Neurologic evaluation and its relation to acupuncture. Acupuncture for neurologic disorders

Acupuncture provides companion animal veterinarians a valid therapeutic alternative to medicine and surgery in a variety of neurologic disorders. The veterinarian must arrive at a lesion localization in the nervous system and determine a presumptive diagnosis before instituting acutherapy. Signalment, type of neurologic disorder, efficacy of conventional treatments versus acupuncture, financial constraints, and ethical issues are useful patient selection criteria. In general, animals experiencing pain respond faster and more completely to acupuncture than those demonstrating neurologic deficits consistent with loss of function. Acupuncture offers clients a noninvasive alternative when medications are contraindicated or surgery is not an option. This chapter serves as an introduction to acupuncture for neurologic disorders in pets. It is hoped that the information here will inspire clinical investigations to evaluate more completely patient selection, patient response, and long-term outcome.