Despite what some physicians claim, the treatment of depression with drugs is not great. The majority of individuals who have depression remain dis-satisfied with current day anti depressant drugs. Initially most drugs work to relieve symptoms of depression but after sometime, relapses are common. Moreover, the majority of drugs have side effects. For this reason, many patients have been turning to alternative health. One of the treatments that has advocated for treating depression is acupuncture.
Acupuncture has been widely touted to treat many types of pain syndromes, anxiety disorders and a whole host of other organic disorders. Now the alternative health care practitioners claim that acupuncture can be used to treat depression. Even though acupuncture has been practiced for decades in North America, not many randomized studies have been done to determine its efficacy.
In the last decade, seven trials have compared acupuncture versus anti depressant medications in the treatment of mild to moderate depression. Most of these trials were conducted fairly, with proper inclusion and exclusion criteria. Patients were evaluated carefully and followed.