[Acupuncture analgesia and the direction, angle and depth of needle insertion]

Literatures on acupuncture analgesia of the recent 30 years are analyzed through the target pain syndromes, points and tools selected for needling as well as the chosen direction, angle and depth of insertion. The relationship between effect of acupuncture analgesia and needling direction, angle as well as depth is initially optimized to enhance the analgesic effect. The result shows that the 3 factors are the key influences. However, studies on the above mentioned relation are still far from enough. Aiming at enhancing the effect of acupuncture analgesia and exploring the relative mechanism, it is held that multivariate analysis should be adopted to do systematic analysis on relationship between effect and mechanism of acupuncture analgesia and direction, angle and depth of the needle insertion.