Journal of Post Trauma Stress Disorders and Treatment 

This article is written in the hope that practitioners will have an arsenal of strategies for treating patients who are, or who have been in: 

a) conflict zones or

b) have experienced and/or witnessed sudden, violent and/or repetitive trauma, or 

c) were in areas where natural disasters struck and then presented with post trauma symptoms.

Background

In the last decade there is an increasing awareness in conflict zone hospitals, in military hospitals and clinics in a number of countries, that acupuncture and traditional Chinese medicine treatments are efficacious and time/cost effective for treating post-traumatic stress and what is labelled as TSR or Trauma Spectrum Response and the recently listed condition of ASD (Acute Stress Disorder) and GAD (General Anxiety Disorders).

The immediate and subsequent symptoms can include: insomnia, residual pain, aphasia, appetite changes, numbing, personality changes, depression, manias, flashbacks, anxiety, muscular skeletal weakness, digestive disorders, tinnitus, temporary paralysis, myopia, fatigue, impulse control problems, filters, triggers, sexual dysfunction, aggressive denial, phobias, cognitive difficulties, ahedonia, hyper arousal, and other ‘qi/chi’ and/or ‘shen’ disturbances which cause suffering in the patients, as well as impact their family, friends, colleagues, communities and their wider society.

To read the full peer reviewed article click