If you didn't have any prior knowledge of what a "cytokine storm" is, you probably do now, as it's been widely proposed as a potential reason why some COVID-19 patients suffer severe and even fatal complications. New research suggests acupuncture has the potential to play a critical role in influencing the inflammatory process that can lead to it.
Researchers at Harvard Medical School have discovered that acupuncture activates signaling pathways that influence the inflammatory response. Using a mouse model, they found that mice with bacterially induced systemic inflammation who received electroacupuncture showed increases in either anti-inflammatory or pro-inflammatory markers, depending on the location, intensity and timing of treatment delivery.
"The revelation of somatotopic organization and intensity dependency in driving distinct autonomic pathways could form a road map for optimizing stimulation parameters to improve both efficacy and safety in using acupuncture as a therapeutic modality," stated the researchers, writing in the journal Neuron.
A Harvard news release provides a layman's explanation, particularly in terms of the study's potential relevance to the "cytokine storm":
"In the study, acupuncture stimulation influenced how animals coped with cytokine storm – the rapid release of large amounts of cytokines, inflammation-fueling molecules. The phenomenon has gained mainstream attention as a complication of severe COVID-19, but this aberrant immune reaction can occur in the setting of any infection and has been long known to physicians as a hallmark of sepsis, an organ-damaging, often-fatal inflammatory response to infection."
To read the full text of this study, which of course requires further investigation in humans, click here.
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