If you are interested in understanding the difference in the approach of Western Medicine and Traditional Chinese Medicine, high blood pressure is a very good condition to consider. High blood pressure is also called hypertension. It is a very common and dangerous condition. It can lead to some serious complications including strokes and heart attacks. Western Medicine divides hypertension into two major categories.
The first is called primary hypertension. It has no known cause and usually occurs in middle age people. It is associated with lifestyle and dietary abuses. Such factors as smoking, alcohol consumption, excessive stress, and lack of exercise are seen as contributing factors. Diet can play a part as well. High salt intake is an example. Secondary hypertension is more often associated with a specific condition. Disease of the kidneys, pregnancy, or clogged arteries can be causative factors.
Traditional Chinese Medicine does not even consider hypertension as a distinct disease at all. It is seen as merely a symptom. The cause of this symptom will be found in an understanding of the flow of vital energy through the body or the blockage of it. It might be excessive damp heat or stagnation of qi in a specific organ. There can be a myriad of causes for the condition. A complete examination of the patient is required to determine the cause of the internal disharmony that is at fault. Then acupuncture can be used to treat the high blood pressure.
Although one might say this, the truth is that acupuncture for high blood pressure is not completely accurate from the Traditional Chinese Medicine point of view. The acupuncture is to restore the body to the proper working condition. When this has been accomplished, the high blood pressure will most likely disappear as a symptom.
The acupuncture treatment for high blood pressure will be supplemented with advice and direction in lifestyle improvements such as stress control. It will be supplemented by diet instructions and restrictions. This is the commonality of medicine. The difference as seen through the eyes of the Eastern practitioner is that it is senseless to treat merely symptoms and then let the causes go unchecked. High blood pressure or hypertension is a symptom of something gone seriously astray. It is the search for the ?something?, and its subsequent elimination that is the goal of acupuncture.
