High blood pressure: acupuncture can help

Larissa Melville completed her traineeship in the editorial team of . After studying biology at Ludwig Maximilians University and the Technical University of Munich, she first got to know digital media online at Focus and then decided to learn medical journalism from scratch.

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High blood pressure is dangerous - it promotes strokes, heart attacks and cardiac and renal insufficiency. Blood pressure values ​​can be brought under control with medication - but often with side effects. The good news: There may be an alternative: acupuncture, or more precisely electro acupuncture.

Earlier studies had shown that blood pressure can be lowered with classic acupuncture. John Longhurst and his team from the University of California-Irvine now looked into the question of how effective electroacupuncture is in this regard. In this procedure, a device sends weak pulses of electricity to the acupuncture needles.

Right and wrong acupuncture points

The study included 65 patients with mild to moderate high blood pressure who were not taking any blood pressure medication. The researchers randomly divided the subjects into two groups. All participants received 30-minute electro-acupuncture once a week for eight weeks. The highlight: In the treatment group, the doctors needled the typical "high blood pressure acupuncture points": above the wrists and below the knees. In the control group, on the other hand, the needles were intentionally placed in the “wrong” places. The patients themselves did not know which group they belonged to during the entire study period.

The researchers measured the subjects' blood pressure 30 minutes before and after the acupuncture sessions. In addition, the participants wore a blood pressure monitor 24 hours before and after the electroacupuncture, which recorded the peak and average values. Furthermore, blood was taken regularly from the test persons and various blood values ​​- including in particular hormones and enzymes that play a role in blood pressure regulation - were determined.

70 percent benefited

The result: The electroacupuncture showed an effect in 70 percent of the test subjects from the treatment group - both in terms of average blood pressure and peak values: On average, the upper blood pressure value (systolic) decreased by six to eight millimeters Hg - while the lower value ( diastolic) decreased by an average of four millimeters Hg. In the control group, on the other hand, there was no significant change in blood pressure values.

The blood pressure lowering effect occurred only slowly - after about four weeks - but then lasted for up to six weeks, the researchers write. Although the reduction in blood pressure was small, it was already clinically significant.

The team also found that the treatment group decreased levels of the hormone norepinephrine in the blood by 41 percent. This hormone constricts blood vessels and thus increases blood pressure. Likewise, the level of the enzyme renin, which can also raise blood pressure, fell by as much as 67 percent. In addition, the aldosterone level decreased by 22 percent - this hormone is also involved in blood pressure regulation.

Process with a future?

"Because electro-acupuncture reduces both peak systolic and mean blood pressure over a 24-hour period, this therapy, if used regularly, could lower the risk of stroke, arterial disease, heart failure and heart attack in high blood pressure patients," says Longhurst.

Human blood pressure is subject to normal fluctuations. Depending on the activity and excitement, it is higher or lower. In a healthy person, however, the value levels off again and again to the normal range, which is around 120/80 millimeters Hg. However, if the blood pressure permanently exceeds a value of 140/90 millimeters Hg, one speaks of high blood pressure. Over half of Europeans are affected.

Sources:

Li Peng et al .: Long-Lasting Reduction of Blood Pressure by Electroacupuncture in Patients with Hypertension: Randomized Controlled Trial. Medical acupuncture. doi: 10.1089 / acu.2015.1106.

Press release of the University of California-Irvine (UCI) from 08/19/2015

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