Acupunc­ture Santa Cruz of Capitola

 

Insom­nia and Sleep Disorders

I have treated thou­sands of patients for sleep dis­or­ders and insom­nia with sig­nif­i­cant clin­i­cal results. There are sev­eral basic types of insom­nia. Most com­mon is the type where the patient wakes up between 1–3 am. They often have com­pli­ca­tions such as stress, jaw tight­ness, and headaches. This is known as Qi Stag­na­tion insom­nia. The patient not only has improved sleep but also sees improve­ments in the com­pli­ca­tions of this pattern.

Another com­mon type of insom­nia is dif­fi­culty falling asleep. Com­pli­ca­tions often include feel­ing hot (espe­cially at night), clam­mi­ness or night sweats and men­tal rest­less­ness. This is the Yin Defi­ciency type of insom­nia and this pat­tern is often treated with both acupunc­ture and herbal med­i­cine. Lunesta, Ambien and other med­ica­tions tend to help these patients, how­ever, there is no need for these med­ica­tions. This pat­tern is reversible. Patients can slowly reduce med­ica­tion lev­els as the acupunc­ture ther­apy improves the condition.

The Qi Defi­ciency pat­tern of insom­nia is marked by light sleep­ing and the patient wakes up eas­ily. Often, patients do not sleep for long peri­ods of time con­tin­u­ously and do not feel refreshed in the morn­ing. Com­pli­ca­tions include exhaus­tion, lack of men­tal clar­ity, diges­tion dis­or­ders and weight gain. The goal is to nour­ish and strengthen the patient’s metab­o­lism so that they can main­tain a sound pat­tern of sleep. As the sleep returns, the patient notices improved energy and a return of diges­tive metabolism.

There are other pat­terns of insom­nia includ­ing those com­pli­cated by post trau­matic stress dis­or­der and panic attacks. It is not uncom­mon to treat war vet­er­ans at my office for this type of insom­nia. It is an incred­i­ble expe­ri­ence to help these patients regain nor­mal sleep. Some of these patients suf­fered decades of insom­nia before get­ting acupunc­ture sleep treatments.

 

Pro­fes­sional Note
A note to acupunc­tur­ists, com­bine acupunc­ture points P6, P7 and Ht7 with SiShen­Cong, AnMian, Cv17, St36, Sp6 and Liv3. Also, use Ear points: Shen­Men, Liver.