Try A Different Type Of Needle For Fertility
The first piece of advice I offer women is to find an acupuncturist to enhance their fertility path. There have been so many benefits of intertwining Eastern and Western medicine. So much so, that now some fertility centers have an acupuncturist within the office. My acupuncturist was working in the same center as my doctors and midwives. It made everything very convenient.
One question I often get from others is “Do the needles hurt?” and everytime I answer “NO, not one bit”. You see acupuncture needles are teeny, tiny compared to the needles we are used to seeing and receiving for various reasons. Many times you don’t know that they are even there or that they have entered your skin. After sending many people to acupuncturists, I have never had someone complain about the needles hurting them.
Another question that arises is “Where do they place them?” The placement is different for everyone because we are all so unique. Some places they are placed are hands, feet, head, abdomen. It all depends on what is occurring on that particular day and what your goal is in that moment.
And yet many ask “Why?” We all have blocked energy running throughout our bodies. Have you ever had an ache or pain that gets stuck in that one spot. And no matter how much you rub it or take a pain killer for it, it keeps reoccurring. Acupuncture can help heal the wound or move the blocked energy from that area.
Three reasons to get yourself to an acupuncturist:
1. Acupuncture improves blood flow
One of the first orders of business in supporting reproduction is to ensure your reproductive organs are receiving adequate nourishment. Stress and/or aging can lead to a decline in blood flow to the uterus and ovaries. Acupuncture can increase blood flow by slowing down (or “down-regulating”) the nervous system (central sympathetic nervous system) which then causes the blood vessels to dilate. When the vessels dilate, they release a flood of nutrient dense blood to the ovaries and uterus. Increased ovarian blood flow may help with response to fertility medications. Increased uterine blood flow ensures a thick uterine lining and sets up an ideal environment for implantation. Better response, better eggs, better lining.
2. Acupuncture reduces stress
Couples undergoing fertility treatments experience immense amounts of stress. It is a common reason for stopping treatment altogether. Acupuncture can help reduce the stress. Research shows that when needles are placed in the skin, the body releases its own natural pain killers (endorphins). Endorphins are responsible for the relaxed feeling one gets after a session. It causes your muscles to relax, your breathing to slow, and your mind to calm. We call it “acu-stoned.” This blissful benefit from acupuncture was cited by IVF patients as helping them feel more relaxed during their fertility treatment, and as a result, also feel more “in control.”
3. Acupuncture improves your odds of having a baby with IVF.
The ultimate goal is to have a healthy mother and baby and to give yourself the best chance of success. The acupuncture and IVF research is a little confusing, even after consulting two of the larger analyses, from Mannheimer, and Cheong, respectively. In some studies, acupuncture performed on the day the embryo is placed back in the uterus improved pregnancy rates when compared to a control, while in other studies investigators saw no difference in pregnancy rates. How can we explain this? I think we are looking at the wrong “dose” of acupuncture. Just like the amount of gonadotropins is important to ensuring egg development, so is the dose of acupuncture. In my own published research, I looked at five years of data on women who did IVF alone and compared that with women who added acupuncture on the day of embryo transfer and women who had acupuncture during their IVF cycles, around 13 to 15 sessions. The women who added more acupuncture sessions were twice as likely to have a baby compared to women who did IVF alone, and 60% more likely when compared with women who just had two acupuncture treatments on the day of embryo transfer. Acupuncture helped their IVF outcomes. The key difference was that patients received more treatment. (By Lee Hullender Rubin, DAOM, LAc, FABORM Acupuncturist at Oregon Reproductive Medicine and Portland Acupuncture Studio)
Be well! Carry on, Goddesses!