What if acupuncture really worked?
Posted on | June 7, 2010 | No Comments
Author:
Jason Voiovich
Ecra Creative Group
Key Points:
1. Scientific studies in peer-reviewed journals are beginning to uncover the secrets behind Eastern/alternative medicine.
2. These studies have significant potential to open huge new segments of the healthcare market.
3. However, alternative care providers need to stop “selling to the sold” and adjust their messaging in order to reach that broader audience.
It was a cold January day in 2005.
Luckily for that time of year, the roads were clear. I was driving from my office in Inver Grove Heights through downtown St. Paul to Shoreview on the north side of town for a meeting. As Highway 52 approaches St. Paul, it slows and stops to allow people to exit onto I-94 or continue onto 7th Street.
As I stopped in traffic I noticed a 40-foot container truck bearing down at over 35 miles per hour in my rearview mirror. Even in perfect conditions, there was no way he could stop.
The driver hit the back end of my Acura TL at roughly 35 miles per hour.
I must have been wearing my lucky rocket ship underpants, because I walked away from it.
Or I might more appropriately say “painfully limped away”.
Nothing was broken, but everything hurt. My primary care physician sent me home with some “super-Advil” and instructions to get some rest. I took the advice. But I also took the advice of a trainer of mine to get some chiropractic help. I didn’t know much about chiropractic, but the idea seemed to make sense: Mechanical help for mechanical problems.
Over the next six months, I saw my chiropractor three days per week, then two days, and then one day. I got better slowly. In the end, I can’t really say whether I got better faster because of my treatment, or if I would have gotten better on my own without any special help.
My experience and my rationale – although isolated – speaks to the larger issue surrounding “alternative” medicine. This group includes chiropractic, message therapy, meditation, acupuncture, and a whole host of other treatments (many of Eastern origin).
The key question for people like me is this: Do these treatments work? And when I say “work”, I mean “work” in the scientifically demonstrable sense. In other words, better than placebo. More specifically, what conditions can they treat? In what dosages? With what side-effects? (Understand that I am not talking about “preventative” care, but rather “treatment”. And yes, I know there is a bigger issue lurking in there).
New research is beginning to shed light on those questions.
One study in particular, published in the highly-regarding peer-reviewed journal Brain Research specifically addresses acupuncture.
To quote the lead researcher Dr. Hugh MacPherson: “When a patient receives acupuncture treatment, a sensation called deqi can be obtained; scientific analysis shows that this deactivates areas within the brain that are associated with the processing of pain.” Current clinical trials at the University of York are investigating the effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of acupuncture for Irritable Bowel Syndrome (IBS) and for depression. Recent studies in the US have also shown that acupuncture can be an effective treatment for migraines and osteoarthritis of the knee.
In short, the team hopes to begin to understand the neurological impact of acupuncture treatments in order to better understand how to use it as a therapeutic device in “Western” clinics.
Of course, more research needs to be done. Additionally, this study seems to conflict with other studies that say any effect is fleeting. Likely, with enough data, we’ll learn what acupuncture works for, what it doesn’t, and in what way.
What’s interesting for the marketing of alternative healthcare is what studies like this can mean for messaging and market segmentation.
To do that, let’s divide up the market not demographically, but psychographically. Start with three “spheres” of healthcare behavior – the first is Alternative Medicine, the second is Traditional US-based Primary Care, and the third is Emergency Room / No Care. As the graph below shows, people do not neatly fit into individual buckets.
Put yourself in the shoes of someone marketing alternative healthcare (a chiropractic clinic, acupuncture therapist, etc). Who do you target? With what message?
Group 1 is obvious. They accept only alternative treatment. But that is akin to preaching to the converted. It’s validating, but not a useful technique to widen your sphere of influence. Unfortunately, that is how most alternative care providers market themselves. Their messaging assumes you already accept Eastern/alternative medicine and its tenants.
Groups 4, 5, and 6 are clearly wastes of time. they don’t take healthcare seriously, or if they do, are not willing to take alternative treatments seriously, no matter the evidence (at least in the short term).
In order to move into Group 2 and Group 3 – which represent significant new market share and profit potential, especially as Baby Boomer retire – alternative care providers must begin to communicate more like a “Western” care provider and less like a “spiritual guide”. And that’s where studies like MacPherson’s are worth their weight in gold. Scientific studies help bridge the gap. They invite skepticism. They demonstrate the limits of knowledge. They do not over-promise. They simply say what is.
This kind of approach can help put people in Groups 2 and 3 at ease. They don’t feel as though they are being bamboozled by fantastic promises of “healing”, but rather that they can make an informed decision based on independent evidence.
It’s not fair, but many alternative medicine providers get lumped into the “snake oil” category and dismissed as such.
As hard as it is to be subjected to scientific rigor, it is the path to wider acceptance for the entire alternative medicine industry.
Related Links:
Study Maps Effects of Acupuncture on the Brain
Tags: acupuncture > chiropractic > eastern medicine
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About
Jason Voiovich
Ecra Creative Group
Phone: 651.209.2778
Principal and co-founder of Ecra Creative Group, a Minneapolis, MN based creative services firm specializing in brand development, reputation process management, naming/trademark, and product launches to drive measurable business results.
