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In April 2019, a team of Italian researchers published a study in Medical Acupuncture that suggests acupuncture may be effective for reducing symptoms associated with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) after a natural disaster. The research team looked at residents of Amatrice, Italy, where a 6.0-magnitude earthquake in 2016 left nearly 300 people dead and almost 30,000 homeless. Natural hazards, like earthquakes, that are unpredictable and wreak widespread havoc on communities, have been shown to cause psychiatric disorders in survivors, including PTSD.

The participants in this study received five weeks of acupuncture treatments starting about a month after the earthquake. Researchers used patient-reported numbers on a pain scale to evaluate the effectiveness of the treatments. Before the treatments, 68 percent of the patients reported having psychological and pain symptoms associated with PTSD. Already after the third treatment, 54 percent of patients reported improvements in their psychological symptoms and 60 percent reported improvements in their pain symptoms. Using a statistical analysis, researchers measured a significant reduction between the initial reported psychological and pain scores and the scores after the third treatment. The researchers did not report any adverse side effects or events.

In the aftermath of natural disasters, communities are thrown into stress-provoking situations for myriad reasons, including loss of life, loss of property, loss of job, other economic losses, loss of community in the case some members move away and loss of infrastructure like schools or restaurants, among other things. Studies show individual mental health plays an important role in the success of communities rebuilding efforts after a natural disaster.

Although more research is needed to bolster the findings of this study, it suggests acupuncture can be an effective therapy for communities in the aftermath of a natural disaster. Studies show acupuncture is effective at balancing hormone levels that contribute to moderating stress levels in the body. The most significant body of research on acupuncture is in the field of acupuncture’s ability to reduce physical pain. This study suggests the effects of acupuncture extend to stress and pain brought on by a natural disaster.

Arizona State University conducted a study on the effects of stress on college students and staff in a “large urban college population.” The study was a two-group, randomized controlled trial where the participants underwent either sham acupuncture or verum acupuncture. The participants included college students, faculty and staff at a large public university and the study was approved by the university’s institutional review board with the consent of each participant.

Prior to the study beginning, each participant answered questions in the Cohen’s Global Measure of Perceived Stress questionnaire at 5 different parts of the study. The intention behind this step was to measure how stress changed or did not change for each participant throughout the course of the treatment.

The acupuncture points that were used within the study were as follows: GV 20 / PC 6 / HT 7 / Yingtang / Four Gates / CV 17 / CV 6 / ST 36.

These points were given to the treatment group which were set to undergo verum acupuncture. Each group reported to the acupuncture clinic once a week for a 30 minute session.

The second group (considered the control group) received sham acupuncture in 3 points that are not known to have any effect on stress. These points on the body that are located between meridians and were inserted unilaterally and without stimulation or manipulation to ensure that de qi would not occur.

After the study was completed, each participant was questioned on the levels of stress that they each endured after 6, 12, 18 and 24 weeks post-treatment. Between the first treatment and the 24th week post-treatment, the verum acupuncture group reported a 45.8% improvement in the perception of stress. The sham acupuncture group reportedly showed a 40.3% difference in stress levels between the start of the study and post-treatment. However, at 3 months post-treatment, the sham acupuncture group had shown a decrease in their stress-scores.

To reduce the amount of error in the study, they “treated every participant with the same point combination, no matter what their underlying energetics may have suggested.” This was to keep the acupuncture points as consistent as possible in order to obtain the most accurate results possible.

The study did determined that stress was reduced through the use of acupuncture on the participants within the study but that a larger sample size would aid in obtaining more statistically consistent results.

This study appears promising for determining the effects of reducing stress on university-goers through the treatment of acupuncture. However, further study and testing would be necessary for more conclusive results.