Dipl OM national credential and an L.Ac. or R.Ac. state practice license.

Unfortunately, that's not how Chinese medicine works - there is no one fixed set of points for the treatment of anything. The points chosen are going to depend on why *you* are experiencing reflux and what else, health wise, you have going on.

Acupuncture and Chinese medicine can be excellent treatment choices for reflux. If you want to try it, make an appointment with a local licensed acupuncturist.

I don't know if acupressure can help with insomnia, I don't use acupressure all that often. In my experience, acupuncture (using needles) is much more comfortable, the treatment effects come on faster, and the treatment effect tends to last longer when compared to pressure techniques.

Acupuncture has a good track record with insomnia; most studies show acupuncture outperforming the usual treatment options.

I'm neither a surgeon nor a neurologist, so I couldn't say whether or not surgery is a viable option for migraine. In most cases, I suspect surgery would be overkill.

Usually, yes. A lot is going to depend on why your ear pressure is high. If there's some structural issue or an infection causing swelling, then acupuncture will be less useful than other potential treatments. If you've been to an ENT and ruled out those issues, then acupuncture can probably help.

Please make sure you're seeing a board certified, state licensed acupuncturist if you decide to go the Chinese medicine route. You want a provider with a Dipl AC or Dipl OM national credential and an L.Ac. or R.Ac. state practice license.

Insomnia typically responds very well to acupuncture. It's something I treat a lot and I usually get good results for folks. Please make sure you're seeing a board certified, state licensed acupuncturist. You want a provider with a Dipl AC or Dipl OM national credential and an L.Ac. or R.Ac. state practice license.

Acupuncture is an excellent treatment choice for all kinds of chronic headache, including migraine. Please make sure you're seeing a board certified, state licensed acupuncturist. You want a provider with a Dipl AC or Dipl OM national credential and an L.Ac. or R.Ac. state practice license.

Generally speaking, yes, acupuncture can often improve circulation. There are a lot of potential issues that fall under the "circulatory problem" umbrella and I'd need more specific information about your particular issue before I could say, for sure, acupuncture would help.

If we're talking about something like varicose veins, chronically cold hands/feet, or fluid build up in the ankles and low leg where cardiac issues have been ruled out then yes, acupuncture can probably help.

Please make sure you're seeing a board certified, state licensed acupuncturist. You want a provider with a Dipl AC or Dipl OM national credential and an L.Ac. or R.Ac. state practice license.

Impossible to say. Just knowing you have knee pain doesn't give me nearly enough information to provide any guidance. Why do you have knee pain? Where is the pain located? How do you experience the pain? Is the pain constant or intermittent? Does the pain radiate or is it fixed? How long have you been experiencing this pain? What makes the pain better? What makes the pain worse? What have you tried so far and what sort of result(s) have those treatment(s) provided? Acupuncture is rarely a one and done treatment. It does happen that way occasionally, but usually patients are looking at a series of treatments. How many treatments are in that series? I usually don't have any idea until the 3rd or 4th treatment. It could be as few as 5-6, or it could be as many as 20-25.

How often you need treatment is going to be dependent on the severity of your issue. In other words: how bad is your anxiety? For mild to moderate issues, acupuncture once per week for a few weeks can typically improve the problem. For more severe issues, it may take 2-3 treatments per week for a couple of weeks to get things under control. Patients should not expect to commit to multiple treatments per week for extended time periods. Personally, I don't go more than 3 weeks with a patient coming in more than once per week unless there are extenuating circumstances.

Yes, acupuncture is typically safe for diabetics. I have several patients with type 2 diabetes under treatment for a variety of issues. You do have to be careful with moxa/moxibustion, especially around the feet/lower leg if you have peripheral neuropathy. Just make sure your provider is aware of any issues you might be experiencing that are secondary to the diabetes (diabetic neuropathy, etc.).

if you know, for sure, that you have an infection, your first stop should be your primary care physician or an ENT. Infections typically require antibiotics.

I don't know if acupressure will help with rheumatoid arthritis, I rarely use it. Acupuncture, on the other hand, is often an excellent treatment choice for all forms of arthritis. Believe it or not, acupressure is not as comfortable as acupuncture. In my experience, acupressure's treatment effect comes on more slowly and doesn't last nearly as long as acupuncture's.

Acupuncture can help with nasal congestion. Much will depend on what's causing the congestion. If it's something like allergic rhinitis, then definitely. If your congestion is due to some sort of structural issue, not so much.

Massage can sometimes help varicose veins. Elevating the feet above the heart for a few minutes each day can sometimes help varicose veins.

I can't answer the question relative to acupressure as I don't use it that often. Most of the time, I treat varicose veins by bleeding superficial spider naevi in the area.

In my experience, acupressure isn't as comfortable as acupuncture, the treatment effect comes on more slowly and doesn't last as long.

Couldn't tell you, I don't use acupressure all that often. Compared to acupuncture, acupressure isn't as comfortable, the treatment effects come on more slowly, and the effect doesn't last as long.

So, does acupuncture treat insomnia? Yes, yes it does. Insomnia is something I work with a lot and I'm usually able to improve a patients' situation.

I wouldn't necessarily use acupuncture or Chinese medicine as a standalone treatment for bronchitis. You may need antibiotics or steroids - neither one of which could be prescribed by a practitioner of Chinese medicine. Visit your primary care physician and get evaluated. Use acupuncture to manage any lingering symptoms.

Maybe. I've seen some studies showing acupuncture improving verbalization among autism patients. This is a place where I'd combine acupuncture with more conventional speech therapy.

The absolute best thing for food allergies is to not eat foods to which you are allergic - assuming you've identified the offending items. Whether or not acupuncture is going to provide any benefit is going to depend a lot on the severity of the allergy and how good you are at minimizing intake of the offending item.

For mild to moderate allergies, if patients can remove the item from your diet for 6-8 weeks and use acupuncture to down-regulate their immune system, sometimes they can return to eating that food item in limited amounts.

For severe allergies, like an anaphylactic type reaction, acupuncture is going to be much less useful. Patients in this case are looking at long term exclusion of the food item.

Please keep in mind that food allergies appear to be sitting at the base of at least some chronic diseases. There's some evidence that Parkinson's might start as a gut flora imbalance probably driven by food. There appears to be some sort of connection between Hashimoto's thyroiditis and gluten sensitivity. I understand that people don't like to give things up, especially when it comes to foods, but the reality is they could be saving themselves a lot of time, money, and anguish down the road.

Hearing issues are extremely difficult to work with. There can be genetic and lifestyle components at play. On top of that, hearing damage is cumulative and people don't often notice the slow creep until they wake up one morning and can't hear out of one or both ears.

If I were you, my first stop would be an ENT. You may have wax build-up blocking the ear canal and clearing that out might return things to normal. Assuming the ENT gives you a clean bill of health, your next stop should be an audiologist. You need to know the extent of the hearing loss and an audiologist will be able to give you that information.

Once you've been through those folks, and your hearing isn't improved any, maybe give acupuncture a shot. The thing is, in my experience, if it responds at all, hearing responds very slowly. You could be looking at months of treatment.

You also need to consider the lifestyle component. Like I mentioned up top, hearing damage is cumulative. If you're constantly in loud environments without hearing protection, if you often listen to loud music in confined spaces - like a car - or use ear buds with the volume up, you will need to change those behaviors and/or start getting serious about wearing ear protection otherwise the damage will keep building.